Tag: welfare

Friday Foodbank Musings

Happy Liptember! The month where I actually wear lipstick and raise funds for women’s mental health projects.

Had a few good conversations this morning about *waves hands around* all of this. Cost of living, Centrelink, gatekeeping and waste from charities, attitudes towards addicts and more. A couple  were in the line for the Ozharvest bag, where the inaccessible nature of the whole process came up because they make us wait outside the gate until 9am, and getting down the driveway or foot or in wheelchairs is hairy at best and they just don’t seem willing to make exceptions. I mean, they don’t even have a designated disabled park on site, and the other parks are up a slope from the doors.

Spams and other tinned meats
Apparently the woolies beef is only 20c cheaper than retail…

I exchanged pleasantries with the volunteers, asking if it was fine to take a fruit and veg bag as well as the pies this week, and yeah there was plenty this week, but I remarked that I didn’t want to get in trouble because if I take one and get told no that was wrong it feels like I’m being told off, and sometimes I think I actually am. Like the time I asked “Hey is it okay is I take a bag of pies” and Sandra was “Please?” ugh. Yes ma’am please mam, I was being pleasant til you got school principal on me. Apparently she also put a guy’s daughter through questioning, which he felt was because “she’s an addict and looks like an addict” and left her feeling like never coming back. He and I talked about playing the meek and grateful role when it’s for ourselves but sometimes getting more than a little protective and defensive of others.

Bread was also in abundance today, which is good because I wound up buying the $8 fancy eggs from Woolies after Aldi was out and Woolies only had the Lake Macquarie local ones left. Good thing it’s pension day!

Two point something percent indexation in not next fortnight’s but the fortnight after. Plus that 10% rent assistance cash splash that Albo was touting that will do SFA, but seems to appease some of the numbers guys.  I’ll be on a whole $1061.60 a fortnight from October 4. I’ll be getting paid for my 3 hours a week work too, let’s see how that affects things!

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Odds are, Bill, the sun WILL come out tomorrow, but the vulnerable will be worse off, and I don’t see Labor changing that any time soon

So Bill thinks we’re all getting a little hysterical when we say that people will die because of the NDIS legislation they’ve pushed through with Pauline’s help. He tells us not to be anxious and that the sun’ll come out tomorrow. I know it will Bill, it’ll be above average temperatures all week on the East Coast and all. But people will be worse off, and have their care needs neglected because of your legislation. They will also be more vulnerable to taking their own lives because of losing supports that keep them safe and healthy, and because of punitive Robo whatever actions you’re overseeing with the lovely staff leftover from Robodebt that have found new lives in the NDIA compliance teams.

I’m not going to put in links to reference this post, I’m sick, and have a GP appointment at 12.15. One that I get to pay $80 upfront for because your government has not helped Medicare bulk billing, and nowhere around here routinely bulk bills concession card holders anymore.

Jimmy’s also promised that he won’t do anything on the welfare end either in the lead up to the election. So, we don’t have to worry about being hopeful or disappointed and we can move straight into getting the Greens and Independents to promise real action on welfare. We have all the evidence that lifting welfare to the poverty line won’t affect Jim’s Inflation, but Labor won’t help us, so it’s time to go around them. Jimmy said this morning there’ll be a March budget ahead of the May election. So that’s his last chance to disappoint us and tell us he thinks we deserve poverty to make his bottom line look nicer.

Are you a unionist? How are you feeling about the Labor- Union relationship with the CFMEU? You don’t have to think that the CFMEU are good or bad to agree that it seems a bit of overreach and a real threat to the union movement to have worked with the LNP to impose 3 years administration….

So, I want a magic answer from the GP, I need to this cough gone. It’s getting in the way of me actually getting out and doing the things I’m otherwise ready to do mentally. I need to be able to talk. And yell. And scream. And rage against this fucking machine.

Middle fingers up til the reaper shows up.

Happy EOFYS! (Don’t let the tax cuts overwhelm you on the way out)

You can’t have missed it. EVERY AUSTRALIAN TAXPAYER IS GETTING A TAX CUT. Well, anyone earning above the tax free threshold is. Anyone paying GST or excise other other taxes that disproportionally impact the poorer peeps only isn’t.

Apparently, recipients of the age pension, a disability support pension and carer payments will be able to earn more before their payments are reduced. Singles can now earn $212 a fortnight (previously $204) and couples can earn $372 (previously $360). Let’s ignore the face that those people are currently on sub-poverty level payments because they’re supposed to be caring for themselves or others full time and really shouldn’t have to go out to work for that elusive block of cheese. Aspirational cheese.

I’m still slightly bitter that the energy rebate is less, even though it was just stupid to begin with. Also jelly of those states going to elections getting extra from their state labor where GST splits have allowed it. My bill is only going up, and here I am hoping my stepson’s JobSeeker application gets approved before the next bill so we can use his backpay to pay that. Waiting time for Jobseeker is still about 12 weeks I hear, so it lines up.

I’ll be relieved when tomorrow comes and the mailing lists I’m signed up for for various organisations with charitable status will stop asking for end-of financial year contributions. Though I have shared this one for Southlakes, the local community support organisaion near me that’s run on the smell of an oily rag, feeding families each week after Centrelink refers them their way rather then government deigning it time to Raise the Rate above the poverty line.

