Single mum on JobSeeker faces eviction
After her child turned 14 last November, Therese was dumped on JobSeeker. She's now being threatened with a Notice to Vacate by her rental provider.
Last week, the government repeatedly crowed about the latest round of routine CPI indexing, which “increased” welfare payments like JobSeeker by 96 cents a day. This comes as an insult to recipients, like Therese, who is struggling to keep a roof over her and her daughter’s head.
Therese is now crowdfunding to cover her bills and rental costs. She shares her story below. The AUWU continues to demand the immediate increase of all welfare payments to the Henderson Poverty Line.
As a single parent who doesn’t receive child support, being left without a job just before Christmas, during this cost-of-living and rental crisis, was devastating – and never should have happened. It didn’t need to happen. Having to sign up to Workforce Australia at that point, and being told that the processing of my JobSeeker claim might be delayed because it was the seasonal time of year, was very frustrating.
It’s a great narrative isn’t it: “You haven’t got a job so you have plenty of time on your hands to look for one”. This is what I’ve heard from Workforce Australia when I have rung them to discuss my obligations. Wrong! Most of my waking hours and most of my sleepless nights, since my job ended, have been spent firefighting bills, creditors, negotiating payments and reaching out to organisations for support. All while being under constant threat of losing the roof over our heads. Not long after I explained my predicament to the real estate agent, my rent was increased by $195 per month. That is the world we live in. It doesn’t need to be this way. I am always behind on rent now and am teetering on the edge this week of being 14 days overdue. Yesterday, the real estate agency threatened to send me a Notice to Vacate.
This is why I am flabbergasted to learn how pitiful the indexed “increase” to welfare payments, particularly rent assistance, is. While in a recent Channel 7 report, financial pundit Sally Tindall acknowledges “it’s not a huge boost”, she also declares it “great news for people on those important payments”. I’m not sure Sally is in the position to judge whether it is “great news”. Any increase is better than none, but the truth is the increase of between $2.27 and $3.40 for rent assistance is ludicrous. My rent has increased by 11%. And from what I’ve heard from other people, this is the thin edge of the wedge. Due to last week’s indexing, rent assistance is being increased by 1-1.5%. Are you kidding me? If the government is serious about helping people keep a roof over their family’s heady, rent assistance should increase to correspond with the rent increase the agent and owner have handed me.
What do they think we are using our benefits on? The government appears to still be operating on a narrative that circulated in the 1970’s and 1980’s that if you are on the “dole” you are a “bum” or “a beach bum” as they used to say … even though the world has moved on. I have a strong track record of employment across five decades! And I am still years away from being eligible for the aged pension. I just want someone to employ me. I have a strong and diverse work history, being employed in education, government departments, social housing, and other not-for-profits. I have a lot to offer a workplace in terms of my breadth of experience and knowledge. Surely this counts for something.
In the meantime, I will search for a carpark I think will be safe enough for my daughter and I to park in at night to sleep. Real estate agents and home owners have been given a non-accountable licence to increase rents as high as they like — all because this country has bigged up, for so many, many years, the power of property ownership, only ever achievable by some. By all means, cap rent assistance, but cap it at a realistic level to maintain human dignity and protect people from losing a roof over their heads. With a property, like a job, once you have one, everything possible should be done to help you maintain it. This rental crisis problem hasn’t been caused by those of us who are forced to rent and have the constant threat of losing our homes hanging over our heads, so why are we paying for it? No parent with children — and nobody ever — should have to be forced to live in tents or cars in this country, or anywhere in this world. It is an unnecessary disgrace.
Days can go by before I even have the opportunity to look for a job, let alone apply for one. Take last week for instance: my daughter was going on school camp and I was trying to shelter her as much as possible from what is happening. I want her to have a good and happy life and not grow up in the shadow of poverty. I have very limited funds to use for some essentials she needs, so I have been avoiding putting petrol in my car. When I received news earlier last week that my elderly mother had been injured in a car accident, I had no way of driving the 66 kilometres to see her. In fact, when I tried to use my car so I could pick up the few essential items I could afford to ensure my daughter was prepared for camp the next day, it wouldn’t start. I had to call the RACV. Apparently my car wouldn’t start, because even though it had some petrol in it, it wasn’t enough to start it, because I was parked on a very slight incline and all the petrol was sitting in the wrong place.
Earlier that day, my mobile phone had been cut off. A friend kindly afforded me the $30 to have it reinstated, but I lost my accumulated data because of the few hours gap between it not being paid. Having an elderly mother, now injured, and a child with an anaphylaxis plan (due to severe nut allergies) about to go on camp, I could not be without a phone.
That same day our WiFi was cut off. My daughter needs WiFi for her schoolwork — it’s not a luxury item, it’s a necessity. And we don’t have any other means of entertainment. We don’t get to have trips to the beach. I have negotiated extra time (one week) with the internet company to pay the bill.
The previous few weeks, I have also been recovering from an illness. I had to pay for antibiotics and dressings — each dressing costs around $10 and I needed to see a nurse every second day. More travelling, more costs.
The jobs I am forced to apply for — those on the Workforce Australia’s job search platform — take me to other sites that want money to improve my apparently-severely-lacking CV, so I can get a job. In some cases these dodgy companies want hundreds of dollars to (allegedly) improve my CV, which after decades of robust employment and experience, they say just isn’t up to standard. Here’s a thought: just give us a job. Give us a job and support us in doing it well, instead of wasting millions of dollars trapping us in a job search industry.
https://www.nobodydeservespoverty.org.au/