James Paterson (Victoria, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I'm pleased also to have an opportunity to contribute on the Social Security Legislation Amendment (Community Development Program) Bill. Along with a number of other senators in this chamber, including Senator McAllister, Senator Dodson and Senator Siewert, I participated in the inquiry conducted by the Finance and Public Administration References Committee into the Community Development Program. I found that to be an enlightening and very useful process. I attended the committee's hearings in Kalgoorlie, Townsville and Palm Island. There's no question that, through the committee, the government received very valuable feedback on the CDP.

One of the things I took out of that inquiry process and the evidence we received was that there was substantial feedback to the government on the running of the program, particularly the administration of the program, the frustrations some people had in dealing with Centrelink and the breaches regime. Overwhelmingly, the evidence was that everybody agreed the principle of mutual obligation is important and should stay and that we should never go back to the system, as it has been in the past, of passive welfare because of the shocking damage it has done to remote and regional communities and, in particular, Indigenous communities. I cannot remember a witness from a remote or regional area, from an Indigenous community, who said they thought it was a good idea to go back to passive welfare or it was a good idea to get rid of mutual obligation altogether.

On one level, I'm not surprised to see the Greens come into the chamber and say they're going to oppose this bill. They're unconvinced about the concept of mutual obligation full stop. They are unconvinced about the idea that people should need to work in exchange for receiving welfare. But the Labor Party is not. The Labor Party says that they support the concept of mutual obligation—that they understand the need to have work requirements in exchange for receiving welfare—yet, as we heard from Senator Dodson, they are opposing this bill. I accept that the Labor Party might not agree with every recommendation the government has adopted. I accept that there may be a different path that they would like to take with the CDP, and, should they have the opportunity of forming government in the future, they, of course, will have the opportunity to do that. But what they are doing today is standing in the way of reforms that the communities we heard from asked us to implement. The Labor Party are saying that the program should stay as it is today until they have an opportunity to perhaps rewrite it in the future. I think that is a mistake.

This bill brings forward reforms to one of the most important priorities for Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander communities. Communities are strong when adults are engaged in work or meaningful activities that contribute to the benefit of the community. Since its introduction in July 2015, the Community Development Program has improved employment and participation outcomes for remote jobseekers. The CDP has supported remote jobseekers into more than 26,200 jobs, and on more than 8,800 occasions they have stayed in a job for at least six months. The CDP turned around the failings of the Remote Jobs and Communities Program, which had replaced the previous Community Development Employment Projects, or the CDEP. The Remote Jobs and Communities Program allowed the return of the misery of sit-down money, and engagement dropped to a shocking rate of seven per cent. The CDP has worked because it ensures that jobseekers have real mutual obligation requirements and because communities are increasingly at the heart of the delivery of the program. While the CDP is successfully getting jobseekers off welfare and into work, the government does recognise that there are areas of the system that can be improved.

The government has listened to the outcomes of the Senate inquiry process, as I mentioned, including the submissions and the public hearings, where many stakeholders took the opportunity to voice their views and concerns, including the Aboriginal peak organisations of the Northern Territory, as Senator Siewert mentioned. The government has also taken on board the Australian National Audit Office's performance audit outcomes. The Department of the Prime Minister and Cabinet released a discussion paper in December 2017 which received 40 public submissions and which provided a range of constructive views and suggestions. What we hear from the community, what people are asking for, is this: more jobs in remote Australia, access to real wages, reduced complexity in the income support system, and simplified actions with Centrelink. We have heard the consistent message that jobseekers need to be engaged to ensure that there is a clear pathway to a job and that the misery of passive welfare does not return. These CDP reforms create a fairer and simpler system, provide more local control, and drive a focus on employment and engagement with jobseekers. The introduction of the targeted compliance framework will significantly reduce the number of breaches, and that is one of the key pieces of evidence that we heard from communities during the hearings.

Critics of the program, particularly from the east coast, who are often driving a lot of the media coverage about this program, can't have it all. They can't, on the one hand, complain that the current CDP doesn't work and then use that same data to block the reforms that we're proposing, which would create a simpler and fairer system. They are standing in the way of improvements to a system that they say needs improvements.

