| Income support payments remain fundamentally inadequate for recipients to live a life free of poverty. Those also subjected to meeting mutual obligations or having their meagre payments forcefully controlled only adds insult to injury.
Australia has been experimenting with various forms of compulsorily imposed management of income support payments for certain groups of Australians now for over 18 years. It began in the Northern Territory in 2007 as part of the then Federal Government’s Northern Territory Emergency response targeting Aboriginal communities. It has undergone various iterations over the years and been rebadged several times. However, the approach to quarantining proportions of people’s income support payments has remained at the core of all subsequent schemes. From Basics Cards to Smart Cards and Cashless Debit Cards to so called enhanced income management, compulsory income management retains the same flawed principle of restricting the rights and agency of recipients to decide how they spend their money. Compulsory Income Management was introduced as part of a paternalist and racially divisive approach to address perceived social issues in certain communities across Australia. The reality is that CIM continues to be disproportionately applied to First Nations people – particularly those living in the Northern Territory. There are still 30,000 Northern Territorians subjected to CIM with well over 80% being Aboriginal people. The vast majority are on CIM for no other reason than they are designated as long-term welfare payment recipients. Australia has a proud history of moving away from a system of welfare based on food stamps and conditional assistance to a rights-based income support payment system that acknowledges the dignity that comes with having choice and control over one’s own funds. This has been a cornerstone of Australia’s ‘welfare’ system for decades but has been fundamentally eroded with the introduction of CIM. Over the past 18 years, there have been countless studies and evaluations examining the efficacy and impacts of CIM at both a community and individual level across Australia. Overwhelmingly, these studies have demonstrated that any intended positive impacts such as reduced crime rates, public intoxication, gambling activity and family and domestic violence were largely non-existent at best. What they did show were the negative impacts on those who were subjected, without their agreement, to the compulsory management of their income support payments. These included the loss of choice over how people spent their income and the stigma associated when identified as an income support recipient on income management. Problems associated with not having the flexibility of using cash for daily transactions and CIM imposed cards also defaulted at certain businesses. This conclusion was supported in the findings of the most recent Parliamentary Joint Committee on Human Rights in 2024. It found that CIM did not only fail to achieve its stated objective of reducing hardship and harms but contributed to significant negative impacts for those forced onto CIM. Rather than taking on board these results, successive Federal Governments have doubled down on the application of CIM. It is acknowledged that the previous Labor Government went to the election with a promise to end the use of the Cashless Debit Card in select communities and fulfilled this promise early in its term. However, it has failed on its commitment to end all forms of compulsory income management across Australia. Instead, it embarked on an endless round of consultations in communities to work out if there remained any support to maintain a practice widely condemned in research literature and through years of feedback by those forced on to income management. It is true that there are some people who would voluntarily choose to remain on a form of income management to assist with their management of their income. But the key with this feedback is that people overwhelmingly want to have a choice rather than be forced into an arrangement that they have no control over. Consultations concluded several months ago and yet the Government and new Social Services Minister are unable to provide a response as to where next for CIM. The decision seems obvious and clear. We have had more than 18 years of a failed experiment to control the lives of those relying on income support payments as their primary source of income. It is time to put a permanent end to all forms of CIM. It is not a difficult decision and while it will not put an end to financial hardship experienced by many reliant on income support payments for extended periods, it will go some way to restoring a sense of dignity and agency. Surely that is the least we should be able to offer. Simon Schrapel AM National Co-Chair of APW and Convenor of the Accountable Income Management Network |
