Job Seeker Diaries Wayne Swan - Shadow Minister for Family and Community Services

Radio Interview with Nicole Haack

Transcript - Radio 5AA - 15 July 2003

E & OE - PROOF ONLY

NICOLE HAACK: If you've been a jobseeker at one stage or another you probably know a little about the dole jobseeker diaries, this is essentially the information that jobseekers have to record in a diary. It's presented to Centrelink, essentially to show that you've been actively seeking work. The only problem is it appears there are no safeguards in place to show that they're filled out accurately. The Government's been talking tough but is it in fact a smokescreen? I'm joined now by the Shadow Minister for Family and Community Services Wayne Swan. Good afternoon.

WAYNE SWAN: Good afternoon Nicole.

NICOLE HAACK: Would you describe it as nothing more than a smokescreen?

WAYNE SWAN: Yes I certainly would. What it shows is that the Government's rhetoric when they've been talking about the unemployed is simply there to assure the public the Government is doing something for the unemployed when it's not. These diaries take a lot of work and they are meant to be comprehensive but what we now know from answers given in Senate estimates is that nobody actually checks the accuracy of them.

NICOLE HAACK: So walk us through it and tell us what checks are in place?

WAYNE SWAN: Well there are a whole range of checks in place in addition to the Dole Diaries. There is in particular, a Recipient Statement Notice, which has to be filed by an unemployed person every fortnight. But you see the diaries were something that was put in place in 1996 and then upgraded significantly in the year 2000 so the Government could pretend it was getting tough on the unemployed and that it was out there weeding rorters out of the system.

The point that I've made through the evidence that we've had in estimates is the Dole Diaries have nothing to do with getting rid of the rorters in the system and everything to do with the Government ‘souping' up its own rhetoric - pretending that it's doing something in the area of unemployment when it hasn't been.

You see the Job Network has been an abject failure. We've seen in recent days where there has been a $30 million bailout to Job Network providers which doesn't deliver one extra service to the unemployed and where the Government has in the last six or seven years, cut millions and millions of dollars in vital assistance away from those programs which give the unemployed the skills to move into the available vacancies. So these diaries have been put in place if you like as a smokescreen to cover up for the Government's lack of performance in assisting unemployed people to move from benefits to work.

NICOLE HAACK: If we look specifically at the diary it requires the jobseeker to record up to ten attempts at looking for work. They've got to supply the name and address of the organisations and companies they've approached. What's happening is that Centrelink is looking for the ten names and addresses but not cross-referencing those or doing any checks that they are true and accurate.

WAYNE SWAN: That's absolutely correct. But when the Government announced this measure of the job seeker diaries in 2000, the Minister Larry Anthony said then that this measure was being put in place specifically to weed out rorters and Mal Brough went out some time later and claimed that there were literally tens of thousands of cruisers on unemployment benefits and they ought to be weeded out.

The point I want make is this. Despite all of that rhetoric, despite all of the changes we still have the same number of long term unemployed in this community as we did seven years ago despite the fact we've had a record period of economic growth in this country. And I guess what that shows is that the Howard Government has been tough in its rhetoric of vilifying the unemployed but very weak in delivering the essential programs that unemployed people need to get the available skills to match the vacancies out there in the economy.

NICOLE HAACK: Would you do away with the Dole Diaries and put an alternative system in place?

WAYNE SWAN: Well there's no doubt that the current Dole Diaries just duplicate information that jobseekers lodge every fortnight in that form I referred to before called a Recipient Statement Notice. Now if the Government isn't going to check the accuracy of these diaries I can't see the point in them.

More importantly, what I do see the point in is us putting together some much more effective programs to provide the unemployed people of this community who desperately want work with skills to match the available vacancies and to do something about making a difference for those very many long term unemployed people out there who aren't getting assistance from the Government's failed Job Network.

NICOLE HAACK: Are there people who have essentially been reprimanded for the way they have gone about collecting the Dole and filled out their diaries because the Government did talk tough they said those who didn't comply with the rules would meet the consequences. Has that happened?

WAYNE SWAN: No it hasn't happened. The only thing the Government did with the Dole Diaries was to penalise those people who didn't fill out the requisite number of ten contacts. The Government never actually checked the accuracy of any of that. Look, the Government already has much of that information from other compliance measures and I think what all this shows is that the Government was only interested for political reasons in talking tough about the unemployed and they did this to cover up the fact that they have ripped millions of dollars out of essential skilling programs. And the consequence of that was that people remained trapped on benefits, unable to make that transition from benefits to the workforce. And all this has happened at a time when there has been record economic growth. So the Government has been unable to explain why at a time of record economic growth long-term unemployment has not been substantially reduced. And as a consequence of that they have been out there talking about rorters.

