Yvette D'Ath (Petrie, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Hansard source

It is my pleasure to add my support to the Social Security and Family Assistance Legislation Amendment (Weekly Payments) Bill 2010. This bill of course implements another key reform set out in the Australian government’s white paper The road home: a national approach to reducing homelessness, which was released in December 2008 by the Prime Minister, Kevin Rudd, and the Minister for Housing, Tanya Plibersek. As the minister is in the chamber today, can I acknowledge the wonderful work that she is doing in relation to housing and homelessness. It is a very important issue not just for my electorate but across Australia. I will get to my electorate in more detail shortly.

The white paper outlined a plan for reducing homelessness in Australia by 2020 with specific goals to halve overall homelessness and provide accommodation to all rough sleepers who seek it. There are currently 105,000 homeless people in Australia, of whom around 16,000 sleep rough. The white paper provided a huge injection of funds, an additional $1.2 billion over four years, a 55 per cent increase in investment in homelessness and a substantial downpayment on a 12-year reform agenda. It included a commitment of $800 million over the next four years for new support services for homeless people and $400 million over the next two financial years for social housing to house the homeless. This injection of funds is part of the $15.1 billion package agreed by the Council of Australian Governments to stimulate the economy and generate up to 133,000 jobs over coming years. In response to the overwhelming feedback from consultations on the green paper, the white paper focused on three core strategies: turning off the tap, better prevention of homelessness and improving and expanding services to help more homeless people, breaking the cycle of homelessness by providing long-term housing and support.

Through the new funding provided by the Rudd Labor government and through reforms made by this government, we aim to help up to 9,000 more young people to remain connected with their families, help up to 2,250 more families at risk of homelessness to stay housed, provide day-to-day support to an extra 1,000 adults with mental illness, build up to 2,700 additional public and community houses for low-income households that are at risk of homelessness, fund a network of 90 community engagement officers within Centrelink to support people at risk of homelessness, build up to 4,200 new houses and upgrade up to 4,800 existing houses in remote Indigenous communities and allocate aged care places and capital funds for at least one new specialist facility for older homeless people every year for the next four years.

Centrelink has a critical role to play in reducing and preventing homelessness. We know that Centrelink provides income support payments to 6½ million people, many of whom are disadvantaged, vulnerable and socially excluded. As a key first-to-know agency, Centrelink is well placed to identify people who are at risk of homelessness and assist them with stabilising their housing situation. Centrelink has already introduced an indicator in its systems to identify clients who are homeless or at risk of homelessness. This indicator will let Centrelink staff know that the client needs active follow-up from a Centrelink social worker to make sure that they are receiving the support that they need to stay housed. The indicator allows Centrelink to improve and tailor its services to the people who are most vulnerable to homelessness.

In October last year, Centrelink also began to establish its network of Centrelink community engagement officers. This program now has 90 specialist staff located across all capital cities and many regional centres. They support some of the most vulnerable people in our community.

This bill provides another reform to be implemented by Centrelink under the Australian government’s white paper on homelessness. As part of the Australian government’s efforts to prevent homelessness, we are introducing weekly payments of income support payments for people who are homeless or at risk of homelessness. We know that some Australians have difficulty budgeting and spend their fortnightly welfare payments too quickly. This can mean that they are left with no money to pay rent, buy food or pay for essential services. Vulnerable customers who are being supported by Centrelink staff will be able to choose to receive their income support payments weekly instead of fortnightly. While the payment amount will stay the same, weekly payments will allow the most disadvantaged welfare payment customers to budget more easily. It will also give these vulnerable Australians an opportunity to stabilise and improve their circumstances.

Another important aspect of this measure is its extension to recipients of the family tax benefit. I commend the component of the bill that allows families on income support that also receive the family tax benefit to receive their family tax benefit weekly as well. The family tax benefit is critical to helping many low-income families in my electorate and around the country in making ends meet and enabling the family tax benefit payments to be received weekly along with income support payments is yet another example of this government’s commitment to a responsive and flexible family support system.

In my electorate, more than 13,000 families receive family tax benefit A and more than 10,400 receive family tax benefit B, with many of these families receiving both. I am certainly proud to support the bill as yet another example of the Rudd government delivering on its promises to tackle homelessness and support families and individuals that are under financial pressure. I certainly know that many vulnerable people in Petrie will benefit from this bill. I heard the member for Bowman speaking about some of the local organisations in his electorate. I have many wonderful community organisations in my electorate that do amazing work. The minister and the Prime Minister have spoken at length about the organisations that they have visited around this country to discuss what this government’s future policies should be in addressing homelessness. There are organisations such as the Orana Youth Shelter and Chameleon House, which are the only two youth shelters in my electorate. They do wonderful work in supporting our young people. But they have to send away far too many young people on a daily basis.