On 8 May 2018 the government announced reforms to the CDP as part of the 2018-19 budget. There are three key changes to the program and they include, firstly, reducing income reporting requirements to Centrelink for jobseekers who have a mutual obligation of less than 15 hours a week. We certainly heard the frustrations of many remote communities in dealing with Centrelink. We've heard that concern and we are responding to it. Secondly, we're improving the assessment process so that barriers to employment are better identified and local health workers can provide the medical evidence needed to reduce the required participation. This is another key theme of the feedback that we received during the inquiry—that often it was other failings of government, and sometimes at different levels, and other systems have let them down, which was preventing proper participation and engagement with the CDP. So anything we can do within the CDP to help respond to those other issues will help the success of the CDP. Thirdly, we're reducing required participation from up to 25 hours a week to up to 20 hours a week.

These changes will commence, if the bill is successful, from February 2019. What they will do is support local control and decision-making through a much more community based approach. We are strengthening the community and the say that they have in how the CDP is delivered locally by contracting with more Indigenous service providers and linking with local governance arrangements. I think it's really important that there are excellent Indigenous service providers out there who are keen to be involved in and have a greater say on the delivery of this program in the local area. With the superior local knowledge they have, they will be able to help deliver the program more effectively.

Importantly, the government will work with local communities to support 6,000 subsidised jobs across remote Australia. This will provide access to real wages and it will move people off welfare and into work. These will be jobs in community, identified by community, and delivering for the community's needs. Things like housing managers, local government workers, community health support, teaching assistants, construction or aged care are some examples of the kinds of jobs that could be delivered under this program. These jobs will only be available to CDP participants. They will help grow the size and capacity of the remote labour market and support the development of more local businesses and more local economies. I take up Senator Dodson's point that the labour market in a lot of remote and regional areas is in many ways an artificial labour market, and we should do whatever we can to help create the ecosystem for a stronger and more genuine economic activity and a proper local jobs market.

The subsidised jobs package is part of a pathway to employment, and it will provide real work experience for jobseekers while also paying them real wages. Again, that is one of the consistent pieces of feedback we received during the inquiry: people want real jobs and they want to be paid real wages. That's fair enough, and we are taking a step to achieve that. Jobseekers will continue to access support from employers and CDP providers to help them to stay in a job for the long term, which is critically important. It's no good getting people into a job that doesn't last very long. It's no good getting them into a job that lasts only a few months. We want to get them into permanent, long-lasting jobs and continued employment.

These jobs will provide meaningful employment, and the participants will be subject to the same pay and conditions that would otherwise be attached to those positions. Many participants who are placed in these jobs will continue to also qualify for the reduced rate of their income support payments after the applicable income test is applied. Some of these participants will not have had a job before or they may have been unemployed for quite some time. They might also need some additional support in making the transition into the workplace. We want these participants to succeed in taking that pathway to meet their career goals and their aspirations. That's why we are removing from them all of the other requirements that would usually apply under social security law. That's so their focus can be on attaining and retaining that meaningful real employment.

The subsidised job program complements what's in the legislation before the Senate today, but it will also be at the heart of the CDP going forward and the pathway to a job. Under the CDP going forward there will be, as I mentioned, 6,000 remote jobseekers being supported into a job at any time. This is a really exciting change and one that allows communities to support more jobs for locals and to ensure that Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people are not only engaged in work but also more engaged in the delivery of services to their own communities. The reforms build on the early successes of the CDP and continue to drive employment in remote Australia by helping to improve the skills and employability of jobseekers, increasing their participation through a greater range of work-like activities in the community.

The bill before us today amends the social security law to support the introduction of a new targeted compliance framework in remote Australia consistent with the arrangements across the rest of Australia. Following the passage of this bill, if it is successful, the CDP participants will be subject to the TCF. This means that there will be one national jobseeker compliance framework for all jobseekers, both remote and nonremote. I think that, in part, addresses the concerns that Senator Siewert was raising—that a different system applies to remote and regional jobseekers, who, as she says, are predominantly Indigenous Australians.

The TCF commenced across jobactive, ParentsNext and Disability Employment Services on 1 July 2018—the rest of the welfare system—and it will commence in the CDP from February 2019, if this bill is successful. CDP jobseekers will see considerable changes in how they interact with providers and Centrelink. The new TCF has additional protections for vulnerable jobseekers. It reduces the interactions with Centrelink, which is again responding to the concerns that we heard directly from communities about being frustrated in their dealings with Centrelink, and builds in more checkpoints to ensure that all jobseekers are fully capable of meeting their requirements. We want jobseekers to be successful in meeting their requirements; we don't want them to breach them. We don't want them to spend their time interacting with Centrelink when it's not necessary. There will be a greater role, importantly, for local CDP providers, who are on the ground and closer to the communities and know them better, to work with the CDP participants in the application of the TCF. That will mean there will be less interaction with Centrelink compared to the current framework. That will mean less time waiting on the phone, which, as we heard from many remote jobseekers during the inquiry, they find to be a very frustrating experience.

