Says it all...
Joe Hockey may be sorry, but that doesn't mean he gets itThe treasurer is really, really sorry for his comments about poor people, but even his apology shows he is still out of touchLenore Taylor, political editor
Friday 15 August 2014 19.14 AEST
Joe Hockey says he is really, really, sorry the disadvantaged may have somehow got the impression he, or the government, did not care about them.
Because in fact the government is doing its “very best” for the disadvantaged – by making the welfare and health systems “sustainable” with the policies outlined in the budget.
Those policies include the cuts to health, pensions, welfare, education and family payments which have resulted in multiple sets of modelling concluding that the impact of the budget is unfair. And they don’t include numerous other ways spending could have been cut, or revenue raised, and the budget brought back to surplus, which would not hurt the poor.
If this is really Hockey’s idea of a budget that shows compassion for the disadvantaged, he is even more out of touch than people thought he was after his ridiculous comments about poor people not driving very far.
Perhaps he could read the submissions to a Senate inquiry into the budget’s welfare changes, where I came across a case study of a man who had sought help from St Vincent de Paul.
He was a 64-year-old from somewhere near Bathurst who had been forced to give up his lifelong job as a truck driver in 2013 after a serious heart attack. He could no longer work, even casually, and was living on a disability support pension. After he had paid rent and power he had $135 a week – which also had to cover around $40 a week in medical prescription costs.
The man had sought financial counselling and had tried to save money in many ways but he still couldn’t make ends meet and was forced to ask for help from Vinnies several times before deciding to move to a shack on a small bush block he owned, without power or running water.
“He will have to use lanterns and a battery radio, and work out ways to heat water and keep food cool. He is willing to live there even though it is not designed or insulated to be a home, and every time it rains the roof leaks, so that he is obliged to put out buckets to catch the drips. The move takes him further away from his beloved daughter and grandchildren. Mr X feels that the only way that he can cope with the cost pressures on his small income is to quit town and move to barely habitable accommodation in a remote location,” Vinnies writes in its submission.
The budget proposes to index the age and disability pensions by the CPI, usually a lower amount than the average weekly earnings that have until now been the benchmark for an annual increase.
The fact that unemployment benefits have been indexed by the lower amount is the reason they are now worth $7,500 a year less than the pension.
Once the pension is also indexed by the lesser amount, the former truck driver on his back block with no power will, over time, have even less money to meet his needs. And almost straight away, if the budget gets through, he will have to find $7 for his first 10 visits to the doctor.
Did the government’s “very best” extend to thinking about the real lives of pensioners like this man?
http://www.theguardian.com/world/2014/aug/15/joe-hockey-apology-welfare-budget-poor-people