NICOLE HAACK: What about welfare fraud though? How significant a problem is that?

WAYNE SWAN: Well if there's welfare fraud it should be stamped out and those people who are responsible for it ought to have the book thrown at them. The point I'm trying to make is that the Government wasn't even serious about policing the Dole Diaries as an instrument of compliance, they are just using it for their own political rhetoric to cover up the failures of the Job Network and to cover up their expenditure cuts to essential labour market programs which are the best chance of people moving off benefits and into work.

NICOLE HAACK: Can you imagine the frustration also on the part of somebody who has taken this very seriously, been out there every fortnight ensuring that they have those ten attempts to find work only to find out that the person down the street who is filling out bogus names or making things up is in no worse a position than they are?

WAYNE SWAN: Yes. And I've had contact today, I mean I'll just read to you an email I've received from a 51-year-old male whose unemployed:

"I don't mind filling out for job search but that's not the problem. The problem is the lack of jobs that are available and if you are over 45 and a male you don't have a lot of options."

There are literally tens of thousands of people out there and what they really need is some fundamental assistance to make that transition when the barriers in the labour market are so huge. The problem has been that this Government cut away much of that assistance and people have not been dealt with adequately in the Job Network system that they have set up. All of the Government evaluations of the Job Network show that it is an abysmal failure when it comes to that gentleman who is severely disadvantaged in the labour market. They're the things that we as a community ought to be talking about and investing in, not wasting the time on diary entries that are never checked.

NICOLE HAACK: Do we reward work over welfare?

WAYNE SWAN: We don't. I mean this is a Government that has got an incentive system in place that is absolutely perverse. On the one hand the Government will go out and say that unemployed people ought to go out and work casually or part time. On the other hand it will take away nearly 90 cents out of every additional dollar they earn from that casual work in terms of taxation. The incentive system is all wrong and even Tony Abbott agrees with Labor's criticism of this.

In January this year he said that it was just obscene that these high effective marginal tax rates were hitting vulnerable people trying to make that transition. But of course Amanda Vanstone two weeks ago in your state said this was fine and she completely agreed with the idea of taking away 90 cents of every additional dollar earned because it accorded with her particular philosophy. So there's a bit of a conflict in the Federal Government over this issue of incentives.

NICOLE HAACK: ….indistinct

WAYNE SWAN: Well certainly it is true that for many people working casually after the Government takes away 90 cents of every additional dollar they earn over the threshold and then they have to pay for their public transport and then they have to pay for essential clothing or whatever, they are substantially worse off for having worked. Now Amanda Vanstone says that's fair enough. She gave a speech where she said that is fair enough. Tony Abbott gave a speech saying where he thinks it's unacceptable. The Labor Party has been arguing the unacceptability of this for a long period of time. The Government said it would have a look at it through the McClure process a couple of years ago and really nothing much has happened. The consequence of this has been that we still have a very high level of long term unemployment in this country, which is no different from when this Government was first elected over seven years ago.

NICOLE HAACK: So what are you offering as an alternative?

WAYNE SWAN: Well I think we've got to give a lot more attention to the skill, training and work experience that is given to those who experience great difficulty in the labour market and we've got to have a greater variety of assistance for those people in terms of the available jobs that are out there. That means we have to be much more flexible in the types of training and work experience packages that are available. At the moment all the Government offers is Work for the Dole and Work for the Dole while it may be publicly popular has a dreadful record of actually delivering people into work and off benefits.

NICOLE HAACK: So how would you address the problem of a casual or part time worker who is being taxed and is losing benefits that they desperately need?

WAYNE SWAN: Well certainly tax credits are one way to address that. It's a policy that we have articulated over a long period. That's one way for them to keep more of the money that they earn over and above their benefits. We think it's got a lot going for it. One Government Minister, Tony Abbott says he agrees with us. Amanda Vanstone, another Government Minister says she disagrees. But it is an essential part of reform of the welfare system to provide some real incentive. Secondly, as a community we have to have a greater range of work experience and training programs and most importantly we must have a Government with the will to fund them, not to be wasting money like this Government is currently wasting by pouring something like an extra $30 million into the Job Network for a whole lot of interviews that will never happen.

NICOLE HAACK: All right well thanks for joining us on the program this afternoon Wayne.

WAYNE SWAN: Thank you Nicole.