Parent support payments scaled back to save budget $700m

[Ana Gram]

Women make up the biggest percentage of custodial single parents. That is why news reports and the like tend to highlight single mothers on the PPS.

[Trillianx]

Disability is safe. It's politically incorrect to attack persons with disabilities. It's always been open season on Single Mums.

Doncha no we all Lazy boozy fag hag cows wif brats too 10 blokes n we never let blokes c the monsters cause we wants all the gimmee gimmee child support $$$ and the centrestink $$$. Mwah ha ha.

I actually found an upside for me... No more reporting my income every fortnight! Also no more "are you still working" phone calls and assessments and threats to cut off my payments because they called my home number instead of work number and couldn't reach me because I was Shock/Horror... Working!

[Jorja]

Disability is safe. It's politically incorrect to attack persons with disabilities. It's always been open season on Single Mums.

Doncha no we all Lazy boozy fag hag cows wif brats too 10 blokes n we never let blokes c the monsters cause we wants all the gimmee gimmee child support $$$ and the centrestink $$$. Mwah ha ha.

I actually found an upside for me... No more reporting my income every fortnight! Also no more "are you still working" phone calls and assessments and threats to cut off my payments because they called my home number instead of work number and couldn't reach me because I was Shock/Horror... Working!

I think posts like this are really inflammatory and not at all representative of the views of (most) those who support the changes.

I personally do support the changes!

I am sure there are those whose circumstances mean they will b disadvantaged. Unfortunatly policy needs to b made for the majority. This really does sound harsh but what is the alternative.... A case by case welfare scheme is just not practical I think there is no reason why the vast majority of parents should not b expected to contribute financially to their childs up bringing!

By the time a child is 8 they have been at school 2 years which I think gives parents plenty of time to prepare themselves for the workforce.

Of course people realise it's not that easy to get a job but that is no reason to make it possible for parents to sit on welfare for 16 years! Time spent out of the workforce/ out of study creates further barriers. Let's not be counter productive

Personally I am pleased I live in a country where the government will fund a parent who chooses to stay home to raise their children until they are in school. Our system is not perfect (nothing is!) but we really are very privileged!

[share a book]

The activity agreement starts at 6. I don't think anyone has a problem with this. People take issue with the drop in income which has caused people to lose their kids.

[HarvestMoon]

I think posts like this are really inflammatory and not at all representative of the views of (most) those who support the changes.

I personally do support the changes!

I am sure there are those whose circumstances mean they will b disadvantaged. Unfortunatly policy needs to b made for the majority. This really does sound harsh but what is the alternative.... A case by case welfare scheme is just not practical I think there is no reason why the vast majority of parents should not b expected to contribute financially to their childs up bringing!

By the time a child is 8 they have been at school 2 years which I think gives parents plenty of time to prepare themselves for the workforce.

Of course people realise it's not that easy to get a job but that is no reason to make it possible for parents to sit on welfare for 16 years! Time spent out of the workforce/ out of study creates further barriers. Let's not be counter productive

Personally I am pleased I live in a country where the government will fund a parent who chooses to stay home to raise their children until they are in school. Our system is not perfect (nothing is!) but we really are very privileged!

I think the issue for many is the fact that even with employment they are unable to financially support themselves 100%.
I have no issues working and am happy to do so. I am in fact employeed but the issue is i still need government assistance to supplement my wage.
So when PPS is cut off i lose that assistance, my FTB has dropped once my youngest hits 5, i lose rego, electricity, public transport discounts as well as cheap prescriptions. So i've got less money and higher expenses.
If my children were a bit older i could get a second night time job or a job with more hours that requires me to be available 24/7 but i can't leave an 8 and 10 year old home alone. I would probably have docs knocking on my door if i did so.

[Ana Gram]

Why is there always the assumption that we 'had 8 years to prepare'. Not all single mums are single mothers the moment their child is born.

The activity agreement at 6 is great, I agree with it. Doing study or training will better your chances of finding work. But a degree take 3 years ( or more) not 2. So in the final year of study, you loose a significant amount of money and may have to give up study, putting you right back to where you started.

I'm in my final year of my degree and have been moved to the newstart (the mechanics of which were horrendous). I have lost $100 a week. My rent went up to $370 a week leaving me with $10 a week. The study workload has increased and as I am doing full time uni as well as being the primary carer for my child, there is pretty much no time to try and work as well.

This is incredibly unhelpful and does nothing to help people get off welfare. If the government was serious about getting women back into the workforce, they should support them for the full amount of time for study or training, not leave them in the lurch near the end.

[Trillianx]

Some people are out of touch with reality. "Single mum" does not equal "Stay at home mum" WE ARE WORKING! We ARE contributing financially to raising our children. We ARE paying taxes. Parenting payments do not cover the rent and bills. Newstart doesnt even cover the rent.

A primary school child is not old enough to left home alone for hours EVERY day and certainly not for WEEKS during the school holidays. A Primary school child is not old enough to be a parent to younger siblings. Lets not forget getting the children to and from school. Day care centres do not have the capacity to care for an entire school.

Where is a parent going to find a job that pays at least $25 hr within school hours? The government is engineering a generation that have little to no parental supervision. Yet "single mums" are constantly told that their kids need more parenting because they are out of control. You can't have it both ways.

[ShanandBoc]

Great post Trillianx.

You hit the nail on the head.

Id like to hear some real solutions to these problems?

[ToughLove]

So it doesn't sound like this will benefit anyone, and nobody likes the changes.

But it won't stop, and it will get worse if we only write sad forum posts about it.

If we are really that devastated by it, or know someone who will suffer from it, then speak up! Write to the Herald Sun, write to the women's magazines, write to the heads of state and to Julia and your council. Rile up the single fathers and mothers who are going to struggle, leave your job for the day, take your kids, the ones who are going to suffer for it in the end, march to Parliament and say that you're not going to stand for it.

When it's close to election time and there's a big anti-government riot, the opposing sides scrabble to be the first ones to "fix" the problem.
now is the perfect time to express your anger and demand change, we're at a perfect time to get what we want if we have the guts to stop writing Facebook statuses and actually do something about it.

We all know someone who is going to suffer for it and our kids will suffer from it in the future. Once they've taken away one right without hearing a peep of protest, do you think it will stop?
No, next there will be no Family Tax Benefit, no disability, no pension. And it will be too late to do anything aboiut it because when we had a chance, we didn't take it.

It's like BSL in Victoria at the moment.
When they began banning "pitbulls" everyone agreed and supported it. Yes, ban the dangerous breeds and the Government promises that dog bite statistics will decline. Instead, the statistics rose.
So they added more breeds to the ban list, and bites continued to rise or stay at the same level. So the Government told us the problem is all of the bull breeds, and the new law is they will intrude on your proerty, and if it looks like a bull breed, they'll seize and destroy it.
Now all the smug morons who supported a pitbull ban are having their family dogs seized and destroyed because "it looks like a bull breed". Bad luck if it's a 18 year old Lab x that has never even lifted a lip to another person, if it looks like a bull breed, it's dead.
But it's too late to ark up about it now, because when we had the chance to say no, we ignored it.
Now they're considering adding anything over 60 kilos to the ban list, following Europe's example.
In a decade all you'll be able to own are dog-shaped stuffed toys.

So what are we going to do about all of this? Make more poor-me pity party posts, or do something?

I wrote a letter to the Herald Sun and to MX today.
Why don't you pitch in?

[Ana Gram]

I have neither the time, energy or money to do anything.

Guess I will have to stick to my 'pity party' posts.