Minister Rishworth must meet with welfare recipients — or find a new job
Welfare recipients are barely hanging on. The minister must tell them what she plans to do about the level of welfare payments in the upcoming budget.
Last Friday (March 17th), representatives from AUWU and the Anti-Poverty Network SA arranged a meeting with Minister Amanda Rishworth’s office, to discuss concerns about the rate of welfare payments, and lobby for an immediate increase.
However, when the group arrived at Minister Rishworth’s office for the meeting, they were told she was not available. After the group insisted they still be given the opportunity to air their concerns, they found that the electorate officers weren’t across the issue and couldn’t provide any information. Instead, the contingent was told to email the office for a follow-up response.
This experience left the group of welfare recipients, local constituents, and supporters frustrated and feeling as though they had been fobbed off by the minister.
Numerous attempts have previously been made to raise concerns with the minister through email and each time they have been met with cut-and-paste form responses and well-worn excuses left over from the previous Morrison government.
Anti-poverty activists have even gone to the effort of presenting a petition in parliament, calling for a raise to payments, only for Minister Rishworth to run from the chamber as it was read.
This latest refusal to hear the concerns of people experiencing poverty continues a concerning pattern, revealing the minister’s lack of respect and ignorance towards an issue of critical importance to her portfolio of Social Services.
This level of neglect by successive governments over the last 30 years has left welfare recipients suffering in poverty. The current cost of living pressures have turned this problem into a full-blown crisis of isolation, homelessness and malnutrition.
There is no social issue in Australia that is not exacerbated by our current rates of poverty. Right now, it is one of the defining issues of this country; yet, Minister Rishworth is nowhere to be seen.
The minister must tell Australians struggling to survive in poverty whether the government intends to raise welfare payments above the poverty line in the upcoming federal budget. There can be no more excuses or empty concern. We do not need to hear, yet again, that payments have been subject to routine indexation or that the miserly energy supplement or rent assistance somehow make the payment acceptable.
The payment wasn’t acceptable in December 2019 when Rishworth stood in parliament and accused the Morrison government of letting Australians “languish below the poverty line” or when the current Prime Minister, Anthony Albanese, and a string of Labor MPs called for the payment to be increased from opposition. It is even less acceptable now.
On no other issue could the government get away with such hypocrisy and neglect. No other minister could get away with refusing to face questions from major stakeholders about such a critical issue.
If the government is not going to raise payments above the poverty line in the upcoming federal budget, the minister must face up to those affected and explain why they must endure yet another 12 months of poverty.
If she does not fulfil this basic ministerial responsibility then she must resign.
Media contact:
Jeremy Poxon
0404 089 575 / media@auwu.org.au
Sign up to receive AUWU statements in your inbox as soon as they are published.