Concetta Fierravanti-Wells (NSW, Liberal Party, Minister for International Development and the Pacific) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I move:

That this bill be now read a second time.

I seek leave to have the second reading speech incorporated in Hansard.

Leave granted.

The speech read as follows—

This bill provides the underpinning legislative authority to enable the expansion of the cashless debit card into new regions.

The government is committed to addressing the serious harm which is caused by alcohol, gambling and drug abuse paid for by welfare payments.

I thank the Joint Parliamentary Committee for Human Rights and the Senate Standing Committee for the Scrutiny of Bills for their comments in relation to this bill. In light of the Scrutiny of Bills Committee's recommendation that the explanatory material be updated, the government will table an addendum to the explanatory memorandum.

The addendum provides further background around the use of delegated legislation to support the operation of the cashless debit card and includes the results from the final evaluation of the cashless debit card trial.

I also thank the Senate Community Affairs Legislation Committee for its report on the bill and its recommendation that the bill be passed.

I note the dissenting reports from the Australian Labor Party and the Australian Greens which recommended that the Senate not pass the bill. However, the government considers that amendments introduced by this bill are essential to sustaining positive impacts in the existing cashless debit card communities and expanding these results to new regions.

Welfare payments are provided to people in need to help with essential living costs, in particular food, clothing, shelter, and transportation. The community expectation is these payments will not be spent on harmful goods such as alcohol, gambling and drugs.

Alcohol is a contributing factor to an estimated 65 per cent of all domestic violence incidents and 47 per cent of child abuse cases in some jurisdictions. Alcohol related harm and illicit drug use costs the Australian economy over $22 billion each year.

The cashless debit card aims to reduce the devastating effects of alcohol, drug and gambling abuse. The card operates like an ordinary debit card, with the primary difference being that it does not work at liquor stores or gambling houses and cash cannot be withdrawn from it. Consequently, illicit products cannot be purchased with it.

The card has been in operation for almost two years in Ceduna, South Australia and Kununurra and Wyndham in the East Kimberley, Western Australia. In each of these communities, 80 per cent of an individual's welfare payments are placed into a separate account which is only accessible using their cashless debit card. The remaining 20 per cent is placed into their ordinary savings account.

Consultations with community leaders led to independent community panels being implemented, as a tool to encourage people to uphold social norms. The panels were established as a mechanism that allows individuals to apply to have access to a higher portion of unrestricted funds.

The community-wide impacts of the use of harmful goods mean that the CDC program is most effective when most people in a community who receive a welfare payment participate in the program. Where CDC participation would not be appropriate, it is not applied. For instance, people do not participate in the program if they have payment nominees, they are a student outside trial areas, they receive the age pension or a veteran's payment, or CDC participation would seriously risk their mental, physical or emotional wellbeing.

To complement the roll out of the cashless debit card, the government committed an additional $1 million in Ceduna and $1.6 million in the East Kimberley in new funding for support services in the first 12 months to ensure vulnerable people were supported. The government has since committed to match the first-year funding envelope for additional support services in a second-year package.

Support packages were designed in consultation with communities and aim to complement and enhance existing services and provide a comprehensive response to address addiction, help people reduce their dependence on alcohol or drugs and have better financial management practices.

The results of the trials are encouraging. There is less public drunkenness, less gambling, fewer alcohol related hospital admissions, and people are engaging with the support services and working to improve their lives.

While the card is not a 'silver bullet' to overcome all community issues, it has led to improvements in the lives of individuals, families and children in the two communities of Ceduna and the East Kimberley.

Since this bill was introduced, the government released the independent final cashless debit card trial evaluation report that assessed the impact of the introduction of the cashless debit card in Ceduna and East Kimberley.

I am pleased to report the independent evaluation found that the cashless debit card has been effective in reducing alcohol consumption and gambling in both trial sites and is also suggestive of a reduction in the use of illegal drugs.

Across the two trial sites, 41 per cent of participants surveyed who drank before the trial started reported they drank less frequently.

Additionally, 37 per cent of participants who reported engaging in binge drinking before the trial, said they were doing this less frequently.

In the East Kimberley specifically, of participants reporting that they drank alcohol before the trial commenced, 43 per cent reported drinking less at wave 2.

Across the two sites, 48 per cent of people reported gambling less often. From April 2016 to March 2017, poker machine revenue in the Ceduna area was 12 per cent lower than in the same 12-month period before the trial started in March 2016.

This is the equivalent of almost $550,000 less spent on poker machines in the 12-month trial.

The government is heartened by the initial positive findings. The extension of the card in these communities will focus on sustaining these positive outcomes in the longer term.

Building on these research findings, the government has announced two new expansion sites, the Goldfields region in Western Australia and the Bundaberg and Hervey Bay Region in Queensland in September 2017. Expansion to these communities will help test the card and the technology that supports it in more diverse communities and settings.

Roll out into these communities will also include $1 million in funding for wrap-around support services in each site to complement the operation of the cashless debit card and ensure vulnerable people are adequately supported.

The evaluation also found that there are areas that we can improve on—and as we roll out the CDC in the Goldfields and Bundaberg and Hervey bay region we will take these learnings into account.

The bill itself amends the existing legislation to enable the cashless debit card to operate in further locations. It removes section 124PF of the Social Security (Administration) Act 1999, which limits the number of locations, participants and end date of the cashless debit card trial.

Removing this section will support the extension of arrangements in current sites, and enable the expansion of the cashless debit card.

Under the legislation, the locations, cohorts covered and timing of the operation of the cashless debit card will still be determined by a disallowable instrument. These instruments can also specify other parameters, including sunset dates and participant criteria.

What this means is that the government can work with individual communities to co-design the particular parameters, and tailor the program to suit that particular community's needs. It also ensures that the parliament itself retains the right to consider each proposed new cashless debit card site on a case-by-case basis.

It is important to point out that the cashless debit card will only be implemented in communities that support it. Support for the CDC is measured through extensive consultation with interested communities. So far consultation has covered all relevant stakeholder groups, including potential program participants.

Consultation is conducted on an ongoing basis in both Ceduna and East Kimberley, and extensive consultation was undertaken prior to announcing the expansion sites. Consultation is ongoing in both expansion sites in preparation for implementation.

The cashless debit card is a world first in how it operates. The trials have been completed, an evaluation has been conducted, and it has been shown to work and now there is an opportunity to expand the cashless debit card to new locations. This bill will allow this to occur.

Doug Cameron (NSW, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Minister for Human Services) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

The matter of the cashless debit card is a complex one. Labor has consulted many communities and many stakeholders from around the country. We have received a wide diversity of opinions from both communities and individuals within those communities. We've heard from some communities and individuals who strongly oppose the cashless debit card and we've also heard from some communities and some individuals who support it. Labor understands that there are areas where there is a community that wishes to try something new to address drug and alcohol abuse, disadvantage and social dysfunction, but we also understand that not all communities want this.

Labor supports genuine community-driven initiatives to tackle drug and alcohol abuse. To be very clear, Labor does not support a national rollout of the cashless debit card. We know that the vast majority of income support recipients are more than capable of managing their own finances. Labor has consistently said that we will talk to individual communities and make decisions on a location-by-location basis. They are the principles that have guided Labor in determining our position on this issue.

