Joanne Ryan (Lalor, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Hansard source

I rise this evening to speak on the Social Services Legislation Amendment (Welfare Reform) Bill 2017 and the amendments moved by Ms Macklin. Where I grew up and where I come from, I am fairly well known as someone who calls a spade a spade. This piece of legislation is a continuation of this government's attacks on the most vulnerable in our communities.

The 2014 budget was like a sledgehammer on Australia. Since the leadership changed from the member for Warringah to the member for Wentworth, all we've seen from this government is a change in the salesperson and a change, through legislation, to find clever, more devious ways to hurt the poor, hurt the vulnerable and unpack the social compact that this country has relied on for decades. This bill is another example of that. There are a few simple, cosmetic changes in this bill that are not controversial, but hidden behind them are some of the most controversial things that we have seen happen in this space in decades. At a time when inequity is at a 75-year high, we are witnessing a government attempting to make people think not once, not twice, but three, four, five or six times before they reach or ask for assistance. That's what's happening here.

There is a building of bureaucracies that is finding small ways to lock people out of welfare and out of the support that they might need to get through the toughest days of their life. Let's build small things that incrementally, one on top of the other, spread like a disease through the community so that people no longer say, 'You should go down to Centrelink. You should be able to get Newstart. You've been unemployed now for a while, and your family could do with that income.' No, what's going to spread through the community is: 'Don't bother trying. Centrelink's an awful place. Centrelink can make you unwell. Centrelink is where you have to deal with uncaring people with no discretion about how they apply the laws. Centrelink is a place that is not friendly to people who are doing it tough.'

This legislation is about kicking people when they are down. It's been dressed up all day as being about love and about the taxpayer not supporting an addict's habit. What a ridiculous thing—to suggest that is contained in this bill. What this bill contains are measures that, if broadly advertised across this country, will mean that young people in my electorate don't apply for Newstart, and that's the aim of this legislation. It's a message to any young person who may indulge on the weekends in what the law determines is an illegal drug. We don't want them to do that—nobody does—but that's not what this bill's about. This bill's about telling them not to apply for Newstart. This bill's about telling them, 'There's a trial going on in your community. You should move electoral boundaries; get yourself out of that community.' So, what's going to happen in Mandurah? Well, a lot of people who may be on Newstart and are worried about a drug test may just move a couple of blocks away and get themselves out of the testing space. Of course, they'll be people who are more likely to be renting than owning, and therefore more likely to move than not.

This legislation has a couple of really key things, some really nasty things. The wife pension cuts—it's being phased out. Only a sadist would put this into a piece of legislation and stop that support. New people cannot apply. We're looking at a cohort of people who are going to be phased out naturally as they go to the age pension—to save what? There are others, like the changes to bereavement support. Speak of kicking people when they're down. Here it is, hidden in there. A group of people on their very worst day, when they've lost their partner, are no longer going to get the kind of support that they came to expect.

The broader picture here is about sending messages. It's about signalling. It's more than a drip. The 2014 budget was a sledgehammer aimed at the poorest. This piece of legislation is part of the Turnbull government's much slicker operation, but the impacts are exactly the same. This is a government that brings on this legislation aimed at actively discouraging people from seeking support not only for their drug addiction but also for their poverty. That's what this bill does, and it comes on the back of the government wanting to give corporate tax cuts worth billions. I don't know how this government can justify putting in the bill what it wants to wrap up as some tinkering-around-the-edges changes but then come in here and say it's a massive reform. It's massive, all right, because it's going to see the number of people being supported by our welfare system drastically reduced.

When I look at the drug testing and the ramifications, the worst part is that if those people who are using drugs don't apply for Newstart, or if those people worried about being caught using drugs go off Newstart, the government will walk into this chamber and they'll say, 'Look at the success rate we've got,' because nobody's testing positive. It's a perfect scenario, really! Luckily, on this side of the chamber, we're onto them. Luckily, on this side of the chamber, we know people doing it hard and we know the number of people who have a relative or someone who lives on their street doing it hard. This is not the Howard era; you can't divide this community so neatly anymore. Equity's at a 70-year high. There are more Australians doing it tough, and wages growth is minimal. There are more Australians not looking over their shoulders, being jealous of one another; they're looking at one another, worried about one another.

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