Rachel Siewert (WA, Australian Greens) Share this | Hansard source

I rise today to encourage the Senate to support the bill that I've introduced, the Social Security Amendment (COVID-19 Supplement) Bill 2020. This bill introduces some very important changes that would give people on income support payments certainty and hope over the period to Christmas, as well as during the Christmas period and into the new year.

The bill retains the coronavirus supplement at the rate of $550 a fortnight for recipients of the JobSeeker payment, partner payment, widow allowance, youth allowance, Austudy, Abstudy, living allowance, parenting payment, farm household allowance, and special benefit. Importantly, it also extends eligibility for the supplement to people on the disability support pension, carer payment and for age pensioners who are receiving rent assistance. This is to deal with the fact that these groups of people and these payments were omitted from the coronavirus supplement from the beginning. As I have articulated in this place on numerous occasions, people living on the disability support pension or carer payment and age pensioners who receive rent assistance have been struggling to meet the costs of surviving under coronavirus and have had extra costs for food, medication and care. The $550 would be backdated to 25 September and be paid until 28 March 2021 to align the end date with the JobKeeper payments. This should have happened from the get-go. There is no reason to expect that people on the JobSeeker payment were doing it easier than those on the JobKeeper payment. It is appropriate that they be given certainty through to 28 March 2021, the same as those on the JobKeeper payment.

I've introduced this private senator's bill because the government is unwilling to provide people with the certainty they deserve about the future rate of income support payments. At Senate estimates the Minister for Families and Social Services indicated that some form of elevated support is very likely to be in place post 1 January, but we are still in the dark about very important details. How much will payments be increased by? When will people on income support payments find out? Will they find out before Christmas, for example? When will there be a permanent increase? There is less than seven weeks until Christmas, yet people on the JobSeeker payment and youth allowance are being left in the dark about whether their incomes will include the current supplement payment of $250 a fortnight or will drop back to $40 a day or $41 or $42 a day. They have no idea. People should have certainty in these very uncertain times. There are a whole lot of things that we can't be certain about, but you can give people certainty about the payments that they're going to try and live on in the run up to Christmas and New Year and then on to March.

If the government does increase the payment—it was indicated during estimates that it wouldn't be a permanent increase to the JobSeeker but a continuation of the supplement—the legislation for it will have to go through this place. At the time of estimates it wasn't even being drafted, so, yet again, we in this place will be provided with legislation to vote on with very little notice. And we will have to vote on it during the last sitting of the year because we need to ensure that people have payments of more than $40 a day beyond the end of December.

This bill is absolutely necessary. This year has been an incredibly difficult year for the millions of Australians who have found themselves unemployed for the first time and for those who were unemployed before the virus and the recession hit and were trying to struggle on $40 a day. This is reflected in Foodbank's latest Hunger Report, which is a survey of their clients. The survey found from what a percentage of respondents said, and the data shows, that the percentage of Australians experiencing food insecurity doubled from 15 per cent in 2019 to 31 per cent in 2020. Those figures are for Foodbank's clients. That is a significant increase.

The pandemic has made life even more difficult for already vulnerable Australians who were struggling with unemployment before that, and, in fact, for those who are struggling with unemployment for the first time. There are many people now who are interacting with Centrelink for the first time in their lives. The government is predicting that the number of people receiving unemployment payments will go up to 1.8 million in 2021. Clearly, this is not the time to be reducing or withdrawing support for these millions of Australians. As the number of people on JobSeeker and youth allowance increases and the government's support decreases, more people risk being thrown into poverty.

When the coronavirus supplement was originally paid at the rate of $550 a fortnight, people described it as 'life changing' and 'transformational'. People were able to afford essentials for the first time, things that many of us take for granted and things that, in fact, people who weren't on JobSeeker previously did take for granted—for example, prescription glasses, a fridge or other white goods, warm jumpers, and school supplies for their children. One of the biggest outcomes of the coronavirus supplement was that it reduced people's financial stress and anxiety in the middle of the recession, when work was scarce. And it is still scarce. People were able to escape homelessness and family violence situations. Many people had better opportunities to look for work because they could afford public transport or afford to get their car fixed, or go to the dentist—all things that are barriers to work. It is well proven that poverty, in and of itself, is a barrier to work. There is no doubt that JobSeeker increased people's health and wellbeing by enabling people on the payment to afford healthy food and medication, both for themselves and for their children. I've articulated before the evidence we received at the inquiry into Newstart, where people were going without their own medication to ensure that their children had theirs.

