Jill Hall (Shortland, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Hansard source

The minister said that I am making it up. No, I am not. I have also had people come to see me who have had to rush a sick child to hospital. One person even had their husband have a heart attack and she was breached. On another occasion a constituent came to see me after being involved in a car accident and they were breached. It took a lot of work for my staff to get those Centrelink benefits re-instated. Those on the other side of this House do not understand what the real world is about.

This legislation is set to cause enormous hardship. The government is seeking to make amendments which would mean that from 1 January 2015 a payment suspension for a participant—a participant is a person who failed to attend an appointment—would not be re-instated until after the person had attended an appointment with their employment provider. As I said, many of the people that have been breached are people who actually work. The provision could mean that they have to wait quite a considerable time before they can attend an appointment.

This is legislation that from one perspective is designed to encourage people to comply with the requirements that are in place so that they can receive Newstart or whatever other benefit it might be, but from another perspective shows a total lack of understanding of people, a total lack of understanding of the job market and a very simplistic and narrow approach to looking at why people do not attend appointments. It is looking at extending compliance requirements to job seekers who are 55 and over. Currently it is a lesser requirement. I mentioned a moment ago the barriers that people who are older face when trying to obtain a job. The government would be much better putting in place a series of programs that would actually help people get the skills that they need to enter the workforce and support them. And if there are people who really need extra assistance, people who may have a mental health problem, which seemed to be an issue that the member for Mitchell raised on a number of occasions, then they should be supported. If a person is constantly sleeping in or missing an appointment for some reason, maybe there is something else going on.

Those on the other side of this parliament are just interested in cutting costs because this is seen as a budget saving measure. It outlines a total of $161.1 million in savings over four years. I would argue very strongly that the $161.1 million should be put into programs that will help people get skills, programs that will help them move from being unemployed to work. I would argue that money would be best spent on programs like Youth Connections, which did a fantastic job in my area. I worked so closely with them.

In my office, I have an employment group. A number of providers come in. We look at and analyse the areas where there are going to be shortages in jobs and then the employment providers look at how they can help people train in those areas and then link them into those industries. Within my area, occupations that will be in demand are in aged care, because Shortland is an older electorate, and disability. But to do that you need to spend about $161.1 million to help develop the skills. You need to put in place a job plan so that you know the direction that you are going in. And a job plan is not about cutting wages, it is not about cutting conditions; a job plan is about making sure there is a proper analysis of the economy, that you look at the areas where there is going to be job growth. You do not to stand up and speak platitudes and say there is no such thing as unemployment, that people are unemployed because they do not want a job. That is not true. My staff spend quite a bit of time helping people prepare resumes. We look at linking them with contacts in the local community. I know it is not what those members on the other side of this parliament would do, but we recognise that there is a very tight job market at the moment and it is getting tighter.

Since the Abbott government was elected, the number of jobs that have been available in my electorate and throughout Australia has shrunk. You only have to look at the figures to see that that is the case. We have had an increase in the level of unemployment; the number of people looking for jobs has decreased—that is, the participation rate, people seeking employment. That is because people know that the jobs are not there and the assistance is not there. The assistance is not there because this government really thinks, 'We'll bring in Work for the Dole; we'll tighten up the compliance mechanism'—the opposition support strong compliance mechanisms, but we also support fair compliance mechanisms. We do not support mechanisms that are going to create hardship and we definitely do not support removing the right of people to appeal decisions that have been made. That is unfair: it is taking away people's natural justice and it means that that people can be ridden over roughshod. It has been one of the tenants of this social security system for many, many years—that is, people have the right to appeal decisions that have been made.

This bill was introduced on Thursday, 25 September and it had its own deadline. The government was trying to get it through because it had request for tenders that were due in September. It did not make it; it has failed to actually meet its own deadlines.

This government needs to take a step back. The minister at the table, the member for Cowper—I have been on an employment committee with him in the past—needs to take a step back. He really needs to look at the issues. The area that he represents has got one of the highest levels of unemployment in this country—real unemployment. I have family who live in that area; I know there are a number of Indigenous people who live in his area who cannot find jobs. Businesses open and they absolutely ignore those young people who are unemployed and who are looking for work. It is a retirement area. He should be sitting down and setting up an employment group in his own electorate similar to the one I have. He should be getting out there and looking at running job expos, looking at doing things that will lead to a better outcome for the unemployed people in his electorate.

Once again, I do not support transferring the decision to breach people to the job agencies. Those on the other side stand condemned for their total lack of understanding of issues surrounding unemployment and how to actually facilitate people re-entering the workforce. (Time expired)

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