There is the Redcliffe Community Association and the Redcliffe Area Youth Service, which do wonderful work in supporting our young people and also many women with children who have been subject to domestic violence who find themselves homeless. They also help those people suffering mental illness who, as a consequence of their medical condition, find themselves homeless. These groups deal with these situations and these real people every day. There is the North Moreton Public Tenants Association, the Deception Bay Neighbourhood Centre, Near North Housing, the Deception Bay Child and Family Alliance, Boys Town Deception Bay, the Deception Bay Community Youth programs and the Youth Advisory Group. These are all groups, among many others, who do wonderful work locally. But we need to do more, and as a government we need to support these community organisations.

I heard one of the members, the member for Deakin, saying earlier that anyone could find themselves homeless. In fact, I remember having a conversation with a woman back in 2007, when I was a candidate. This woman explained to me how she was a stay-at-home mum with two young children. Her husband was a middle-income worker. They never considered themselves to be struggling. He was a middle-income earner; she was at home raising the kids. They were in rental property. They thought they were doing well until one day they were given notice that the property owner wanted them to vacate because he wanted to renovate and put the property on the market. The woman and her family found themselves in a very difficult position, trying to get into another rental property that was affordable for them. In fact they ended up moving into a local caravan park with their family. The even thought that this was acceptable, except that the caravan park notified them that they were closing down. And suddenly this family, who never saw themselves as struggling and never thought they could ever become homeless, found themselves in a situation where they were about to be living out of their car. Friends stepped in and helped them and eventually they got back into another rental property.

That is an example of how easy it is to become homeless. We always think that it is people who come from difficult relationships, who have some health issues or who are long-term unemployed who end up homeless. But anyone can end up homeless. I know that the white paper identified that of the 105,000 homeless up to 23 per cent fall into the category of older people and that children form up to 22 per cent according to the census data in 2006. Families made up up to 11 per cent and rough sleepers made up 16 per cent of the homeless.

I know there are many young people in my electorate who are sleeping rough, sleeping on friends’ couches or moving around every night. I have had men who manage boarding houses in my area say to me: ‘Yvette, we don’t know what to do; these women turn up on our doorstep with young children. This is not an appropriate place for them to stay. We’re concerned about their safety. This isn’t a good environment for the children. We can’t take them in but what else can we do?’ There are many of us working on how we can change this situation locally.

Redcliffe Area Youth Space in their last annual report looked at the predominant issues that they encountered as a youth service. In 2007-08 homelessness was a predominant issue in 62 per cent of cases, up seven per cent. In 2008-09 the homelessness was a predominant issue in 75 per cent of cases. That was up 13 per cent from the previous year. So this problem is growing. Interestingly, mental health was a predominant issue in 90 per cent of cases. So there is a link there, and it is a link that we cannot ignore—nor is the government ignoring it.

I am very pleased that the government has said that in our health reforms and future announcements we will be very much focusing on mental health, because that is an important area. I am pleased that the government is dealing with homelessness through its previous announcements and through this bill and that through the stimulus package and nation building there is extra social housing. In terms of refurbishments, repairs and maintenance, in my area alone 374 social housing units are being repaired. I know that those repairs included providing safer bathrooms for elderly people, support baths, wider doorways and fans to keep them cooler. The fact is that our summers are getting hotter, especially in Brisbane and Queensland, and with safety as a major priority, heat stress is a major problem for elderly people.

I was pleased, when I was talking to the Queensland government’s QBuild operators, to learn that they had put in a large number of ceiling fans into the one- and two-bedroom units that elderly people are living in, in social housing throughout the electorate. We are also building another 43 social housing units and I know that the Urban Land Development Authority and the Brisbane Housing Company are building new rental affordability properties in Fitzgibbon. That is another fantastic announcement.

While we are doing all this wonderful work, unfortunately, there is a lot of obstruction from the opposition. I would hate to see more obstruction in any areas that deal with the homelessness issue. In just the past year 41 bills have been obstructed in the Senate. That is four times the average number of bills that have been obstructed by any opposition over the last 30 years. While we are trying to be fiscally responsible and to make sure that taxpayer dollars are going into those really important areas that we need them to go into, such as health and homelessness, we have the opposition leader, Tony Abbott, now wanting to increase costs for households by introducing a great big new tax through a paid parental leave scheme. He does not want to fund it in a responsible way; he wants to tax big business to ensure that those costs will then flow on to households, and women particularly will feel the pressures of those increasing costs to their home. There is no point in giving paid parental leave when every time parents go to the supermarket it is going to cost them more to get food, to get essential services and to clothe their children. These costs will flow. We know these costs will flow, and it is at the very least disappointing. It fails the Australian community in putting forward these proposals. But it is my pleasure to be part of the Rudd Labor government, which is actually not just fiscally responsible but is looking after those important areas of our community such as homelessness, and I am very pleased to commend this bill to the House.

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