The government announced in the 2017 budget that it will it establish trials of cashless debit cards in two further locations from 1 September 2017. This bill enables this by repealing one section of the Social Security (Administration) Act. The section repealed by this bill—section 124PF—contains the existing limitations on the cashless debit card trial, which require that: the trial ends on 30 June 2018; the limitation for trials to occur in up to three discreet trial areas; and that the trial areas include no more than 10,000 participants in total. These limitations mean that currently only one further trial site could be established and that all trials would need to end by 30 June 2018. The bill provides the frameworks for additional trials to be implemented but does not enable any specific trials. Specific trial sites need to be established by a legislative instrument.

Last year the government announced that it wants to establish trials in the Goldfields in Western Australia and Bundaberg-Hervey Bay in Queensland. Labor referred this bill to a Senate inquiry to allow for proper scrutiny of the changes and to allow for further consultation with the communities in existing and newly announced trial sites. From continued consultation with communities in the Bundaberg and Goldfields regions and the evidence presented to the Senate inquiry, it has become clear that there has been insufficient consultation with these communities and that there is no clear framework to establish whether they consent to trials being established in their areas. Labor believes that there is insufficient evidence at this stage to justify an expansion of the cashless debit cards to further sites.

The Senate inquiry heard that the ORIMA evaluations of the trial are unreliable and that no empirical judgements can be made on the basis of the information collected. Janet Hunt, Deputy Director of the Centre for Aboriginal Economic Policy Research at the Australian National University, said:

… the evaluation showed that the government's cashless card trials had not actually improved safety and violence despite that being one of the trial's objectives.

Hunt's research paper on the evaluation is critical of the methodology used in the ORIMA evaluation. She points out:

People interviewed for the evaluation reported that they drank less than before the trial began. However, such recall over a year is not likely to be very reliable.

Hunt also makes the valid point that given that people had to give their identification to the interviewer, they may have said exactly what they thought the interviewer wanted to hear and certainly would not have incriminated themselves. This is particularly true of the Aboriginal population, who, for historical reasons, are likely to view authority figures with suspicion.

The previous Minister for Human Services, Alan Tudge, described the cashless debit card trials as 'a huge success', and the Prime Minister himself has said the card has led to:

… a massive reduction in alcohol abuse, in drug abuse, in domestic violence, in violence generally.

But Janet Hunt made clear that this wasn't the case, stating clearly:

Someone needs to tell them that the report does not say that.

The ORIMA report shows that, when participants were asked about the impact of the trial on their children's lives, only 17 per cent reported feeling their lives were better as a result. In fact, a bigger group of parents, around 24 per cent, felt their children's lives were actually worse.

So Labor does not believe that the government can justify the further rollout of this card on what is clearly a flawed evaluation. In addition to the poor quality of the evaluation, we believe that more time is needed before you could draw solid conclusions about the success of the existing trials in Ceduna and the East Kimberley. The evaluation and our own consultations with the communities have showed mixed results, with some groups in Ceduna and the East Kimberley maintaining support for the trials while others are critical of their impacts.

Labor's Jenny Macklin and Linda Burney visited the East Kimberley in April last year to conduct three days of consultations with locals and, in September last year, Jenny Macklin also spent a number of days talking with people on the ground in Ceduna and the surrounding communities. As I said, the feedback we received was mixed. Some people were supportive of the card. They said that the situation was so dire that they were willing to try anything they thought might make a difference. Many of these people supported the cashless card not out of hope but out of despair. Other people made clear that they thought the cashless card was disempowering and that it didn't address the underlying cause of disadvantage and social dysfunction.

St John Ambulance in Kununurra said that the call-outs for alcohol related violence had gone down since the card was introduced; however, at the women's refuge in Kununurra they did not have a positive view of the card. They told Ms Burney and Ms Macklin that life had gotten harder with the card, that there was more violence and more crime as cash became scarce. Other people indicated that if people really wanted to abuse alcohol or drugs they could find a way around the cashless card, typically through the sly-grog trade. Others expressed serious concern that there was no pathway for people to get off the cashless card even if they demonstrated that they could manage their money wisely.

In Ceduna, the local mayor, Allan Suter, is a strong supporter of the card, as is Corey McLennan from the Koonibba Aboriginal corporation. However, Ceduna Koonibba Aboriginal Health Service Aboriginal Corporation is opposed to the cashless card. Others expressed disappointment that the cashless card hadn't helped local Aboriginal people get into work. So the feedback on the ground in these communities was mixed.

The government is now proposing to roll out the cashless debit card in the Goldfields region of Western Australia, which includes Kalgoorlie-Boulder, Laverton, Leonora and Coolgardie. It has become clear to Labor that there was insufficient consultation with the communities in the Goldfields region of Western Australia. Witnesses at the Kalgoorlie Senate hearing, in particular, expressed serious dissatisfaction with the consultation process that was undertaken prior to the announcement of the Goldfields trial site, describing it as very lacklustre. The participants in the process often felt disempowered by the discussions. A local councillor, Linden Brownley, said:

I was involved in the initial discussion. However, I felt as though my presence at that meeting was irrelevant due to the fact that I work full time and run my own business. My comment was to actually engage the people of our community, not just Aboriginal but our community as a whole, to inform them of their intentions and what the cashless card is all about.

The other site where the government wants to roll out the cashless debit card is Bundaberg and Hervey Bay and would also include Howard and Childers. Unlike the other three sites, the government is proposing that this rollout of the card will be targeted at the specific age cohort of people aged 35 years and under who receive Newstart, youth allowance, parenting payment or parenting payment partnered.

It does not include disability support pensioners.

Under the government's proposal about 6,700 people in total would receive the card in Bundaberg and Hervey Bay. We don't think there is sufficient community support for the rollout of the card in this area. Fraser Coast Deputy Mayor George Seymour has indicated that he does not support the rollout of the card in Bundaberg and Hervey Bay. He indicated that what people need is jobs, not policies that humiliate and divide people in the community. In their submission to the Senate inquiry, the Say No to the Cashless Welfare Card Australia Hinkler group stated:

The human aspect of what will happen to people when they have their individual choices removed, their self control over their lives and how they manage their incomes and their bills. Rather than building a cohesive inclusive society, this card will being using exclusion …

Key groups from the Bundaberg region also felt ignored by the government's consultation process. Representatives from the Gidarjil Development Corporation explained:

Gidarjil is probably considered the largest Indigenous organisation in Bundaberg, and there hasn't been any approach from the federal minister in regard to this or in fact anything.

What an indictment of this government.

The cost of the rollout of the cashless debit card is also an important consideration in this debate. Given the significant cost of the trials—an accrued cost of around $25.5 million, or around $12,000 per participant—we must be sure that the cashless card can deliver its stated objectives. The government gave around $1.6 million to ORIMA Research to provide a frankly substandard evaluation. It is quite extraordinary that we are debating this bill today without any indication from the government about how much it will cost taxpayers to roll out the card at the two new proposed sites in the Goldfields and Bundaberg-Hervey Bay. There has been no indication about how much this will cost taxpayers. It really is quite extraordinary. The minister still won't reveal how much it will cost taxpayers to expand the rollout of the card to the Goldfields and Bundaberg-Hervey Bay. It's just not good enough.

