There appears to be much truth in the stories in the media (particularly in the Fin for which no links are available) that the budget process has been a sorry story of a mixture of incompetence, insane turf fights and a botched administrative reorganisation of the responsibility for welfare between 6 different departments and agencies, and distraction by politics. In particular, as usual, it seems that the welfare to work measures have proved a perennial too hard basket for the government, with the increasing volume of rhetoric having to be matched by hastily pasted together policy proposals in the last week or so. The whole area of welfare and tax benefits has become so complex that as the ALP discovered last year, almost any change will have unpredictable and unwanted knock on effects. In this context, it’s disappointing that the government - supposedly committed now to radical reform - hasn’t grasped the nettle and embraced ideas such as those of Ross Garnaut for combining a top tax rate of 30% with an abolition of all welfare benefits and their replacement by a guarenteed minimum income or negative income tax, and the abolition of all tax dodges, deductions and payments. This would combine simplicity with equity, and be an elegant solution. It ought to be accompanied by a dismantling of the punitive aspects of the Centrelink regime (do we really obtain much benefit from obsessive tracking of the activities of those on unemployment benefits?) and funnelling some of the money saved into genuine labour market programmes and assistance for those seeking work and skills. It’s very heartening to hear that Wayne Swan is considering such ideas with interest.
Elsewhere: Andrew Bartlett has noticed a rhetorical shift from dole bludger to “shirker”. This should be a sub-editor’s dream - Smirker Cracks Down on Shirkers:
However, now that the target is widening to the disabled and sole parents, the Government clearly feels a new and more broadly encompassing label is needed. To that end, it seems “the Shirker” is being called up for action. Let’s face it, the Bludger was always going to get a bit fat and go to seed. There are so many more things that can fit beneath the umbrella of the modern-day shirker. It’s the new, all-purpose updated bludger. A far more inclusive approach that can also demonise the sole parent, shirking their responsibility to their child, or the person with mental illness, shirking their responsibility to ‘pull themselves together’ and stop their malingering. We can all feel comfortable that — at least when it comes to targeting sections of the community for political gain and finding new ways to make life harder for the less well off while still insisting they’re helping — this is a Government that’s still full of fresh ideas.
The ALP needs a big economic policy differentiator that can play to the electorate and eliminate the grab-bag effect of current ALP policies. Many are sensible in and of themselves but they just cannot be sold as a coherent whole to the electorate. A framework such as a big tax/welfare reform package would enable other policies to be hung off those hooks.
Also the Libs, well, have generally wasted the last 9 years of Government with feather-bedding, pointless ideological battles with unions and other hated groups, overheating the housing market, and squabbling amongst themselves, briefly waking up only to implement a regressive tax leftover from the 1960s. A big tax idea like this could shock the electorate into seeing the Liberals for what they are - coasting along into the abyss of the coming recession dog-whistling in the dark. (mash those metaphors!).
‘Shirker’ seems tied directly to the neo-liberal drive for ‘maximum productivity’, which, when translated, means ‘extract surplus value from every human endeavour’ and ‘efficient reproduction of the status quo’. If people want to stuff around and be the societal equivalent of couch potatos, then bugger them. However, I hardly think the complexity of juggling many responsibilities can be reduced to the one for which the government provides financial support, such as parenting support, medical benefits, employment assistance or whatever. To reduce the complexity of the lives of people who do receive this support according to a singular axis revolving around the support itself is utter nonsense.
From my experience (admittedly on the sidelines, watching people close to me work in the ‘benefits industry’) reducing the lives of people in such a manner isn’t just wrong, it is a tragedy. There are people who have horrid lives and who do try to make a go of it, but find it very difficult. It is funny that most people do not want to live shit lives. I agree with what Andrew has written, I cannot see how the rhetorical path (or, more correctly, popularist discursive formation) being roughly hewn from reactionary public sentiment by the government is at all enabling.
No argument from me, Glen. It’s got much more to do with keeping wages low and the needs of business than any welfare motivation - not to mention making political capital.
In lieu of trackback:
http://glenfuller.blogspot.com/2005/05/dole-bludgers-guide.html
[…] As a sidenote to Mark’s post on ’shirkers’ I thought this may be a good opportunity to share some of my very serious Van Wheels magazine archival work. […]
Another aspect of the “bludger” to “shirker” re-badging is the demographic loss of the 1970s surfie drop-out types.