The reforms will see a significant reduction in the number of penalties applied to CDP jobseekers. The introduction of the TCF will remove penalties for one-off breaches of mutual obligation requirements, and financial penalties will focus on those who are persistently and wilfully noncompliant. Again, we heard about the impact that breaches have on participants in the program and also local communities. Breaches should not be applied unless they are persistently and wilfully noncomplaint. They shouldn't apply for occasional noncompliance or incidental or accidental noncompliance. They should really be focused only on those wilful and persistent noncompliant participants in the program.

To assist CDP participants in meeting their requirements, mutual obligation hours—as I mentioned earlier—will be reduced from up to 25 hours per week to up to 20 hours a week, and that will depend on the jobseekers' assessed work capacity. Alongside the application of the TCF, the reforms include a number of changes to increase the role of local health service providers to support participants in their communities. As I said earlier, participation in the CDP is often hampered by other issues with government service delivery in the community. The more we can help the people participate in the program and remove those barriers to participation, the more likely it is that the CDP will also succeed. Changes will include, for example, the provision of local health workers to supply evidence for the Department of Human Services to use when deciding whether to reduce a participant's mutual obligation hours.

The bill also introduces specific exemptions for participants in subsidised employment, removing interactions with Centrelink and focusing on engagement with the employers. Participants in subsidised employment will be exempt from the activity test requirements and will not incur mutual obligation failures under the TCF. This seeks to emulate one of the positive aspects of the old CDEP, where participants were paid wages outside of the income support system. We heard a lot of affection for that former program, the CDEP, which was abolished by the former Labor government and replaced by the remote jobs scheme. Crucially, entry into subsidised work will be voluntary. Therefore, CDP participants who for any reason refuse an offer of subsidised employment will not incur a work refusal failure. This provides CDP participants with the freedom to determine whether the subsidised employment opportunity available to them suits their personal commitments, their career aspirations, their skills and their experience. CDP participants will continue to have appropriate JobSearch requirements as part of their mutual obligation requirements determined by their provider. Similarly, participants in subsidised employment will not be subject to a work refusal failure if they refuse an offer of suitable unsubsidised employment.

Participants in subsidised employment will also not be subject to an unemployment failure if they voluntarily leave their position or are dismissed due to misconduct. This approach provides participants with the opportunity to leave subsidised employment without penalty if, after commencement of the position, they determine that the role is not suitable for them or their personal circumstances—for example, due to a requirement to relocate or family violence. As each subsidised position is funded for two years, this will also free up the subsidised job opportunity for a jobseeker who may be better suited to the role. This bill ensures that the local community is at the heart of our remote employment services. That was probably one of the main themes that came out of the inquiry: local community control to address local community problems. It listens to local views and local priorities, will be delivered by local community organisations, will ensure local jobseekers are engaged and better supported, and will provide a clear pathway to a job.

Without this legislation, though, the government will not be able to fully deliver the subsidised employment program as participants will still be subject to compliance under social security laws. I assume that would be a seriously unintended consequence of the decision by other parties in this chamber to vote against it. I presume they don't want the existing compliance regime to apply to subsidised workers, but that will be the effect if they follow through on their decision to vote against this legislation in the chamber. Without this legislation, CDP participants will continue to be subject to a different compliance model than the rest of Australia. We heard from Senator Siewert earlier that one of the Greens' criticisms of this system is that people in remote communities, who are predominantly Indigenous, are subject to a different set of rules than the rest of Australia. This bill attempts to bring it more closely into line with the requirements for other welfare recipients around Australia, and the Greens are proposing to vote against it. The legislation ensures remote jobseekers will have the support they need to move along the pathway to work. I hope the Greens and Labor reconsider their opposition to it.

I want to make one final point about consultation. The minister has personally visited more than 200 communities since the commencement of the CDP. The government has listened to the outcomes of the Senate inquiry process, which I have talked about, including the submissions and the public hearings, where many stakeholders took the opportunity to voice their views and concerns about the program. This process of consultation has not finished. We will continue to consult with remote communities, remote jobseekers and Indigenous leaders as we work to implement these reforms. It is a little bit disappointing that others in this chamber have listened more to academics on the east coast than to the people who live in remote Australia.