Labor believes that there still exists sufficient community support for a continuation of the trials in Ceduna and the East Kimberley. We supported the original trials at these locations in 2015; we therefore support the continuation of the trial in Ceduna and the East Kimberley. As it currently stands, the legislated end date for the trials is 30 June 2018. Labor will move to amend the bill to extend the end date for trials to 30 June 2019 so that a proper evaluation can take place. Labor knows that entrenched social issues cannot and will not be solved by income management alone. That's why we continue to insist that the government provide additional community supports for participating communities. We are calling on the government to support our amendment that these critical wraparound services be specified to make clear what was agreed as part of the trials and to ensure that these services are delivered. We also want to make sure that existing trial participants understand the rules around how they can have their proportion of income support payments on the card altered or can exit the trial. Labor will move amendments to ensure these rules are specified.

Labor will also move an amendment to ensure that no new trial sites can be introduced, by changing the allowance of three discrete trial sites to the existing two. In the future, Labor will only consider the introduction of a new trial site if the government can show that they have an agreed formal consultation process with the community as well as an agreed definition of consent and where there is sufficient evidence on a proposed model to warrant expansion.

I want to sum up by saying this: I believe that the government proposes the cashless debit card not because it genuinely is interested in improving the lives of our most vulnerable citizens, but because it seeks to spread a narrative that many people who rely on our social security system can't be trusted—that our most vulnerable Australians cannot be trusted with their own spending needs. It's the old conservative narrative about the undeserving poor.

I urge the government and the members of the crossbench, in particular, to give serious consideration to the amendments that Labor proposes for this bill. We aren't saying that there doesn't need to be government action in a very meaningful way in many of these communities. We are not for a moment saying there aren't chronic social problems in these communities. But we believe there should be genuine community-driven initiatives to tackle chronic alcohol abuse. We know that employment is important to changing the life choices and chances for many people who are currently welfare dependent. But the notion that a cashless debit card is some sort of silver bullet that is going to fix all these social ills is completely false. Labor has thought about this issue very deeply. We have consulted and discussed on this issue widely. It's not a position that we have come to quickly. I believe we have come to a position that is reasoned and balanced.

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

I rise today to speak on the Social Services Legislation Amendment (Cashless Debit Card) Bill 2017. The Australian Greens oppose this bill, which will remove the current limitations for the scheme of three trial sites and 10,000 participants as well as allow the scheme to continue past 30 June 2018. It does this by removing section 124PF of the Social Security (Administration) Act 1999. The Greens have opposed the cashless welfare card from the start, the same as we have opposed income management now for 10½ years. I can guarantee this place that we will continue to oppose income management. We will continue to campaign on this until income management is not used as a policy mechanism in this country. While I very strongly welcome the ALP's opposition to elements of this particular bill and I also welcome the NXT's opposition to this bill, I do have deep concerns that you think it's okay to allow the cashless welfare card to continue in the existing trial sites. In the separate debate that will happen this afternoon, I urge you to support my disallowance to end this farce of a policy.

If this bill passes, all that will be required for a future trial site to be established—and 'trial' is a misnomer—is the drafting and registering of a legislative instrument. There will be no need for it to be debated by the parliament prior to enactment. The government will be able to roll out the cashless debit card—I frequently call it the welfare card, so I'll use that too—far and wide, and this bill enables them to do it if they want to. This is particularly the case given the bill before us does not contain safeguards on how long trials can run for, how many participants they can include or any requirement to consult with the communities of future trial sites. There is also no way in which people can transition off the card now or in the future. The Greens have opposed this cashless welfare card since its inception. It's a continuation of compulsory income management, no matter how the government wants to disguise it and play with words.

We submitted a dissenting report to the Social Security Legislation Amendment (Debit Card Trial) Bill 2015 expressing deep concerns regarding compulsory income management and recommending that that bill not be passed. The evaluations of the two existing trial sites, in the East Kimberley and Ceduna, have reinforced these concerns. The ORIMA reports, both the interim and final, are not reliable sources of evidence. These so-called independent evaluations have been widely criticised by numerous social scientists and academics for not adhering to academic standards, having major flaws in methodology and the way in which it was reported and relying on piecemeal and anecdotal evidence.

There are submissions and evidence to the bill's inquiry from social scientists and academics who outline the major flaws with the evaluation methodology and reporting, noting myriad concerns with the data presented and researched. The key concerns with regard to the way the research was conducted were the unreliability of self-reporting on behaviours, social desirability and recall bias problems, not to mention the fact that people were paid to be involved. The East Kimberley and Ceduna data weighting finding was not proportionate to the populations of income support recipients in the trial areas, meaning improvements were overstated at the very best. There was a lack of adequate baseline data on alcohol, drug use and gambling in trial areas prior to trial commencement to compare to so-called improvements. There was a lack of differentiation between large numbers of people who reported not drinking at all. The evaluation reports did not make clear that additional services were provided to help people deal with the addictive behaviours or when those were up and running, but it seems that what there were came late in the trial period and, as I said, there was payment for involvement in the assessment process.

Dr Elise Klein, who has just completed a 13-month research project on the cashless debit card in the East Kimberley, expressed to the inquiry deep concern with regard to the reports which are being used to justify these trials as a success. To the inquiry she said:

My concern as a researcher is how that has been allowed to be evidence and used as a proof of concept.

…   …   …

All these other important issues around community disempowerment, around violence, around at what cost—it reports all these positive things that happen, but completely underplays the really large numbers of people reporting issues and hardships with the card too. It gives a very distorted idea of what the card is or is not doing. I do believe there needs to be a review of how that has been allowed into the public sphere and to be labelled by politicians as proof of concept. As a researcher and as an academic, I think it's a real problem the way that evidence has been used in this process to continue pushing the trial forward when there are some severe issues around what that research did or did not do.

In her very recent working paper with the former principal solicitor for the Kimberley Community Legal Services, 'The cashless debit card trial in the East Kimberley', the result of 13 months of research, the abstract says:

We find not only that the trial was chaotic, but that its logic is deeply flawed, and disconnected from the relational poverty experienced by people receiving state benefits. We also find that the card has become a symbol of government control and regulation in the study site.

Compulsory income management is a failed measure. It's been proven to be an ineffective policy that disempowers and harms those that need help the most. One of the most extensive evaluations of income management is Evaluation of new income management in the Northern Territory, commissioned by the Department of Social Services. The report was issued by experts from the Social Policy Research Centre at the University of New South Wales, the Australian National University and the Australian Institute of Family Studies over several years. One of the key findings of the final report was:

The evaluation could not find any substantive evidence of the program having significant changes relative to its key policy objectives, including changing people's behaviours … The evaluation data does not provide evidence of income management having improved the outcomes that it was intending to have an impact upon. Indeed, rather than promoting independence and the building of skills and capabilities, New Income Management in the Northern Territory appears to have encouraged increasing dependence upon the welfare system, and the tools which were envisaged as providing them with the skills to manage have rather become instruments which relieve them of the burden of management.

It failed, and here is the government trying to increase the expansion of income management when the tool does not work.

Compulsory income management impacts negatively on individuals and the community and imposes significant costs on government. Evidence provided through submissions and at the hearing of the inquiry on this bill show the fundamental and deep flaws in this approach. In its submission to the inquiry the Australian Council of Social Service said:

CDC costs approximately $10,000 per person covered by the trial over a 12-month period. The actual cost of the program over the forward estimates is unknown as this information is commercial-in-confidence.

To put this expenditure into perspective, the individual cost of CDC is almost as much as the single rate of Newstart Allowance, which is $14,000 per annum.

How farcical! How farcical that the government is subjecting people to this card and it costs almost as much as their Newstart allowance in the first place, which is inadequate and which we know is below the poverty line.

