Community sector and unions call on new Parliament to outline priorities for overcoming poverty and disadvantage in Australia
As the new Parliament sits, community organisations and unions have called on the Government, the Opposition, The Australian Greens and the independents to outline their priorities for combating poverty during Anti Poverty Week 2010.

With unemployment at 5.1%, there are still 611,000 people looking for work. Current economic conditions have brought some benefits, but glaring inequalities remain:

    * Young people and sole parents are particularly hard hit, competing for jobs in the face of unemployment rates of 14% and 10% respectively.
    * The level of long-term unemployment is now rising: 300,000 people on the (unemployment) Newstart Allowance having received that payment for longer than a year.
    * Seven million Australians go without the dental treatment they need due to cost.
    * Indigenous poverty and social disadvantage remains acute, with life expectancy for Indigenous people well below that of the total population and infant mortality for Indigenous infants at three times the rate of non-Indigenous infants.
    * Corporate profits are up strongly and profits share of national income is now near the record highs of 2008, but the wages share is the lowest since 1964.
    * The gender pay gap also remains a disappointing 17.3%.
    * Internationally, Australia is yet to announce plans to meet UN targets for overseas aid.


“On 4.3 million occasions last year Australians requested help from community services. Yet throughout the federal election and since the formation of Government we have seen scant support for those Australians who are missing out the most,” said Australian Council of Social Service CEO Dr Cassandra Goldie. “This includes jobless Australians for whom there has been no real increase in unemployment
payments for almost two decades.”

Addressing the need for improvements in the life experiences and outcomes of Indigenous Australians, Reconciliation Australia CEO Leah Armstrong said: “Despite the growing—and welcome—focus on closing the ‘gaps’ across a range of social indicators, reconciliation remains critical to addressing Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander poverty. In our solutions, we must be mindful of the historical aspects of Indigenous disadvantage that are played out in the disparities we see today.”

“Decent work is a vital part of the economic and social development of many people’s lives,” noted Australian Council of Trade Unions President Ged Kearney. “In striving for a more cohesive and equal society, we need to strengthen and secure workers’ rights to employment and income security through collective bargaining and to maintain a minimum wage that promotes social inclusion, a fair and relevant safety net, and improves fairness and equity in Australian society.”

Marc Purcell, Executive Director of the Australian Council for International Development said: “Over the past two years, nearly 100 million people in developing countries were plunged back into extreme poverty – living on less that $2 a day - as a result of the Global Financial Crisis and food price spikes. Bipartisan commitment to the halving global poverty by 2015 and the Millennium Development Goals is welcome, however the Government and Opposition need to announce their timetables for committing to the UN Target of 0.7% of Gross National Income for overseas aid, in the run up to the next Federal Budget”.

The four organisations represent community services, trade unions, development organisations and the commitment to reconciliation between Indigenous and non-Indigenous Australians. They have identified priorities to overcome long term unemployment by addressing the barriers to work; reducing the vulnerability of jobless households; highlighting the decent work agenda; strengthening reconciliation by closing the gap for Indigenous Australians; and working internationally to contribute to the reduction of poverty worldwide.

At the start of the new Parliament, the groups called on the major parties and independents to respond to a set of major areas and initiatives that had been identified for reform; and to outline their own priorities to reduce poverty and address disadvantage in Australia and internationally.

Community priorities for an Australian Government anti-poverty agenda:

    * Provide opportunities for low income earners and job seekers to improve skills and get ahead in the labour market.
    * Reform the social security system so that payments are based on minimum costs of living.
    * Reform Australia’s tax system to ensure that it is fair, equitable and sustainable.
    * Promote better work-family and work-life balance.
    * Strengthen and secure workers’ rights to employment and income security.
    * Maintain a minimum wage that promotes social inclusion, a fair and relevant safety net, and improves fairness and equity in Australian society.
    * Work to guarantee respect for the rights of all workers in Australia and put an end to poverty, inequality, discrimination and exploitation.
    * To acknowledge the ongoing role of reconciliation in ending Indigenous poverty, and to work harder to involve Indigenous people at all levels of policy design and implementation.
    * For Australia to develop the Close the Gap agenda to include a range of targets that address the dimensions of poverty.

5.1 per cent unemployment does not seem to bad.  Then again, of course governments want us to think we have low unemployment.  One must ask the question though, what is the real unemployment number?.  What about the people that are the hidden unemployed?.  The ones that the government don't want us to know about, so they are not counted in the official ABS figures.

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It is, if you happen to be a member of that 5.1%.


The 5.1% that the Govt and the 'right' don't give a flying frack about.

Sounds to much like socialism crooked one. Australians don't want to be socialists.