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

I rise to speak on the Social Security (Administration) Amendment (Income Management to Cashless Debit Card Transition) Bill 2019. As has been firmly established by the member for Barton and other speakers from this side this afternoon and this evening, the opposition are seeking to amend this bill and are unable to support it in its current form. The government's proposal in its current form is nothing but a short-term solution for issues that have arisen over a long period of time. It is a planned short-term solution that we now have evidence will not actually fix anything.

While we should always be scrupulous with the administration of taxpayers' money, the government's selection of locations can be described as questionable at the least, and we must seriously address the origin of the problems the government is claiming it is trying to solve in these communities.

There are many failings with the cashless debit card. We know this is a stalking horse for a national rollout of the cashless debit card. Labor has said and I repeat today that we will have no part in any national rollout or extension of the cashless debit card. One of the issues I have with it is that it's discriminatory and applies predominantly to our First Nations Australians. They have rolled it out into the Northern Territory, where 80 per cent of Northern Territory citizens on income management are Indigenous Australians; 23,000 Territorians are on social security payments. We've learnt from the past, via the Intervention, that there's no clear evidence to suggest that broad based income management works, and the consequence of this is that it will diminish the work of the Closing the Gap strategy. Research, as we've heard from the member for Jagajaga and the Menzies School of Health Research, has even found that birth weight of Indigenous babies—a key indicator of disadvantage and one of the seven Closing the Gap targets—actually declined under compulsory income management. There is no better indicator that this is a failed idea.

The government's arrogance in this space has been on display with the fact there has been next to no consultation with communities about the expansion. Shockingly, what we have seen from other instances is that the card has actually exacerbated the social harms it was designed to reduce or prevent. Those opposite argue they're trying to tackle drug use. They see a complex issue and apply a simplistic solution that does not work. If they're trying to stop the purchasing of alcohol, they need to find a solution to alcohol abuse in these communities. In an evaluation conducted by the University of New South Wales, it was concluded there was no empirical evidence to suggest that income management leads to behavioural change. The missing element in the government's approach is the wraparound support required to change lives.

In short, the things that will work are not there. Instead, there's blind belligerence about imposing something that we have no evidence will work. What will work is community education and the empowerment of individuals through employment. Tackling historical disadvantage in these communities is how we solve this issue, not a piece of plastic that demeans the bearer. Labor cannot support this bill in its current form, because not one job will come of it. It's costly and we know it will not work. We want to see the cashless debit card become voluntary, as it was originally—where a community genuinely wants the card introduced, or for an individual case where we know that willingly joining income management will assist. Where a community genuinely wants to use the card, it is up to the government to properly consult with and provide the necessary support for that community, because willingly signing up for income management may have benefits and may lead to financial literacy.

I think about my own life and approaching a credit union when I was a single parent of three children, working part-time, managing a budget and paying a mortgage. I approached my credit union, I asked for support and advice and I was given that support and advice. Did it work for me? Did income management, when I willingly engaged in it, work? Yes, it did. If it had been imposed on me, I would have rebelled. If it had been imposed on me, I would have resented it. If it had been imposed on me, it would not have worked. Human nature is not that difficult to understand. We need things that are consistent with the principle of self-determination. In the situation where a community genuinely wants to try the card, I do not believe it is the government's role to be a blockade to that process. To reiterate: the opposition is not opposed to income management per se or in all circumstances, but we are opposed to broad-based, compulsory programs that disempower people without appropriate consultation and support.

To impose this in a broad-based way across an entire territory is Dickensian. As the member for Lingiari so eloquently put it today, when you match it with the CDP, with the mutual obligation to work 30 hours a week to get your social security, and then match it with the CDC, what we're looking at is an empathy-free zone, a Dickensian regime, incarceration without walls and incarceration by card. To be clear: Work for the Dole in our communities is 20 hours for mutual obligation, but in remote communities the CDP demands 30 hours of work—30 hours of work for your social security payment, and now we'll impose income management on top of that. It is incarceration by card—incarceration by payment.

We've heard lots of evidence. We've had evidence from the Senate inquiry. We've come to this position because we've actually listened to the experts. We've heard much evidence that the card is not working in the way it was designed to in previous rollouts. That's because there are loopholes. This bill seeks to grossly expand a program, even though, in its current form, there are blatant loopholes that mean it is a failed program, and even when the intent is supported. Australians who the government claims need the cashless debit card the most find ways around it. The technology and the processes of the cashless welfare card simply do not meet the objectives it sets out to meet.

We have heard that people on these cards are still able to gamble. They still manage to buy alcohol and drugs. If the intent of the card, as the government claims, is to fix these entrenched, complex social issues with a simplistic solution, it's failing. People are still accessing and buying cigarettes. They're still buying pornography. They're still gambling. The ease at which they are doing so is jaw dropping. They buy a credit card, purchase what the government wants to be prohibited items and use their cashless welfare card to pay the debt. It's a really simple loophole.