Legitimate questions have been raised about the opportunity cost of the CDC, particularly when the trial sites have serious problems such as poverty, lack of employment opportunities, unaffordable housing and poor access to health services. The expenditure on the CDC might have far greater impact if it were directed to services and programs developed and led by the communities.

There are also clear flaws in how the government consulted with communities before, during and after they imposed this card. The inquiry into this bill, as well as the inquiry into the Social Security Legislation Amendment (Debit Card Trial) Bill 2015, highlighted significant gaps in the consultation process. It is also clear that the government have focused their consultation on some Aboriginal peak organisations and some individual members of Aboriginal communities but have not consulted broadly with community members, particularly those who are actually on income support and who will be directly affected by this legislation. This shows a fundamental lack of respect for people receiving income support.

Nor have the government consulted on this current bill. The Law Council of Australia told the inquiry that where consultation is also undertaken with local government and those responsible for law enforcement, that is inadequate. The Australian Human Rights Commission was of the view that it is not free, prior and informed consent if people affected are not consulted. Ms Hatfield, from Catholic Social Services, who spent time in both Ceduna and the East Kimberley, told the inquiry:

Many of the people that I spoke to felt that the government had consulted with a number of key leaders but hadn't consulted more broadly with the community, and that those key leaders didn't represent them and couldn't speak for them. So they felt this card had been imposed on them. It was suggested that if the consultation had been more inclusive and took into account people that were directly affected by the changes, it could have been done better and there would have been more a sense that the card was not imposed on people. Most of the people that I spoke to said that the card had just made their lives more difficult, and they were very frustrated that they didn't have an opportunity to be involved in the consultation beforehand.

The community consultation process across both trial sites and the intended trial sites has been opaque, fractured and secretive and is not a reliable indicator of community sentiment.

We are still concerned about the operation of the cashless debit card and its impact on participants. In fact, during the Senate inquiry, when I asked the Mayor of Ceduna if, after the trial had started, they had gone back to ask participants what they thought about it, I was told no, they hadn't—in fact, we had some cross words with each other about it.

During the bill's inquiry there have been many issues raised by people on the card, service providers in the community and business owners. Many people in the current trial sites face barriers in using the card to purchase necessities and to pay their bills. The following is a list of some of the scenarios raised during the inquiry that people subjected to the card have experienced: they are unable to buy second-hand goods; the card doesn't work at the supermarket, chemist or post office—and I have subsequently heard there are so many times when the card gets rejected, and that's from speaking directly to people who have to live on the white card—there are no joint accounts; there are difficulties for people with disability, carers and couples; and there are no direct debits.

Something that is very interesting on the card is that you can't use the card for BPAY—in other words, you can't use it to control your own finances. You have to use it as a credit card. You have to supply your credit card number. That means the people wanting to take your money are the people that are in charge of your bank account—in other words, it lessens your ability to manage your funds. There's no privacy and there is the feeling of being stigmatised, resulting in poor mental health outcomes.

I've heard directly from participants who, where their card hadn't worked, were asked to stand aside in a supermarket because the person running the till had to serve other customers, which, again, is stigmatising them. You might as well put a card on their head that says: 'I'm on the Indue card; I'm on the white card'. This flies in the face of what one of the architects of this whole debacle, Mr Forrest, said, when he said in the previous inquiry, 'There'll be no difference with this card; it will be just like any other credit card or bank card.' Well, I'm sorry; I said at the time that that wasn't true, and it simply is not true. Everybody in these communities knows what the white card is and who's on it as soon as you pull it out.

People on the card have also experienced restrictions from many dining venues and been unable to purchase from mixed merchants. This is particularly so, for example, if you go out to a restaurant. Again, I heard direct evidence from participants of their not being able to use their card when they go out for dinner—if the place doesn't have separate EFTPOS facilities, which many don't—and that they have not been able to pay their bill and have had to borrow funds. It's simply outrageous. They also experience isolation from their communities because they can't participate in activities where cash is required or at venues where alcohol is served. Landlords in some communities only accept cash as payment for rent. There are difficulties for individuals to visit country without access to cash. The card is making money management harder. If you have one of the early cards that doesn't have EFTPOS written on it, you can't use EFTPOS; if you have a later card with EFTPOS on it, you can. Have the government reissued the card so that everybody can have a card with EFTPOS? No, they haven't. They haven't even told those people that they can get one with EFTPOS on it, which is, again, making life hard for people.

During the inquiry the committee also heard evidence of how people are circumventing the system to get the cash they need—and I've talked about that before. There's also increased 'humbugging'. There were many reports from stakeholders that people have left communities to try and get away from the card. A number of us heard about the outrageous situation where women were reported to be selling their bodies for sex in order to get cash; reports of significant increase in family violence because of the increase in poverty and pressure on the household; deliberate overcharging for services in order to get cash back; people gambling to be able to afford alcohol sold on the black market; paying for other people's shopping with the card and receiving cash in exchange. Again, I've heard that directly from people who have been doing that.

We are also deeply concerned that this bill limits human rights, as outlined in many submissions to the inquiry. The circumstances and trial sites are not so extreme or exceptional as to warrant an approach that infringes on the human rights of income support recipients. In the Australian Human Rights Commission's submission to the inquiry, the Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Social Justice Commissioner said:

The Commission considers that the measures are not proportionate to the benefits sought by the Bill because their purpose could be achieved through other, less restrictive means …

…   …   …

… the Commission does not agree with the assessment that the Bill or existing cashless debit card measures are compatible with human rights standards.

The parliament's own Parliamentary Joint Committee on Human Rights, in Human rights scrutiny report: report 9 of 2017, made some comments about it as well:

In assessing whether a measure is proportionate, relevant factors to consider include whether the measure provides sufficient flexibility to treat different cases differently or whether it imposes a blanket policy without regard to the circumstances of individual cases.

As the cashless debit card trial applies to anyone residing in locations where the trial operates who is receiving a social security payment specified under the scheme, there are serious doubts as to whether the measures are the least rights restrictive way to achieve the stated objectives.

…   …   …

The compulsory nature of the cashless debit card trial also raises questions as to the proportionality of the measures.

A number of submissions to the inquiry noted the trial sites' disproportionate impact on Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander communities, and, in the Human Rights Commission's submission, the social justice commissioner noted:

As at September 2016, 75% of trial participants in Ceduna and 82% of trial participants in the East Kimberley were Indigenous.

The Kimberley Land Council told the inquiry:

While we acknowledge the widespread negative impacts of alcohol and drugs in the Australian community, it is evident that it is Aboriginal people and communities who are most often penalised by punitive, experimental and top-down policies regarding an issue that impacts the whole of society.

The government has taken what the KLC would characterise as a ‘sledgehammer’ approach, which does little to address the root cause of the issues faced by Aboriginal people, particularly those in the East Kimberley.

The KLC is further concerned that for those people who need assistance to overcome alcohol and drug dependence, the CDC has very little proven ability to improve lives or create meaningful change.

That came through even in the flawed ORIMA evaluation.

The Australian Greens oppose compulsory income management. It is not the way to address these fundamental issues. It undermines people's ability to manage their money, it underlies Aboriginal disadvantage and it furthers Aboriginal disadvantage. The approach the government is taking to address Aboriginal disadvantage and issues around addiction is flawed. We need a health-based approach to the addiction matters that the government claims this card is there to address. This is a flawed policy. Compulsory income management is a flawed policy. I urge this chamber to vote no on this legislation.

