Warren Snowdon (Lingiari, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Assistant Minister for External Territories) Share this | Hansard source

I'm pleased to be able to speak in this debate on the Social Services Legislation Amendment (Strengthening Income Support) Bill 2021, but I have to say I'm not too pleased with the outcome of this bill. Whilst we on this side of the parliament will be supporting the legislation because we accept the proposition that any increase to the base rate of these income payments is welcome and important, it is an absolutely lousy amount. And we need to comprehend how lousy it really is.

I listened to the member for Sturt, and my ears pricked up when I heard him say a few things around safety nets and getting off JobSeeker by getting a job. He admitted that living on this would not be too comfortable. So he's accepted the fact that living on an extra $3.57 a day on top of the $40 is not too comfortable and he probably couldn't live on it. 'But it's an incentive to get into work,' he said.

Let's be clear. I note the member for Sturt said, 'Look, we increased this payment by 9.6 per cent,' and said this was the first increase since 1994. Well, that's an indictment of all of us—all of us. I've sat in this parliament since 1994, and we haven't seen an increase in this payment. I'm disgusted. And now we know people are living in dire poverty as a direct result. We have a responsibility in this place to look after the interests of all Australians and to understand what poverty really means.

When I was listening to the member for Sturt I was reflecting on my own electorate, which has large numbers of Aboriginal people who are unemployed, on CDP, living in really remote places where there are just no jobs. Yet we now have the government saying that they're going to change the mutual obligation requirements and provide a hotline to report people who don't turn up to accept a job offer—well, I'm not sure that there are going to be too many job offers in remote communities in the area I look after—and there will be a return to the precoronavirus number of monthly job applications, 20. What 20? Where are these 20 jobs going to appear from? It's just bizarre. Then there are the intensive job preparation activities after six months of unemployment payments. We accept mutual obligation on this side of the chamber, but mutual obligation means 'mutual'. It includes an obligation for us in this parliament and the government to do a lot more than we're doing.

It is more than just an issue about poverty; it's a public health issue. Let me go to the reasons why. The Arnhem Land Progress Aboriginal Corporation has given me some data about the impact of income supplements over the COVID period, what it's meant for people in remote parts of the Northern Territory where the ALPA stores operate and how their sales figures have changed as a result of the COVID supplement. Remember, this is an issue about health. I'm saying it's about public health. During May and April of 2020, the extra social security increased nourishment in the ALPA communities. Access to the chiller and freezer produce went up by 49 per cent, fruit and vegetables by 36 per cent, groceries by 12 per cent, meat by 60 per cent and prepared foods by 12 per cent. This is a public health issue. Now we're saying to those people: 'We're going take this money, which you're using to purchase extra nutrition for your families, off you. That's coming away, and we'll give you a lousy $3.57 extra a day.' We've got to do better than this. We're condemning people to poverty. We're condemning people to poor health outcomes. We are, really. Think about this: how can we expect kids to go to school with a full belly if there's no food in the house? The member for Sturt said he might find this difficult to live on. It's impossible to live on.

As I say, I reluctantly, in a way, support this legislation, but only because even this minuscule amount will make some difference. But it is clearly not enough, and more needs to be done by all of us in this place.

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