Friday 19th of April 2024
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modern poverty...

 

judging tudging

The human services minister, Alan Tudge, has argued increasing welfare and government services to disadvantaged and remote Aboriginal communities will do little to alleviate poverty.

In a speech on child poverty on Thursday, Tudge outlined his view on the alleviation of poverty, which is still experienced by three million Australians, including 731,000 children.

Tudge’s speech to the Centre for Independent Studies in Sydney was largely an argument against further welfare spending and government services.

 

He said government spending had previously helped to reduce “absolute poverty”, but would not address “modern poverty”.

“Just continuing to put more and more government services into places, be they Aboriginal communities or not, and continuing to increase welfare payments, isn’t going to be the solution to the problems which exist in many dysfunctional locations today,” Tudge said. 

Instead, Tudge called for a focus on what he described as the “pathways to poverty” – citing welfare dependency, drug and alcohol abuse, family breakdown and poor education standards.

“Long-term welfare dependence is a poison on the individual, it reduces people’s ability, it reduces people’s confidence,” he said.

Tudge said government payments had increased by 38% in real terms to a couple on unemployment benefits over the past 30 years. Unemployment benefits had increased by 10% in real terms for a single person, he said. 

He also warned support services in Indigenous communities were at “saturation level”, citing 2013 figures from Wilcannia, New South Wales, which suggested there were 102 funded services for an Indigenous community of 474 people.

Tudge used the speech to criticise calls by the Australian Council of Social Service(Acoss) and others for rises in poverty-level welfare payments.

But Acoss said Newstart had not risen in real terms since 1994 and family payments had been effectively frozen since 2010.

Cassandra Goldie, chief executive officer of Acoss, said many recent policy measures took a stereotypical view of welfare recipients rather than relying on evidence.

“Asking people to ‘better manage’ incomes of $38 a day is not the answer. The reality is that poverty hurts and it hurts children the most,” Goldie told Guardian Australia.

read more:

https://www.theguardian.com/australia-news/2017/jul/20/human-services-mi...

 

 

chapter 12...

This chapter analyzes the level of unemployment in a market economy and classifies the debates of the orthodox market-mechanism group with imperfectionists on the problem of unemployment. It begins by examining various interpretations of the notion of a self-adjusting market with respect to John Maynard Keynes’ own view of the market mechanism, followed by a description of the imperfectionist argument that implies unemployment is attributed to rigid or sticky money wages. The chapter concludes with a consideration of the debate over the natural rate/rational expectations hypothesis, in which the theoretical poverty of the imperfectionist position is revealed.

http://www.oxfordscholarship.com/view/10.1093/acprof:osobl/9780199777693...

 

Unemployment is at the source of poverty. That Australian (and the rest of the Western world) hangs on by the skin of its teeth to employing people is only due to a false concept of importing more people to provide shelter (and employment) for. It's a rat chasing its tail in a guinea pig ferris-wheel. Machines are replacing many jobs — and all we are left with is building houses and serving coffee... In some communities, this is not even a possible reality. Part-time job become the norm to be counted as "employed". Mind you in Sweden where machines are working overtime, the government is trialling 6 hour working day for people. People tend to become more efficient and dedicated. One hour a week of employment is not enough though.

the cost of being poor...

Welfare advocates, business leaders and economists have long made the more obvious point, that the problem lies in the fact that, despite 25 years of uninterrupted economic growth, unemployment benefits have not increased since 1994 and now sit well below the poverty line, at a level that makes it almost impossible for recipients to pay for basics such as shelter and food. Even the Business Council of Australia has argued benefits are so low they act as an impediment to unemployed people getting a job.

But Tudge rejects the whole idea that we should measure poverty as a percentage of a country’s average household earnings, such as the OECD’s benchmark of 50% of median income, which puts 3 million Australians, including 731,000 children, below the poverty line.

He says a relative measure like that means that if we have any level of wealth inequality, some of us would be deemed to live in poverty, even if we were all very comfortable in absolute terms.

Instead he proposes a new definition – “absolute deprivation” – a measure of whether people can afford the basics, such as food, clothing, shelter and education, compared with how much they might have had to spend in the past.

read more:

https://www.theguardian.com/australia-news/2017/jul/22/alan-tudge-waves-...

of slavery and shame...

One of the four Aboriginal leaders who supported the government’s cashless welfare card trial in Western Australia says he feels “used” by the human services minister and he no longer supports the card.

Lawford Benning, the chief executive of the East Kimberley’s Gelganyem Trust, regularly met with Alan Tudge ahead of the card’s introduction more than a year ago, and was critical to drumming up support for the card in his community.