Slade Brockman (WA, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I rise to speak on the Social Services Legislation Amendment (Cashless Debit Card) Bill 2017. I'm going to begin today with Kalgoorlie, one of the proposed trial sites in my home state of Western Australia, and talk a little bit about the reason Kalgoorlie was selected and the origins of Kalgoorlie and the Goldfields coming up as a place where the cashless debit card may be something that the community would like. I am going to quote my good friend the member for O'Connor, Rick Wilson, in his speech on this bill in the House of Representatives. I think it gives a real insight into where it came from. The member for O'Connor said:

Today, I stand here to give voice to my community and the leaders who have so bravely stood up and fought for the introduction of this card. They are people like Leonora Indigenous leader Nana Gaye Harris, who started the ball rolling—

Who started the ball rolling—

when she first sought me out in Leonora in late 2015; people like Laverton Indigenous elders Bruce Smith and Janice Scott, who moved an entire room to tears with their powerful account of children living on the streets of Laverton, abandoned by parents on the grog; and people like Coolgardie community leader Betty Logan and her niece, Amanda Bennell, who in the presence of the Prime Minister challenged naysayers to look into the eyes of a child suffering the effects of fetal alcohol syndrome and not feel compassion. I give voice to people like Leonora police officer in charge Isaac Rinaudo, who has described children as young as five years of age breaking into houses just to steal food. And I give voices to civic leaders like Laverton's Patrick Hill; Leonora's Jim Epis and Peter Craig; Jill Dwyer and Ian Tucker from the Shire of Menzies; Mal Cullen and Betty Logan from the Coolgardie shire; and Mayor John Bowler of the City of Kalgoorlie-Boulder. They are fighting for what's best for the communities …

This is a community led endeavour. The people of the Goldfields widely want to see this trial go ahead. This is not something that the member for O'Connor, Rick Wilson, or the government plucked out of the air. This was something that was originally brought to Rick Wilson's attention by an Indigenous leader as something that was worth a try. This is a trial. Yes, there are currently two trial sites underway. This is two more trial sites, one in the Goldfields and one in Queensland in Hervey Bay-Bundaberg. We must remember that this is a trial.

The idea that there has not been consultation in this community is quite frankly a nonsense. The former minister has visited Kalgoorlie on at least four occasions. The member for O'Connor, Rick Wilson, has done literally hundreds of community consultations—direct meetings, face-to-faces with individuals, community groups, Indigenous leaders, Indigenous community groups, people on disability support pensions. This has been extraordinarily widely canvassed. I know this from my direct experience in Kalgoorlie. I've been lucky enough to have been to Kalgoorlie three times in the last four months since I've been a senator, and every time I was there every single person I spoke to, be they Indigenous, from the business community or the non-Indigenous community, said, 'It's worth a try—it's worth a try to do something different to try and break the cycle of welfare dependency, drug use and alcohol abuse that exists up there.'

I want to say from the start that the trial in Kalgoorlie is not targeted at Indigenous people. The welfare recipients in the Goldfields region are about 50-50, Indigenous to non-Indigenous. Obviously, part of the thinking behind the trial site in Queensland in the Bundaberg-Hervey Bay region is that it is a largely non-Indigenous cohort of people who will be under the trial.

This is a government that wants to try something new in a space that has been for an extraordinarily long period of time a wasteland of good policy. It's very difficult to see what gains we have made in this area over the last 30 years. It is time to try something different, and those communities are crying out for a new approach, a new way of thinking. Again, this is not a nationwide rollout; this is a trial currently in two areas, looking to expand into another two areas and it's a trial that the government is committed to. It's committed to it because we're trying to reduce the social harm caused by welfare-fuelled alcohol abuse, drug abuse and problem gambling in areas where there are high levels of welfare dependency.

This bill provides the underpinning legislative authority to enable the expansion of the cashless debit card into these new regions like the Goldfields. The bill will allow the legislative authority to enable the Goldfields region to be the third and, to date, the largest site for the cashless debit card. Welfare payments are provided to people in need to help with essential living costs such as food, clothing, shelter, transportation. From this, and in the longer term, we want to see communities that are safer. We want to see people using welfare to look after themselves, look after their families and get into a position where they can actually get off welfare, which is obviously much harder if you have a gambling, drug or alcohol problem. Welfare should be a safety net for those who need it, not a means of facilitating serious damage to health and serious damage to those communities.

Alcohol is a contributing factor to an estimated 65 per cent of all domestic violence incidents and 47 per cent of child abuse cases in some areas. Alcohol related harm and illicit drug use costs the Australian economy $22 billion a year. There was an independent report into the trial site—and, obviously, that has been criticised by some parties and we have heard a significant number of those criticisms from Senator Siewert. But this evaluation and all evaluations have to be read in the context of what they are. It found that 48 per cent of drug takers were using fewer drugs—and, yes, this is self-reporting and there are problems with that, but I'm quite sure if I looked back over the Hansard transcripts, I would find people all around this chamber quoting self-reported statistics. It found that 41 per cent of drinkers were drinking less; and 48 per cent of gamblers were gambling less. Nobody thinks that this is a silver bullet, but it may be a move in the right direction and it is certainly something that is worth trying.

As I said, I've been to Kalgoorlie three times in the last few months. This issue was raised with me by a number of people off their own bat but, obviously, in my role as Chair of the Community Affairs Legislation Committee, I raised it with pretty much everyone I met. As I've said, the reaction was overwhelmingly positive. Rick Wilson, the member for O'Connor, has done extensive consultations in his community to gauge success and has been running a petition as part of that process. Over 1,200 people in the Goldfields have signed the petition in support of the cashless debit card. There is an online petition that is still collecting signatures, so that number is growing all the time.

There has been a postal survey to 18,000 Goldfields households. They are still coming back. There have been hundreds of responses—currently running at 85 per cent in favour. The idea that the Goldfields community in particular does not support this trial is not borne out by the facts.

We need to deliver hope to the people in these communities. We need a chance; we need something to break the cycle of antisocial behaviour. We've got to remember that these funds are provided by the taxpayers of Australia—welfare recipients receive their money from the taxpayers of Australia—and the taxpayers of Australia deserve to know that we are trying something to try to break the cycle of abuse, of welfare dependency, of alcohol abuse, of drug abuse, of gambling addiction and, as I said, of welfare dependency.

As Chair of the Community Affairs Legislation Committee, I did hear, and we have heard, from a number of community leaders who did stand up and voice their support for the introduction of this card. I read submissions and heard witness accounts from community members and I think that we need to recognise that we do have large numbers of people who do strongly support the trial. From the Community Affairs Committee hearing on 12 October last year, for example, the mayor of Kalgoorlie-Boulder, John Bowler, said:

Locals who live here complain to me about what's happening. They want a solution. I've been almost pulling my hair out—the little bit of hair I've got—asking: what is a solution? Then I heard about the cashless debit card, took an interest in it and thought this may be a way forward. A former friend of mine went through Ceduna last year and talked to the deputy mayor there, who was telling him how good it was and how Ceduna was so much better. So he got his number, and I rang the deputy mayor up—this was probably going back earlier this year or late last year—and spoke to the deputy mayor. He told me that court appearances had gone down by 38 per cent—you've seen the figures—hospital admissions were down by something similar, and that, generally, people in Ceduna thought life there had improved dramatically since the introduction of the trial.

