Howard uses family support as a political football

Peter Mac

It has been revealed that over the last year the Howard 
Government failed to implement two crucial plans to reduce the 
financial burdens for families receiving welfare support.

The first plan, the outcome of considerable pressure on the 
government to improve its miserly approach to struggling 
families, sought to address some of the difficulties experienced 
by families when a parent rejoins the workforce, such as 
inequities in access to childcare and part-time work, and the 
sudden burden of extra taxation.

The plan offered:

* improved financial assistance after the first child;

* facilitation of access to part-time work for parents returning 
to paid work;

* improvement in access to paid child care for low and middle 
income families with more than one child;

* improvement in payments for parents returning to the workforce; 
and an increase in payments for multiple child and single-income 
families.

Kay Patterson, the Minister for Family and Community Services, 
last week sang the praises of the government for devising the 
plan. "We're always constantly looking at assisting families to 
balance work and family", she declared proudly: However, the 
government approved the plan 15 months ago, kept it under wraps, 
delaying its implementation to a more politically opportune 
moment — certainly not before the 2003/2004 budget according to 
a leaked cabinet document.

Howard himself dismissed criticism of the government over its 
inactivity, declaring airily that they had just decided to assist 
families in other ways!

The delay will be able the government to use it as both a carrot 
and a stick for the coming election by promising to implement it 
after the election, while warning that it might not be introduced 
by a Labor government.

The second proposal concerns the repayment of millions of dollars 
inadvertently paid out as excess family welfare payments. In 
September last year Howard asked the then Minister for Family and 
Community Services, Senator Vanstone, to report on ways to 
prevent families incurring large welfare overpayment debts.

Vanstone now has a different portfolio, and it is not even known 
whether she actually formulated any proposals at all. What is 
clear, however, is that the government asked for the overpayment 
proposals to be drawn up for consideration by the cabinet "—in 
November/December 2003, for consideration along with the possible 
work and family package", according to another leaked document 
signed by Howard himself.

All of this indicates that the Howard Government has dodged its 
responsibility to support Australian families in need, and that 
it has been manipulating the electorate with the utmost cynicism, 
in order to gain an advantage in the coming federal elections.