While a tiny % of those on the dole may indeed live relatively happpy lives at Byron, et al, the sort of negative branding inherent is suych a stereotype has lost its former edge.
With a typical unemployed person now much more likely to be highly-educated and live in a large city, a new negative branding campaign is obviously required.
Well, given that you would lose the dole for 6 months if you moved to Byron without putting a case to Centrelink and probably the AAT, there can’t be too many of them these days.
Mark,
You’re missing my point. If I really could live happily on $230/wk as a surfie dropout in Byron, I’d bite the 6 month penalty as cheap at the price.
But funnily enough, not many of my generation actually want what was apparently de riguer for young aspirationals in the 1970s. I WANT A JOB - and I’m living in an grimy area where there are supposed to be plenty. That makes me a “shirker” by definition, I expect.
I got what you were saying, Paul, but I also wanted to make a point about the stereotype of the surfie shirker.
How sweet: welfare to work!
If work exists de facto-why professionals are employed on biological merits only while world-wide luring newcomers with tales of “Australian opportunities� and speechifying of “family business� and “work is akin a marriage: you are loved or not to�?
Reality is that playing statistics while providing a real number of unemployed and establishing a system where the most educated and intellectually capable of inferior backgrounds have been pressed into denigrating activities while any three-month short term contractors and job-network members are contributed by government.
Even “work-for-a-dole� slaves’ placements were contributed by receptors of a work force-these “community� (too often, simply church-belonging) shops of which retail prices are higher than in many other places.
Using a meaning of job as a stick used to manipulate under-castes is a very it of a next neo-racist neo-nazi Howard government’s rape of freedom and democracy in this England’s semi-colony.
Glen [2nd post on this thread]:
It’s not just an issue of morality and of applied (as opposed to ideological) economics ….. it is a matter of national security. You don’t need an IQ much above 65 or 70 to understand how it is that Hamas and Hizbollah gained so much widespread support and so many willing recruits willing to die for the cause - or - go back a few decades and see how the Nazis and the Communists came to power. The Howard government claims to be fighting terrorism yet with this “Welfare-To-Work” ideological nonsense, it has prepared and fertilized the ground for all sorts of terrorist groups to find willing recruits and enthusiastic support right here in Australia. Back to the drawing-board before people get really hurt by counterproductive policies and half-baked programs.
Everyone:
Now that Veterans’ Day (Long Tan commemoration) is over and the spin-doctors’ “apology” to Viet-Nam War veterans has been safely delivered to an unquestioning public by Mr J.W.Howard …. it’s a safe bet that Dept. of Veterans’ Affairs will start heaving Totally and Permanently Incapacitated veterans off their pensions as the Stakhanovites in D.V.A. strive to exceed their norms too. “They wouldn’t dare do that; we fought for our country”. Yeah , right….
Everyone:
As understood, “Australia Loved� had embedded by deploying some special Universe-English so-called “Welfare-to-Dole initiative� from a very practical notion of a person not w o r k i n g f o r but being a vital part of a xenophobic racist Australian job-system creating employment opportunities for the l o y a l to English royals Anglo-Saxes only.
G.Bell, to my understanding, does caught a very core of Howard’s novelty: as “potentially suspicious inhabitants�, non-Anglo population especially, cannot nowadays be openly forced into registering with and explicit supervision by police/correction services as it was done at the time with abos in Australia and more recently in S. Africa with non-whites, subtly sheltered with rhetoric of a “job assistance�, a correction-style system is being established by a good son of a then member of Australian fascist party recently.
Practically, anyone on government handover recently are on mercy of seemingly non-government “job network� bureaucrats and can easily be relocated wherever imaginary job opportunities are higher.
Zig Hail “Job Network�! Zig Hail coalition! Zig Hail White Australia!
“…Zig Hail “Job Networkâ€?! Zig Hail coalition! Zig Hail White Australia!…”
???!!!
Oh well.
Sieggy played guitar,
Jammin good with Weird and Gilly,
And the Spiders from Mars.
He played it left hand,
But made it too far…