Australians need the coronavirus supplement to continue at the full rate so they can keep paying their rent or mortgage, put food on the table and look after their health and their family's health. Apart from these excellent reasons, retaining the rate of $550 a fortnight would also generate the economic stimulus we so desperately need, by increasing the incomes of over 2.3 million Australians. When you're on a low income, you spend all your money. That is, in fact, what people on the coronavirus supplement were doing.

I think I should bust some of the myths that are constantly being repeated about unemployment benefits. Recently the government started dusting off their old narrative around a higher income-support payment acting as a disincentive to work. The same old tropes are coming out yet again. I'm yet to see any hard data or evidence supporting this argument. At Senate estimates, I asked the Minister for Families and Social Services if she had any hard data or actual proof of these claims. The minister said:

There is not a specific statistical body of evidence in relation to this specific issue.

She did, I will acknowledge, take it on notice to provide the committee with further information. Of course, that was just a week or two ago, and I haven't seen that evidence as yet. Instead of using data and evidence to inform decisions that will impact millions of Australians, the government is relying on anecdotal evidence in the form of, for example, emails from businesses. The government doesn't have evidence to back up these claims. In contrast, there is evidence to show that inadequate income support payments don't increase labour force participation and can act, and do act, as a barrier to finding work.

By reducing the JobSeeker payment back to below the poverty line, people are being pushed into poverty instead of being supported into work. We know that the main driver of unemployment doesn't have anything to do with people's unwillingness to work; it has everything to do with a lack of available jobs.

This crisis isn't over. Our economy is certainly not out of the woods yet. People are still unemployed or in precarious work. The number of hours worked is not significantly increasing, so we are still seeing a lot of unemployment. People are still likely to lose their homes because they can't afford the rent. If you're living in Perth in my home state of Western Australia at the moment, there is no affordable accommodation. So people in the coming months unable to afford the rent can't simply move to a cheaper, more affordable rental, because they are not there. They will be moving out to homelessness.

The government aren't interested in looking at new ways of doing things. This pandemic had two ways of going. The government could have chosen to take a new path. They acknowledged that unemployment benefits, JobSeeker, was too low. They could have chosen to not demonise people who are unemployed, but they're returning to their old ways. We can see that by the quick return of mutual obligations and debt recovery, with debt recovery processes restarting on 7 December, with debts to be recovered by February. Mutual obligations have started, and around 75,000 people have already been suspended from payments. I will acknowledge that the government know that's wrong because, come December, people are going to get 48 hours warning. So the government know it's wrong, yet they have gone ahead and reintroduced the old punitive system that has so far imposed penalties such that 75,000 people have had their payments suspended.

The government are missing an opportunity coming out of the recession and the pandemic and that is to embrace a longer term vision and to put in place systemic changes to our social security system so people are supported—not demonised and not punished—to find work and improve their wellbeing and lives. The pandemic has demonstrated that Australians want government to play a key role in providing a strong and fair social security system—yet people receiving the coronavirus supplement have been left in the dark about the future rate of income support payments. The government are keeping people in the dark in the run-up to Christmas, when so many Australians are looking forward to Christmas this year. They don't know whether they're going to be able to put food on the table for Christmas. It is unfair. The ongoing uncertainty around the payment rates is cruel and it's damaging people's mental health and wellbeing. Australians have a right to certainty and clarity about the future of income support payments in this country, especially into the lead-up to Christmas and the new year. You can guarantee that, unless people know what those payments are going to be and that those payments are adequate, they will not be spending in the run-up to Christmas.

I urge the opposition and the government to get behind this bill so that we can provide Australians with a liveable income above the poverty line through the early months of 2021. Increase the supplement and keep it going until March 2021 and, in that time, make sure that you are putting in place a permanent increase to the JobSeeker payment. People cannot live on $40 a day. It is not possible. That was amply demonstrated prior to the pandemic, and the government knows that itself because it put in place the coronavirus supplement. Dropping people back onto payments below the poverty line is not fair and it's counterproductive. It's not fair on people and it's counterproductive for our economy. Please support this bill.