Catholic Welfare concern at reforms

Sydney
22 December 2002

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Catholic Welfare concern at reforms

By Marilyn Rodrigues

Attempts at welfare reform should be aimed at helping people who rely on income support, and "not punish them further, making it tougher than it already is", says Catholic Welfare Australia.

It was commenting on a Government consultation paper on welfare reform - Building a Simpler System to Help Jobless Families and Individuals - which it described as a "positive initiative".

The paper was launched by the Minister for Family Services and Community Services, Senator Amanda Vanstone, and Employment and Workplace Relations Minister Tony Abbott, with an invitation for written submissions from the community.

Catholic Welfare Australia welcomes the invitation "to participate in this consultation on possible reforms", says national director Toby O'Connor."The Government appears genuinely interested in engaging in public debate with the community about the options for improving the current system," he says.

"However, Catholic Welfare Australia remains concerned that the Government's efforts in welfare reform are not used as an exercise in reducing payments to people receiving income support and penalising the most financially disadvantaged in our community.

"If welfare reform is to be effective then more resources need to be diverted to addressing the systemic cause of poverty and to job creation schemes."

The paper seeks to begin community debate on how the current social security payment system, which has 15 different types of payments for people of working age, and leads to some inconsistencies, might be simplified and made fairer.

With the current structure, some adult full-time students get less than unemployed people and sometimes people are worse off if they get a pay rise, especially if they have a number of dependent teenage children.