Luke Simpkins (Cowan, Liberal Party) Share this | Hansard source

This motion is about poverty. As we know, this is Anti-Poverty Week and Friday is International Anti-Poverty Day, as declared by the United Nations. The aiming mark for foreign aid is to be increased to 0.5 per cent of gross national income, and I note that the government has committed to achieving that mark by 2015. It is appropriate to note that increases in Australian foreign aid have been made over many years in real terms. However, when we think of the keen focus on a mark of 0.5 per cent, we should be very careful that this does not become our only focus. Should we reach that mark, it should not be ‘game over, tick the box or mission accomplished’. Even though the Rudd government has said it will take six years to reach the mark, it is critical that we focus on making sure foreign aid targets the capacity to ensure self-sufficiency. Yes, stopping people starving right now is very important, but aid designed to develop agriculture and water projects is where the long-term focus, the goal, must be. Critically important also is the need for governance and strong systems in the countries receiving aid. Take a look at any country where the government is corrupt and where resources are diverted from the people to a ruling elite and you find the greatest hallmarks of poverty. The need for an effective or progressing democracy should be linked firmly as a prerequisite to our aid programs in order that we may have confidence that the money is going to count for the people suffering in these countries.

It is appropriate that I also make mention of poverty in Australia. In this country I know that ACOSS has defined the poverty line as 50 per cent of median disposable income, which I understand was $281 per week in 2006. That figure sounds familiar these days, because here we are in late 2008 and that is what the aged single pension and a number of other pensions round out to per week. It is my view that not all of those on $281 per week in 2008 are in poverty but they have to be very well organised to be able to afford housing, transport, food and clothing. I think a single age pensioner would have to own their own home to be able to afford to live on that amount. I would, however, like to take up the case of someone who is not even getting that much, Mrs Margaret Anne Ryan, a constituent of mine in Ballajura. Mrs Ryan is 60 years old and a recipient of the widow’s pension. Mrs Ryan sent me an email last week, which said:

Whilst I am pushing for the pension to be increased I am mainly interested in getting my benefit increased which is the “widow allowance” now that benefit is NOT a pension it is only the same as the Newstart benefit which is what you get when not working. The “widow allowance” is around about FORTY dollars a week LESS than the single aged pension and that is what I want corrected. At the present moment on the $245.90 a week I am getting, after I pay my mortgage and the other bills I am lucky if I have fifty dollars to buy food and pay for bus fares.

It is not a nice situation to be in where you only have fifty dollars to your name and face the daily prospect of not only losing the house you are in but getting all the amenities cut off.

I worry that people like Mrs Ryan are under the poverty line and cannot afford three meals a day. This is the front line in this country for those on fixed incomes who face potential poverty. Here is an older Australian who is community minded—and I can personally vouch for that—and doing the right thing in 2008, as she has always done in her life. So where is the government for all the Mrs Ryans in this country? It is hard for me to speak in favour of increased foreign aid when I know how hard she and others like her are doing it. There is of course a big contrast between Mrs Ryan and those people who tell me how tough times are whilst standing in front of their houses, with two cars, a huge wide-screen TV and a Foxtel subscription. I also make known my concern about those parents out there who might prefer drugs, alcohol or cigarettes before healthy food for their children. There is a marked difference between people in those sorts of circumstances who have adopted those sorts of lifestyle choices and someone like Mrs Ryan, who has always done the right thing and stands in a very difficult situation.

This brings me back to the main issue, and I will finish by saying that there are people suffering here and around the world. Aid should be given, either in the form of increased pensions or payments here or by foreign aid, but always with accountability.

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