He went on:

I then drove to Ceduna to experience it firsthand and make my own observations. I spoke to people. I was hoping to speak to the mayor this time—I heard him on ABC South Australian radio about the card—but he was out of town. So, once again, I spoke to the deputy mayor, I spoke to retailers in the town and townspeople and got the same picture: they were glad that it had been introduced. They said there were some complaints, but even some who initially had been opposed to the card had really come around to say that life generally was better, particularly for those living on the streets.

The mayor went on to say:

So I say this: the introduction of this card is a possible step in the right direction for not just my townspeople but these visitors and the lives they lead.

We also heard from Mr Patrick Hill, President of the Shire of Laverton. He said:

Everyone in town—the police, the hospital, the school, the Laverton Crisis Centre, the ambulance, the fire brigade, the resident group, the shire—has done everything possible to try and stem this abuse and the effects that alcohol, drugs and gambling have on our towns and the availability of cash. Council has formally adopted and supports the cashless welfare card because we see this as an opportunity to try and do something. We have had up to 50 agencies come into Laverton to try and address these social issues, and we do have our Laverton inter-agency group meetings to come up with solutions to try and stem this violence.

Again, Mr Hill went on talk about why the cashless debit card provided hope for their community, hope for their town and hope for an opportunity for those who are suffering under this cycle of welfare dependency, drug abuse and gambling abuse.

Mr Hill went on:

This will at least give us breathing space to do something and sit back and analyse where things can be done better and what we can do better as a community. We see it every single day. We have done everything we can as a community to try and solve some of these issues that we've got.

I invite any of you to come to Laverton over Christmas or when we have funerals so you can see it for yourself and understand the complex issues we have here. We know that the cashless card is not going to fix everything, but at least it will give us a chance to fix and address some of these really major issues we have in our communities, which a lot of people do not understand and don't see on a day-to-day basis as we do.

I'll just go on, again from that same hearing at the community affairs committee. Mr Taylor, who appeared before the committee in a private capacity, gave very powerful testimony.

He said:

I'm here today to, hopefully, give you some insight from a father who lost his child, a young adult—my son…My son came into contact with social services as a teenager. His life was marred by bouts of alcohol and other drug abuse, through his teenage years into his young manhood. He was 27 when he took his life. This card might have helped …

And Mrs Holman, a business owner in Kalgoorlie, revealed the desperation in the community and the hopes for the CDC—the cashless debit card. She said:

I think they are and, without a lie, every customer that has come into my shop or person I've spoken to, which is quite a lot of people in the community, are welcoming the cashless card. You've got to remember that we are desperate. The cashless card offers us a little bit of light, a little bit of hope, that things might improve. We just want something that helps and stops the alcoholism. Everyone's been celebrating—'We can't wait for it. I hope things get better.' We don't know if it's going to work. No-one does, and everyone who says it's not doesn't know either. We just want to give it a go. We want something—we need something …

This was my experience in Kalgoorlie, from Indigenous to non-Indigenous people I interacted with personally while on the ground, outside the public forum of the committee. Everyone was supportive—from taxi drivers to workers in shops to people I was chatting to in the pub. Obviously, in the committee hearings there were alternative views. In particular, I remember vividly the evidence from the Kalgoorlie Aboriginal Residents Group, who said that, within their organisation, there was a diversity of views: there were those who support it and those who oppose. And that's completely understandable when you have a significant change to the welfare system such as this. It is significant but it is a trial. It is trying something new in a space where we have an extraordinary amount of failure.

Again, if this card can be a tool to help reduce the amount of alcohol- and drug-related domestic and other violence, if it helps channel welfare dollars to where they're best spent, if it makes sure that kids have a meal in their bag when they head to school or if it makes sure the bills are paid on time then that is a way of breaking a cycle of welfare dependency and helping these communities for whom there is a level of desperation. We do have two trials going like this in different regions. Let's keep trying to solve some of these intractable problems. Let's not give up.

In the couple of minutes remaining to me, I want to quickly address something Senator Siewert brought up—the $10,000-per-person cost. The previous minister, in a speech, indicated that that cost reflected some initial set-up costs. That is falling. It's estimated that the per-person cost in Kalgoorlie would be something more like $1,000 and, as the trials expand, that cost will continue to come down. This is an example of the card. We're not supposed to use props in here, but it looks identical to a credit card. It's not white; it's a grey colour.

The government appreciates the support from the Labor Party in continuing Ceduna and East Kimberley, but we would like them to reconsider their position on the other trial sites. It is important that we keep rolling this program out into different communities, because communities are different. Communities have different balances of certain groups, different needs and different employment drivers. There's a wonderful opportunity in the Goldfields at the moment because there are jobs in the community. The mining industry has picked up again. I was there as recently as 10 days ago and was told by a range of community leaders that there are currently a thousand unfilled jobs in Kalgoorlie. There is an opportunity at the moment to really try and break this cycle of welfare dependency, to get people spending their money more wisely and get people out of a cycle of drug and welfare dependency. This is a really good opportunity to expand this, to keep looking and trying to find things that work, things that will change people's lives on the ground. I commend the bill to the Senate.

Cory Bernardi (SA, Australian Conservatives) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

This bill, the Social Services Legislation Amendment (Cashless Debit Card) Bill 2017, is a good bill which seeks to remove the restriction to three sites for where the government can implement the cashless debit card. Australian Conservatives support the cashless debit card. I note the comments made by a very philanthropic Australian, Mr Andrew Forrest—he's been right to advocate its broad introduction. I also note the comments made by Mr Andrew Forrest when he called the Greens 'the party for paedophiles' for opposing this reform. I'm only quoting what has been attributed to him, but the rhetoric he used seeks to point out the terrible cost of the dogged clutching to ideology that we see with the Greens and others on topics like these.

The Greens and others refuse to accept that business as usual for Indigenous communities simply cannot continue. There are terrible human costs and terrible economic costs to too many families and to the Australian community. Reforms like these are working. They are delivering benefits to Australian families—Indigenous or otherwise. They are ensuring that welfare money isn't spent on grog, on smokes, on dope—on all things that the Greens seem to love—but are instead spent on food, on nappies and on the things that not only a family needs but a mother knows a family needs.

The Greens, the purported champions of women, the ones who parade around with their white ribbons, are on this occasion refusing to back Indigenous mothers who want to put food on the table and protect their kids. Instead they're backing the abusive husbands who seize the money, drink it away and commit all manner of crimes. We cannot allow this to continue; we have to break this cycle. We have to stop business as usual, and this bill goes some way to doing it. Let's not forget, this regime allows 20 per cent of the welfare payment to be spent how the recipient likes. Eighty per cent is on the card, and they can do as they want with the rest. It's a rough and ready principle, the 80-20 rule.

