2022-11-25
This year we turned a corner: people voted for change, and what a relief that is.
By Senator Janet Rice
This year we turned a corner. People voted for change, and what a relief that is.
We’ve already seen just how important it is to have Greens in the Parliament. We need to be pushing the Labor government to go further and faster on just about everything, but it’s so good to be doing that dance with them, compared to the previous eight years of fighting against consecutive Coalition governments.
Social safety net
I took on the community services portfolio just over a year ago, when Rachel Siewert stepped down. And what huge shoes to fill, and a huge job to do in this space. It’s been so good to have been proudly working alongside community campaigners, impacted people and advocacy organisations in the fight for social and economic justice over the last year.
When 5.1 million Australians are barely scraping by on Centrelink payment rates below the poverty line, and millions more are facing cost of living pressures and the crushing stress that goes with it – something is deeply wrong and needs to be fixed.
We recently welcomed the end of the Cashless Debit Card, which was a huge win for the more than 12,000 people who will now be able to exit compulsory income management. We were pleased the government agreed to our amendment for the minister to report on progress on a transition plan in each of the four communities, outlining the extra services and supports that will be available after the cashless debit card is abolished. The fight continues, with more than twenty thousand people still trapped on compulsory income management, which we know is punitive, harmful and completely ineffective.
In the lead-up to the election I launched the Greens’ new policy for a liveable income guarantee that would see all government income support payments raised above the poverty line, mutual obligations abolished, and unfair restrictions on who can access the payment removed, to ensure that everyone has the means to cover their basic essential needs.
Make no mistake: poverty is a political choice.
So understandably people on income support were devastated and angry when the new, supposedly progressive Labor government rolled out the Liberal Government’s broken and punitive employment services system, Workforce Australia. The transition to Workforce Australia caused people harm and stress, as the government threatened payment suspensions for people who, through no fault of their own, struggled to navigate the broken new system. My office became a conduit between impacted people and the minister’s office, and I proudly presented the Senate with a petition of more than 31,450 people who called on the government to prevent another robodebt-like disaster by suspending Workforce Australia payment cut-offs for three months.
I’ve heard directly from countless people about how poverty has an acute impact on nearly every aspect of their lives: not being able to afford nutritious food, an education, housing, the resources to get a job, and on their physical health and mental wellbeing. It has been a privilege to share some of these stories in the parliament, elevating the voices that the government seems so intent on ignoring.
After years of inaction by successive governments, this year the Greens established a Senate Committee inquiry into the nature and extent of poverty and cost of living pressures in Australia. As the Chair of this inquiry, I will oversee wide-ranging hearings across the country, enabling people who have been forced to rely on woefully inadequate payments to have their voices heard, and take that evidence into Parliament.
Older people
Today we care for the generation of older people that came before us, and at the same time we are modelling and planning for how future generations will care for us as we age.
A central focus for us is working towards a human rights based approach to aged care, underpinned by a new Aged Care Act that enshrines the rights of older people who are receiving aged care. We’ve consulted with residents, advocacy groups, providers and unions as we’ve examined and moved amendments to aged care legislation to date, and we’ll take that approach on the new aged care bill, when it’s introduced.
Forests
Over the last year I’ve worked with my Greens colleagues and community campaigners across the country in trying to protect our precious native forests.
As part of the climate bill negotiations with Labor, the Australian Greens were able to secure an important commitment to look at removing a Coalition loophole from the Renewable Energy Act, which allows wood sourced from the destructive logging of native forests to be classified as ‘renewable’ energy when burnt in power stations.
Burning wood from native forests in power stations actually releases more carbon into the atmosphere than coal! I’m working with ENGOs, forest campaigners and grassroots groups to seize this opportunity to ensure the Labor Government commits to removing this outrageous loophole.
Earlier this year I fought alongside Senator Lidia Thorpe and my Victorian Greens colleagues when the Victorian Labor Government introduced a bill that will see forest defenders slapped with fines of up to $21,000 or twelve months in jail for protest actions. This is an extreme penalty for peaceful and non-violent protestors who simply want to save our precious forests and the important habitat they provide.
Our forests need to be protected for their own sakes, and for their role in soaking up and storing carbon, as the traditional lands of our First Nations people, their totems and songlines, and for water and wildlife, not destroyed by destructive logging.