$12 bag of expired food items from a foodbank

I’ve starting attending rental inspections for the step-kid and bub to mover back to Newcastle, there’s so little out there and so many families at each inspection. At least we all have housing, it’s not ideal but it’s shelter.

I’m tired, sore and disappointed. Happy Budget Hangover day

This but it’s May 2024:

A couple of days ago we heard that there was gonna be some sort of increase to the useless rent assistance payment in this budget. That turned out to be 10% from September 20’s next indexation, up to $9/week depending on how much you already get, if you’re one of people who can actually access it. If my rent goes up less than $10/week at the end of the year (if I’m lucky enough to get a renewed lease hey) I’ll be shocked. Shocked.

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5000 people on JobSeeker who have assessed work capacity of <15 hours (and by all rights should be on DSP if the rules for that weren’t so restrictive) will get a slightly higher rate of Jobseeker, like the over 55s who have been on Jobseeker for 9 months or more. I guess it’s their substitute for not having a sickness benefit – so Cancer patients can afford to pay for parking at the hospital for treatment or something.

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No actual JobSeeker or other welfare increases, despite the hopes and prayers of the community sector and the Economic Inclusion Advisory Committee. Thoughts and prayers that I beg them to at least persist with for the next 12 months, because Labor can’t be re-electable without a plan to bring welfare payments to the poverty line in their 2025 election promises.

The $300 energy bill subsidy for all is less than pensioners and families got this financial year (you might be getting some extra in Qld or WA from their state labor governments going to elections this year), and won’t be felt by those who don’t need it and $50 less subsidy a quarter WILL be felt by me. So Yeah. Not impressed. Also, straight to the billing company, quarter by quarter no chance of using it in one hit to catch up or to use for something else. (or someone else if you want to spend your subsidies and tax cuts on Andrew Leigh’s dream of a doubled charity sector by 2030).

Medicines are being capped at their current top rates ($7.70 for pensioners, $31.60 for everyone else) for a few years. So that’ll mean getting less behind, something I yelled about them doing sooner, and yay they’ve done it. Which is great, cos I’ve been having health concerns, and having to pay upfront for the GP isn’t going anywhere for most of us as most GPs haven’t returned to bulk billing, and the average gap in $44 a session now. My scans and blood tests were bulk billed last week, but still need $76 upfront for an appointment for follow-up  so I’m going on Friday, pension day!

I’ll leave you with the darling Catherine Caine, brains behind Nobody Deserves Poverty, and her budget reaction from last night.

Love yas. xo

Why should we care about poverty?

So I started a short course last night – “Understanding Poverty, Inequality and Social Disadvantage in Australia“. My fees were paid for by AUWU, which was sweet of them, and will help put me on the same page as all the not for profits and their staff doing and writing the course when I’m posting for Nobody Deserves Poverty. Last night’s lecture was a lot of background theory and definitions, I may have glazed over at points when they started talking numbers, but it was good to be able to take time to do readings and put my thoughts into words for a more academic audience, rather than my blog posts or Twitter. Like formulating a response to someone hinting towards personal responsibility for poverty without saying as much in pre discussions. But still bringing myself and my experiences, I mean I was there in the Zoom with my hello kitty fleece and onesies downunder onesie on….

In two weeks Jim’ll have given his budget speech, papers will have their winners and losers, and other parties and organisations will be preparing their responses. And there will be a year til the Federal Election. Which should be interesting, let’s see if Albanese can come back from angering many women on the weekend, not just by lying by lying about lying, and using the “But I’m the primeminister” line which was not at all helpful.

Free coffee!

We were talking in line at the foodbank this morning, since we were there before opening, about how everyone is just extra stressed at the moment, and that how if someone pushes in here or another example was a guy wandering cluelessly in front of the like at Centrelink, you have to be cautious about calling them out on it. Because sometimes you get the oops, I’m sorry, but sometimes you might get punched. If politicians aren’t able to keep their cool with women and model that behaviour, how’s everyone else going?

So, why should we care about poverty? was a question posed at some time last night. Perhaps it’s beyond politicians to care about it because of it being the right thing to do to look after others, but perhaps the possibility of being voted out, of rising unrest among the masses, might make them care. Or they may just try to arrest their way through it.

It’s the start of May, so I’m meant to look back at some of the things I got at the foodbanks last month. It was an up and down month financially here, with the boys struggling to finish a job and finally getting paid for it, and different places being closed for school or public holidays, or simply not having deliveries that week. But there was a great rockmelon, a terrible bottle of vanilla pepsi max that got poured down the sink, and so many breads and crackers.

I also did a lovely roast chicken with veges from OzHarvest. These little bean tubs keep giving, and I still get very excited when there’s bananas! Then we had good paydays, and braved the supermarkets screaming why is everything so expensive and paying because we could this fortnight for the big and little things we’d been holding out on. I finally got olive oil, but I keep forgetting soy sauce.

There’s 10+ days of rain here, so the boys are working between the showers. Occasionally someone stops to look at the boat for sale on the front lawn but moves on. I’m trying to keep up with washing on the racks, still trying to figure the best place for them. I looked at the app for the electricity and estimate on that freaked me out. So while I think there are many better ways than paying the electricity companies money directly to subsidise our bills, I’m really hoping, personally, for it to continue for another year lol. I’ve said before I don’t see how they could end it before the election, they’ve cornered themselves on that one.

So, happy May Day.