But he told Guardian Australia on Wednesday he was ready to publicly state the card had not addressed issues of alcoholism and violence in his community as he was led to believe. The card has been trialled in Wyndham and Kununurra since April 2016, andlegislation introduced last week by the federal government means those trials will continue indefinitely.

read more:

https://www.theguardian.com/australia-news/2017/aug/23/aboriginal-leader...

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A Senate committee investigating a controversial work-for-the-dole scheme has been told it is driving up crime and poverty in Western Australia's remote communities.

The Community Development Program (CDP) covers about 33,000 welfare recipients, but it hascome under fire for punitive measures and a lack of effective results.

The Senate Finance and Public Administration Committee visited Kalgoorlie-Boulder, 600km east of Perth, on Wednesday for the first of three public hearings into the CDP's effectiveness.

While the Government has rejected suggestions the scheme has increased poverty, residents of remote and regional communities told the hearing the program had increased social dysfunction since it was rolled out.

 

read more:

http://www.abc.net.au/news/2017-08-23/community-development-program-driv...

 

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I very much doubt that if it comes time for me to work for the Dole that I will be participating. I would like to hear from anyone with legal knowledge about the Australian Constitution and common law regarding WFD. I fully intend on contesting this in court should it come to it. I stress that I'm not trying to get out of WFD even though I know its a rort (A fair days work for a fair days pay) is what I learned when I was a Union Rep. I wont be offering my labour to anyone who isn't prepared to reimburse me fairly for my time and effort.

AUSTRALIAN Current “Work for the Dole” programs and the so-called ‘voluntary work experience’ programs are simply unconstitutional. PART V.-POWERS OF THE PARLIAMENT. Legislative powers of the Parliament. (Paragraph 51, sub-paragraph xxiiiA) The Parliament shall, subject to this Constitution, have power to make laws for the peace, order, and good government of the Commonwealth with respect to:- The provision of maternity allowances, widows’ pensions, child endowment, unemployment, pharmaceutical, sickness and benefits, medical and dental services (but not so as to authorize any form of civil conscription), benefits to students and family allowances: Lots of stuff in this paragraph including the constitutional obligation to provide welfare allowances to the unemployed that cannot be linked to “civil conscription” programs, i.e. (but not so as to authorize any form of civil conscription) which means that the current “Work for the Dole” programs and the so-called ‘voluntary work experience’ programs are simply unconstitutional. School students doing work experience is one thing, but is it really ‘voluntary work experience’ if adults can be deprived of their constitutional right to an unemployment benefit simply by declining to do two weeks work with no award-rates-payment for this work? Surely, voluntary work experience should be a no-strings-attached option for people seeking work if it really is to be a voluntary process? The answer is that if it is a compulsory activity, then it is Civil Conscription which, as the above section of the constitution makes quite clear, is unconstitutional. The victims of this unconstitutional scam are entitled to be compensated by being paid at award rates for the work that they did, PLUS compound interest, on that unpaid wage for however long they have been unpaid! Some employers have offered work experience or work for the dole programs for years and thus have never had to employ wage earning people to do this work. In effect, work experience has been little more than a nice way of saying SLAVE LABOUR!

read more:

https://www.reddit.com/r/Adelaide/comments/3qxuy8/work_for_the_dole_prog...

at kanbra's sexhouse...

An Australian minister has been stood aside from cabinet after a former staffer claimed their extra-marital affair was abusive at times.

Rachelle Miller alleged that she had experienced bullying and intimidation during her relationship with Education Minister Alan Tudge in 2017.

Mr Tudge said he "completely and utterly rejected" the allegations.

But Prime Minister Scott Morrison said the minister had agreed to stand aside while an investigation commenced.

"I wish to stress that this action in no way seeks to draw a conclusion on these matters... but this is the appropriate action for me to take under the ministerial standards," said Mr Morrison. 

Ms Miller, Mr Tudge's former press secretary, had made their consensual relationship public a year ago - but on Thursday revealed further details. 

 

She said there had been a "significant power imbalance" during their relationship and she had felt "completely under his control".

"The bullying, intimidation, harassment I experienced from him at work completely destroyed all of the confidence I had in my ability. I did not believe I'd find a job anywhere else. I was breaking down in tears regularly," she said.

After the pair split, Ms Miller said she felt "blacklisted" from other jobs within the ruling Liberal party. Mr Tudge was promoted into cabinet in 2019.

Ms Miller's disclosure comes just days after a landmark report found sexual harassment was rife in Australia's federal parliament.

The findings have reignited discussion about Canberra's political culture and the conduct of politicians.

Ms Miller cited the report as a catalyst for her decision to speak out again on Thursday, and called for political leaders to take action.

 

Mr Tudge said he acknowledged that the couple had a "consensual affair", but denied the allegations.

 

Read more:

https://www.bbc.com/news/world-australia-59501182

 

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