Rachel Siewert (WA, Australian Greens) Share this | Hansard source

We will also be opposing these amendments that make an already bad bill, the Social Services and other Legislation Amendment (Promoting Sustainable Welfare) Bill 2018, even worse. I want to take this opportunity while I'm on my feet to draw attention to a few facts—particularly those that have come up since we were debating this in the chamber on Thursday last week.

Organisations have come out very strongly calling on the Labor Party to, in fact, not back this bill. 'ACOSS calls on the Senate to reject social security cuts for migrants'. They put out a release last week:

ACOSS, along with the community sector, calls on the Senate to do the right thing and vote against the bill to make migrants wait up to four years to access social security. There is no justification for cutting off support for people, including children, who are in financial need.

The government's original bill to impose a four year wait to access social security was cruel, and void of good policy. Migrants make huge contributions to our society. We should be supporting them when they need it, not making it harder for them to build a life in Australia.

The amended bill before the Senate, however, will still impose a four-year wait to access Newstart, hurting people most in need. It will also, for the first time, impose a one-year wait to access Family Tax Benefit Part A, which is a crucial payment for low-income families, including families without paid work and families on the minimum wage trying to give their children the best start in life.

ACOSS urges Labor to join the Greens, Centre Alliance and Tim Storer in opposing the bill in the Senate, and protect people from falling further into poverty.

FECCA also put out a media release. They're the organisation that were originally saying that this was a step in the right direction. They've now actually looked into the details and also understand that, just as was demonstrated in this place not 10 minutes ago, we could have knocked off this bill. We could have knocked off the other bills, because we had the numbers to vote no. FECCA wrote:

The Federation of Ethnic Communities' Councils of Australia today—

this was on 29 November—

called on the Labor Opposition, the Australian Greens and cross-bench Senators to reject a bill which extends waiting periods for newly arrived migrants accessing social welfare supports including Family Tax Benefit.

The Chairperson of FECCA, Mary Patetsos said: "This Bill will inflict unnecessary hardship on vulnerable people and is due to be voted on in the Senate shortly.

"Earlier this week FECCA accepted amendments to the Bill on the understanding that there was not enough support in the Senate to defeat it. FECCA now believes that – combined with the votes of Labor Senators and Australian Greens Senators – there are sufficient Cross-bench Senators prepared to vote against this legislation."

FECCA maintains that the Parliament should consider that the inherent risks, while mitigated by the Opposition amendments continue to impose a burden on vulnerable people.

FECCA is the national peak body representing Australians from culturally and linguistically diverse (CALD) backgrounds. Our role is to advocate and promote issues on behalf of our constituency to government, business and the broader community.

There's also a letter, in fact, to the Labor Party, urging them to oppose the migrant social security cuts. They make many similar points. They say:

Migrants make a huge contribution to our society. Our social security system should provide them and their children with the same support to which other residents are entitled. Now that we know the ALP would have the numbers in the Senate to block the worst parts of this bill, we call on you to vote with the Greens, Centre Alliance and Senator Tim Storer to stop the extension of social security waiting periods for recent migrants. We already have three million people living in poverty in Australia. We know that people from non-Englishspeaking backgrounds experience discrimination in getting paid work, and have higher poverty rates than others in Australia. These cuts risk worsening poverty amongst this cohort.

If legislated, this Bill will divide our communities even further, along migrant and racial grounds. These cuts are nasty and harsh, and should be rejected outright.

That comes from ACOSS, FECCA, the ACT Council of Social Service, Anglicare Australia, Asylum Seeker Resource Centre, Carers Australia, Harmony Alliance: Migrant and Refugee Women for Change, Jobs Australia, National Ethnic Disability Alliance, the National Social Security Rights Network, the NT Council of Social Service, the Queensland Council of Social Service, the Settlement Council of Australia, SA Council of Social Service, the St Vincent de Paul Society National Council, Tasmanian Council of Social Service, UnitingCare Australia, the WA Council of Social Service, Women With Disabilities Australia and YWCA Australia. (Quorum formed) As you can see, there are a lot of organisations that care very deeply about the impacts of this atrocious, appalling piece of legislation that could so easily have been knocked off. The only reason this is getting through is because Labor, instead of voting on this side of the chamber with the crossbench, are voting on that side of the chamber to support legislation that condemns migrants to try and survive for four years without income support.

I outlined in my second reading contribution the impact that that will have on people. I also outlined how much harder it is for people, particularly from a non-English-speaking background to navigate our employment services, and we've had that in evidence to the Senate committee. This is bad legislation. It should not be supported. I say to the Labor Party: it's not too late; you've still got the third reading. Vote with us. Vote with the crossbench to send this legislation where it should be, and that's in the bin.