Fears that welfare review could be watered down after budget backlash
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Version 0 of 1. The consultation process for the government’s welfare reforms has been criticised as speculation mounts in the community sector that the government has watered down a report after the backlash to the budget. The welfare review, headed up by a former Mission Australia chief, Patrick McClure, was announced last year. The social services minister, Kevin Andrews, initially said he expected an interim report by the end of January. The deadline has been repeatedly pushed back but it is believed parts of the 200-page report will be released this month after being delivered to the minister on 20 May. It is understood the report looks at tightening eligibility for people on carers’ pensions and support for the work for the dole scheme the government is planning to reintroduce for people under 30. The report studied other systems around the world, taking particular interest in New Zealand’s welfare reforms, the UK’s recently introduced universal credit and the Netherlands’ disability scheme. Andrews has signalled the interim report will not have recommendations and instead will be a discussion paper-style with a consultation period to follow. This has reassured figures in the community sector who have been disappointed with the level of consultation. Those who did get a meeting saw McClure only once earlier in the year and have not heard from him since. Several have speculated the government has watered down aspects of the report, or what is being made public, after the severe public backlash to the budget however the government has maintained only minor factual changes were made to the report as a result of the budget. Terese Edwards, chief executive of the National Council of Single Mothers, was one of the community sector representatives invited to “soft” consultations in January but has had no further involvement. “We were pleased to be invited but we did not get a sense of the review. I did not think we got into policy discussions; we stuck very much to broad strokes,” she said. “We had a difference in opinion about the success of the previous welfare reforms … It’s getting harder and harder and harder for sole parents. Basic things are becoming a luxury.” Edwards said she would have liked to have spent time going through various reports and independent groups’ responses to sole parents social policies to prove what worked and what did not, in particular the move to put sole parents on to Newstart after their child turns eight. “No matter what way you slice the cake, or which lens you look through, Newstart is not structured for single parents. It’s a bleak, dark existence,” she said Other community groups who did not want to speak on the record agreed they were not consulted properly but were hopeful the process would improve after the release of the interim report. It has been proposed within the Department of Social Services to include stakeholder engagement roundtables and potentially call for written submissions as well as undertake web forums. Secretary of the department, Finn Pratt, told Senate estimates earlier this month that the processes still had a long way to go. “There is plenty of consulting with a range of interested stakeholders and organisations. I recall listing a number of those at the last estimates,” he said. “But there was a much broader range than that. From memory, those were organisations which had a particular interest on behalf of recipients of the various payments. All that is still in train and we expect that, following the release of the McClure report in due course, there will be further consultations and a final report later this year.” About $1.7m will have been spent on the review by the end of this month. It is expected to cost between $800,000 and $1m over the next financial year. |