We've also heard, at the recent Senate inquiry into the matter, from a range of submissions about how it puts a burden and stigma on vulnerable Australians who need a helping hand from their government. After hearing the evidence and reading submissions, one conclusion can be made: this card does not solve the problems it is meant to. Professor Matthew Grey and Dr Rob Bray said in their submission that:

… a review of data relating to child health and wellbeing, school participation and outcomes, alcohol consumption and impact, and crime and justice … clearly shows that there has been a total absence of any improvement in the outcomes for Indigenous people in the Northern Territory which can be attributed to income management …

They went on:

… the evidence strongly shows that the simplistic conceptualisation of income management and the Cashless Debit Card, and the purported benefits of these policies, are false.

Other submissions suggested that there is no evidence that the cashless debit card translates into employment, which we know is the real step to dignity. More than 60 per cent of Indigenous Australians on compulsory income management were on income management for over six years. The government should put its efforts into solving the social problems besetting communities rather than demonising whole communities.

The Senate inquiry also told us something we already knew: it is stopping vulnerable Australians from being able to purchase the essentials—perhaps not the intended consequence, but a consequence nevertheless. A submission from researchers from both Griffith University and The University of Queensland used real-life examples of this. One story told was the experience of a parent who had had their card declined at their child's soccer game when trying to purchase them a bottle of water. The damage caused by this one moment is something we need to take into account when thinking about this bill. We need to think about the stress placed on the parent. We need to think about the judgement cast by other parents. Unfortunately, we need to think about the earth-shattering embarrassment the child and the parent would have felt. What good does this do the community? How do government MPs feel about that scenario? How would anyone in this chamber feel if that was them trying to buy their child a bottle of water at their soccer match? What benefit is there to have a vulnerable parent feel like this? The submission included many tales, each heartbreaking in their own way.

I implore government members to ask themselves: how would you feel being the parent unable to pay for their child's excursions and their sporting fees simply because that would require cash? Put yourself in the shoes of the parent trying to cope with the fact they are unable to buy their child a bottle of water after they've competed in their sporting passion and ask: how would you feel? These are real, simple examples of where this card fails. It fails in what we would consider ordinary daily events. It therefore requires families to plan more than other families are asked to plan for their weekly events. How would you feel being the Australian unable to buy fresh produce at the market because they don't have an EFTPOS machine? What feeling would you be left with after being unable to buy reading glasses to help with your work because they're not available at your local supermarket? How would you feel when your way of life is diminished, when you're unable to do the things you used to do, stuck at home?

Imagine if this was you:

I was at the shops and one of the machines, it was bit of an older machine and I was trying to get the chip to read and it wouldn't read. I'm putting it in and out and in and out and it just would not read. Usually after the third attempt, it asks you to swipe. With this card, it doesn't.

So after the third attempt, the self-serve light on the top started flashing and I had to wait for the lady to come over and then I had two tradies just behind me and they were like, 'Oh, that's one of them junkie cards'.

I was already a bit panicky because the card wasn't working and I burst just into tears and I was like, 'Oh my goodness, like I've never touched drugs in my life'. I burst into tears trying to get it to work…

I think that story—that real-life story, that real voice of that real Australian—encapsulates for those opposite the stigma that is attached to this precious piece of plastic that they want to impose on tens of thousands of Australians.

Taking all of this into consideration—the stories we have heard and submissions we have read; the many loopholes to access the goods that the government want to make inaccessible—we can see there is a common theme when it comes to this government, the programs they administer and the policies they implement: they are unable to empathise with those people that their policies will affect the most. It's no wonder this Prime Minister needs an empathy consultant. This legislation speaks volumes about the empathy-free zone opposite.

In conclusion, before we vote on Labor's amendment and on this bill, we must ask ourselves this: we've heard about people's previous experiences, so, when comparing those with the government's objectives, will this actually solve the problem? The answer is simple. The answer is no. Changing behaviours requires complex processes, requires wraparound supports. Managing someone's income will not fix an addiction. We know how complex these social issues are, and they require complex solutions. Most importantly, they require commitment, and that commitment has to come with actual resources.

When all is said and done, the failure of this government is that it wants to implement simple ideas, but it doesn't want to do the hard work, it doesn't want to put in place the real resources, the wraparound community supports that it takes to assist addicts to change their lives. This government doesn't want to help deal with the complex needs of those addicted to gambling. It certainly doesn't want to deal with the deep social issues that it claims it sees, which it then suggests simple solutions for. This leaves us absolutely convinced that this is a stalking horse to put the rest of Australia on a mandated system like this. Why won't we support it? It fails to get to the root of problems. It fails to stop the loopholes people are already using. It fails to lift employment. It fails to—

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