I will focus my comments today on the implications in South Australia, not just because it's my home state and not just because Ceduna, on our state's far west coast, has been a successful trial site and is a place I have visited many times but because, if the media reports are to be believed, the so-called SA-BEST party, as the Nick Xenophon Team will soon be, are going to kill this reform today. It's not just the Greens who are obstructive in this space; there's a far more cunning and slippery character: former senator Nick Xenophon. He's the aspirant for the South Australian state seat of Hartley. He's the grand inquisitor, who's launched enough inquiries to make Senate clerks weep. He's flip-flopped and, as the Leader of the Government in the Senate has said on a number of occasions, has wibble-wobbled like jelly on a plate on policy that he knows works, because he doesn't want to offend the left-wing base that he courts. I don't buy, and many Australian people don't buy, the Xenophon sensible centre nonsense. His voting record during his time here is absolutely clear. He voted in divisions more often with the Greens than with any other party. Premier Weatherill, the South Australian Labor Premier, might try to claim Mr Xenophon is a Liberal but that's nonsense. His voting record shows that he is of the left through and through, and you cannot hide from those facts. Mr Weatherill's rubbery figures are designed to paint SA-BEST as a conservative party. I'm not easily offended, but Mr Weatherill has certainly struck at the heart of offence in suggesting that Mr Xenophon is a conservative or that his party is a conservative party. I haven't found that the SA-BEST team have actually put their name to a single conservative initiative. In fact, everything that Labor have stood for has pretty much been backed, to an even greater degree, by the Xenophon team, and I suspect that Mr Weatherill is only worried that Mr Xenophon is chomping at Labor's base.

Notwithstanding that he's no longer here, everyone understands that Mr Xenophon is pulling the strings of the group called the Nick Xenophon Team, even though he's given up his part-time job with fellow Senator Griff that was designed to get him through the financial hardship of running for his third house of parliament. I note that Mr Xenophon has lodged a name change with the AEC to change the name of the Nick Xenophon Team to SA-BEST.

Yet again, I would say that the Australian Conservatives are leading the way. We recognise the cult of personality does not work for the interest of the body politic and it doesn't work for the interest of the Australian people, and yet that's precisely what we have seen with the Nick Xenophon Team. The Australian people want principled parties now; they're looking for people who are going to stand by their convictions rather than just jump on any populist wind or weather vane change to get themselves some more attention.

But, of course, I would argue that the South Australian media will chair Mr Xenophon around the state, promoting him—unquestioningly almost—and painting him as a Playford reborn in the interests of South Australia. Of course he's nothing of the sort, and here on the cashless debit card we see precisely the type of ambulance-chasing, get-the-headlines behaviour of the Nick Xenophon Team writ large. Let's remember that the leader of the Nick Xenophon Team/SA-BEST, zipped over at taxpayers' expense over to Ceduna, in my home state, where this cashless debit card trial was announced. The local mayor, Allan Suter, a good man, was—rightly so—a very strong supporter of this regime.

And it's worked. I know it's worked because I've been there and I've looked at it myself. Alcohol abuse in that community has slumped. There are better outcomes for everyone in the community as a result of this, and yet too many left-wing ideologues from the sterile comfort of this place expressed opposition to the schemes. But out on the ground, where people have to live with the reality of social breakdown that occurs as a result of abuse, not only of substances but of welfare payments—and, quite frankly, even worse abuses of the most human tragic kind at the coalface—people are crying out for these reforms.

I will go back: Mr Xenophon flew to Ceduna because he wanted to look concerned for the cameras. He's quite fond of quoting that character from The Comedy Company, for those old enough to remember, Con the Fruiterer. He's always, 'Looking, looking, looking.' He created division in the community; he stirred it up, saying, 'There was division and we needed to keep looking and looking to find a better solution.' Braver souls, I'm happy to say, stared him down and said, 'No, it's actually time to get on with it.'

I also know that Mr Xenophon's protege, the member for Mayo, in the other place, told The Guardian today that they want there to be a 'social licence' for a rollout in other areas. A social licence. That's also known as an 'opinion poll'. And that's the precise SA-BEST/Nick Xenophon Team model: opinion polls. In South Australia, we've always been able to predict where the Nick Xenophon Team would land on a particular issue, because we just have to look at the polling on that issue. It's blatant populism. It's worked a charm for him, because he and his team have been untrammelled about the principles behind the decisions they're making. But I would say that following polls slavishly isn't leadership, it isn't moral fortitude and it isn't significant rigour for making decisions in this place. It's not doing the right thing; it's choosing the path of least resistance. And, frankly, it's gutless.

The Xenophon approach is to be the rooster on the roof of every house, the weather vane, blowing whichever way the hot air of opinion polls is blowing. The member for Mayo, whom I might add is almost like a protected species for her fellow left-wing travellers, she's not going off to the High Court. Somehow that shop has closed around her to keep her safe from the High Court. I find that quite extraordinary—once again, a lack of accountability by those who squeal the most about delivering outcomes and evidence based policy.

Yet some of the strongest attacks against Mr Xenophon come from the Australian Labor Party and their useful sock puppet, the union movement. They loathe Mr Xenophon because he's prosecuting the left-wing political case better than they are. He is quite literally crushing the Greens in South Australia, cruelling the high ambitions of Senator Hanson-Young, who may be enjoying her last years in this place. In fact, Mr Xenophon is not so much siding with the Greens as slowly taking them on and taking them over as well. Some would say he's a Justin Trudeau in a cheap suit.

But I come back to the point of this bill. Here we have it. We have the Nick Xenophon Team stopping reform that can save lives in regional and poorer communities. They are stopping reform that reinforces that welfare payments are not a right but a privilege to help you step up from poverty, not to leave you in it. And this reform, if the media reports are correct, will fail today because the left-wing parties—the Greens, the Labor Party, the Nick Xenophon Team, and others who profess to know best—will join ideologically as one on this reform. This reform opposes the leftist narrative that people in this place will cling to even as it leaves people languishing in poverty and despair and has proven to be a broken model.

Today I have focused on the Nick Xenophon Team because, of those of us on the crossbench, they are the reason that this initiative is going to fail today. That disappoints me because I think Australians deserve better accountability from their politicians. I think Australian communities deserve better from their politicians. I think those who are most troubled by substance abuse in the communities—the families that are welfare dependent and are missing out because of the actions of some in their households—will rue the day that this important reform was blocked by the Nick Xenophon Team and others.

So I make no apologies that the Australian Conservatives wholeheartedly support this bill. I think it needs to be rolled out much more widely in the welfare space. I think we need to ensure that this is not just targeted at Indigenous communities and that it is applied liberally across all welfare recipients but with a particular focus on those areas most in need. We're considering moving amendments to apply this regime to all welfare recipients under the age of 21. It would seem like a moot point given the circumstance in the reporting today that this important reform is going to fail.

I commend the government for their pursuit of this reform. I think it's important. I want to commend Mr Andrew Forrest, whom I have seen in this place many times walking around trying to lobby very, very hard for this important reform. And it's encouraging to see a successful businessman not give up the ghost and leave it to other people but actually get in here, into the trenches, and try and convince some people here who have their minds closed to the fact that something else needs to be done if we're going to have a meaningful impact in reform. I congratulate him for it. I only wish that he'd been more successful in his efforts. I make no blame for him, because it is not him. It is not his efforts. It is the intransigence of others opposite who refuse to open their eyes to the fact that there is a better way in dealing with welfare in this country.

Ian Macdonald (Queensland, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

It's a pleasure to take part in this debate following Senator Bernardi, who has a wonderful turn of phrase. His perspicuity in his comments about the Nick Xenophon Team and the Greens are worth recording for posterity. I congratulate Senator Bernardi for his understanding and shouting out of two political parties who are really a waste of time and a waste of space—one might say oxygen thieves—when it comes to serious policy debate in in chamber.

The cashless debit card, as many senators have said, was first introduced on a trial basis in March of 2016 at Ceduna in South Australia, and this was followed by further trials at Kununurra and Wyndham in the Kimberley. These trials, by anyone's assessment, have been an unmitigated success. Alcohol consumption in these communities has fallen, gambling and illicit substance abuse has been curtailed and alcohol related violence has been reduced. It's also been reported that 30 per cent of people impacted by the reform have reported being better able to care for their families and save money. Some cynics might say, 'It's only 30 per cent; it's not 100 per cent,' but in this area of social policy having 30 per cent of a selected group better off is well worth the effort of undertaking the exercise.

The measures in the Social Services Legislation Amendment (Cashless Debit Card) Bill 2017 will remove some limitations on the rollout of the cashless welfare card and allow the program to be introduced into my state of Queensland, and that's really why I am contributing to this debate. I know that in the last budget the government announced that the cashless welfare card would be expanded to two new locations. One of them is in my home state of Queensland in the Bundaberg and Hervey Bay region—in the Maryborough area of Central Queensland. It is one of the parts of Queensland that perhaps has the lowest socioeconomic profile, and it's one where there are real concerns with family violence, with alcohol and drug abuse and with various other forms of addiction that have impacted on so many families.

The rollout is good news for my state of Queensland and certainly good news for the people of Bundaberg. I know that the local federal member for Hinkler, Mr Pitt, consulted widely, as did the department, in relation to the introduction in the Bundaberg and Hervey Bay area. All sensible and mature community leaders support the extension of the trial into that region.

I'm very hopeful that a similar initiative will be taken in the Townsville region—where I have my office and where I live, south of Townsville, in a place called Ayr—because Townsville, regrettably, has been hit by very high unemployment and all of the social problems that follow unemployment and despair. Small business has been struggling. The unemployment is too high, but there are some bright lights on the horizon. For example, 800 families have been employed in Queensland by the Adani company as part of their railway line construction for the coalfields in the Galilee Basin.

I cannot understand why Labor politicians, particularly those like the Labor member for Herbert, Ms Cathy O'Toole, are lukewarm—that is the most positive way I can say it—in their support for this construction initiative which would mean so much for the Townsville district. I and my party support the Adani project because of the jobs it would create. Already, I repeat, 800 families have jobs in Queensland thanks to Adani. The Labor mayor of Townsville, Councillor Jenny Hill, is a very courageous person. Councillor Hill is fully committed to the Adani project. Why? Because it means jobs for Townsville people and a real boost for small business in Townsville.

I've asked Councillor Hill to join with me in seeking a clarification from the Labor opposition leader, Mr Shorten, on the comments he made as part of his campaign to maintain the seat of Batman and stem an onslaught from the Greens political party. Unfortunately, it seems that the opposition leader is trying to match the Greens promises in any way that needs to be done to retain that seat. Quite frankly, I don't care what happens in Batman but I do care about the impact of the promises Mr Shorten is making in Batman on the workers of North and Central Queensland.

Similarly, I cannot understand why the CFMEU—the 'M' being for 'mining'—are not wholeheartedly supporting the Adani project for the jobs it would create in railway construction, mine construction and eventually in an export-oriented mine in Central Queensland. The construction workers and mining workers would be members of the CFMEU. I know the CFMEU has a huge influence in the operations and policy of the ALP. It simply beggars my belief why the CFMEU would just be following the old Labor line of anti-everything, because it's their members who would benefit from Adani. But I digress slightly.

This cashless welfare card helps many jobseekers establish the security and stability they need in their lives to effectively re-enter the employment market. The card has been proven to work. It has been proven to reduce domestic violence and it has been proven to have better outcomes for those who do use some of their welfare money for alcohol and drugs. It's clear that not everyone does that, but there is a significant proportion of the community on welfare who do use the money for alcohol, for drugs, for gambling, which means their family and their children do without.

There are reported cases of alcohol-fuelled violence and violence because families don't have enough to eat. They don't have enough to send the kids to school properly, and that causes family problems. Here is a solution, which has proved to have worked in Ceduna and in the Kimberley. It's has proved to have worked and it does bring benefits. That's why I support this rollout to the Bundaberg-Maryborough-Hervey Bay area of my state of Queensland. That's why the community leaders in those communities also support this. And I look forward to the day when community leaders in Townsville will petition for the cashless welfare card to be introduced in the their region.

Again, I cannot understand why the Labor member for Herbert, Ms Cathy O'Toole, opposes this. She knows better than I do the impact of alcohol-related family violence, the problems of children not having the right money for school or food, because the welfare recipient has used the money for gambling or drugs or, more often in my region, on alcohol. Again, I acknowledge this is not 100 per cent of the people; I'm not putting everyone in that same basket. But this proposal will not affect those who already manage their welfare cheques well one iota.

Why Ms O'Toole would be supporting the Greens in their opposition to this real initiative to stop child abuse, lack of food for children, lack of proper schooling—I simply cannot believe it.

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

It's not true.

Ian Macdonald (Queensland, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I hear Senator Siewert screaming something from the crossbench about this not being true. I'm sorry, but I will take my advice from people who know—that is, the department that is interested, that does the surveys and that follows these things. It is not part of a political party that simply wants to compete with Labor in the rush to the left in the hope that it might win the seat of Batman.

These are proven results. Although it won't affect 100 per cent of the people, even if you can see a noticeable difference in those impacted, of 30 per cent, then that's got to be a good thing. I repeat: the evidence shows that those who are doing the right thing with their welfare won't be impacted at all. They already spend their money not on alcohol or on drugs or on gambling, but on buying food for their families and children and making sure their children have sufficient resources to attend school as part of the school community in the normal way. Those people are already doing it, so giving them the cashless debit card is not going to make one iota of difference. I cannot understand people like Ms O'Toole who claim some interest in this area, or some expertise in this area in a past life. She would know better than I the impacts on families of drug and alcohol abuse and of gambling abuse. This cashless debit card is a great way to go and assist those families.

The government that doesn't try to break that cycle of loss of self-esteem is being irresponsible in the extreme. The social impacts on affected communities, as everyone who involves themselves in this area will know, are disastrous. Add to that the psychological impact on people who are receiving benefits and who abuse substances. This is a recipe for entering a never-ending cycle of self-harming behaviours that include gambling, alcohol abuse and illicit substance abuse. We as a government feel we have a responsibility to try to help those families who, for whatever reason, are not able to help themselves. I repeat: this won't make any difference to those who can help themselves, because those families already spend the money on the right things. This will only impact upon those who do abuse alcohol and gambling, and it will try to put those families in a situation where—

Louise Pratt (WA, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Minister for Environment and Water (Senate)) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Are you saying everybody on welfare abuses alcohol?

Ian Macdonald (Queensland, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I will take the interjection, Senator Pratt. If you'd been listening to me, you would have heard me say twice already that I am not saying that 100 per cent of people on welfare abuse alcohol and drugs. But 30 per cent of affected families have been proven to be better off. Isn't even 30 per cent worth it? I cannot believe that people who are supposedly compassionate, who abhor domestic violence and who allegedly abhor substance and gambling abuse cannot see that this is a good step in the right direction—it's not the panacea, but it's a step in the right direction. It is helping some families get proper food for their kids and properly equipping them to attend school. It gives those people in those families the self-esteem to try and move forward to get one of these jobs in the Townsville and Bundaberg regions when they come from initiatives being taken by the federal government, and, I repeat, from the employment that will be created when Adani gets into full swing.

I support this project very, very strongly. As a Queenslander, I hope it can be introduced into the Hinkler region, as the department proposes, very quickly and as soon as practically we can do it. I hope the Townsville community will embrace this, to lead to a better life for their citizens.