Kick in the Guts

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Kick in the Guts
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So

THE Rudd Labor Government has refused to guarantee a $1600 payment to
Australians who care for sick, elderly or disabled relatives.

The payment has reportedly come under the scrutiny of Prime Minister
Kevin Rudd's budget razor gang.

Carer groups say the money is vital for families under financial and
emotional strain because of their duties.

IM A BLIND PERSIONER AND RUDDS REMOVAL OF THE
$1600 YEAR CARER BENEFIT IS THE MOST MEANSPIRITED
AND CRUEL INFLICTION IVE EXPERIENCED FROM
ANY POLITICAL PARTY. Gone is the difference
between eating and not eating.

Cutting the payment will disadvantage some of
the most vulnerable people in society.

"These people are the saints in Australian society,



ITS HARD TO GET CARERS AND KEEP THEM HAPPY
AND
RUDDS CARER
BASHING WILL CAUSE MAY CARERS TO
GIVE UP THE GHOST.

To Labor supporters I say BEING
a light o the hill wont help
if pensioners and carers cant pay the
electricity account

THAT $1600 yearly centerlink payment
FOR CARERS IS IMPORTANT

ITS HAD TO GET CARERS AND THAT LITTLE
MONEY KEEPS THEM HAPPY

MANY OF US WILL LOSE OUR CARERS

RIDD in TAKING AWAY THAT $1600 yearly centerlink
payment
FOR CARERS is KICKING many of us who voted labor
IN THE GUTS.

I dont see LABOR politicians earning less money

The Labor government should not let carers
bear the brunt of budget cuts.

From my reading of all that has been in the papers, on radio and
television, I would be very disappointed and surprised if the Labour
Govt. cut down on the Carers' bonus. Carers as we know, save the
government millions if not billions for the wonderful work that they
do for the less fortunate.
Come on Kev.07 prove that these are just rumours and even increase the
Carers' allowance.
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LABOR will scrap a $500 seniors' bonus payment created by John Howard
last year to help the over-65s deal with rising costs, despite a
massive community backlash over plans to abolish the $1600 carers'
payment in the May budget.

But as welfare advocates and unions yesterday joined the Opposition in
condemning the social spending cuts, the Treasury said spending under
the Howard government was unsustainable and likened its profligacy to
that of the Whitlam Labor government.

A Treasury report provided crucial support for Wayne Swan's insistence
on the need for deep spending cuts in the 2008-09 budget to ease
pressure on inflation and interest rates.

"The recent growth in spending stands out, along with the growth in
spending under Whitlam in 1974-75 and the increased spending following
the recessions in 1982-83 and 1990-91," the Treasury report stated.

The Australian revealed yesterday that the Government planned to axe
the $1600 carers' payment as part of its May budget savings.

As the Treasurer refused to confirm the plans yesterday, other
government sources said the $500 seniors' bonus, created last year,
was also in the budget razor gang's sights.

Sources said the Government maintained its determination to deliver
all election promises, but that all Howard government programs faced a
line-by-line search for spending cuts.

The carers' bonus was paid to 400,000 Australians for the past four
years, providing up to $1600 each, while Mr Howard created the
seniors' bonus last year at a cost of $1.3 billion.

Both payments were said to be one-off - meaning they were funded out
of budget surpluses and were not written into the budget forward
estimates.

News of the plan to axe the carers' bonus sparked widespread community
anger yesterday, highlighting the political risks facing Mr Swan as he
grapples with the need to reduce budget spending.

Carers Australia chief executive Joan Hughes said many family carers
lived below the poverty line and used the $1600 to augment their
living expenses. "It's going to be a very tough time for carers," she
said.

Mental Health Council of Australia spokesman Simon Tatz said carers
needed the payment to help with medication, food, transport and
accessing services.

"The utilities allowance cannot substitute for what the carer bonus
can buy," Mr Tatz said.

The move sparked a warning from the Australian Services Union that the
Rudd Government's "social inclusion" agenda might be damaged before it
had even started. The ASU covers non-government workers providing
housing, counselling and other support services.

National assistant secretary Linda White said the budget would have to
be carefully thought through, and that taking money from programs that
helped the people on the margins of society would be counter-
productive.

"Taking money out of programs in a circumstance where there is already
some difficulty being experienced at the front line getting labour -
there is already significant difficulty getting workers for the pay on
offer - then the Government's social inclusion agenda could be in
jeopardy before it starts," Ms White said.

Community and Public Sector Union national secretary Stephen Jones
said his union was concerned about job losses, but was also "concerned
about the impact on the most vulnerable in the community".

Opposition Leader Brendan Nelson demanded that Mr Rudd intervene to
protect carers.

"Whoever it is in Mr Rudd's Government who dreamed this up needs to
pick on someone their own size," Dr Nelson said.

"Anyone who thinks that Australia's carers do not deserve the support
they are getting just needs to walk a mile in their shoes."

Liberal MP Chris Pearce became personal by questioning whether Mr
Rudd, whose wife, Therese, is a successful businesswoman, had
forgotten what life was like for non-millionaires.

Since Labor's victory in November, Mr Rudd and Mr Swan have gone to
great lengths to warn about the need for spending cuts and to demonise
the Howard government for reckless spending and pork-barrelling.

The Treasury study released yesterday, prepared by Kirsty Laurie and
Jason McDonald of the department's budget division, made similar
observations.

It said that, including spending since 2004-05 and budgeted through to
2010-11, the Howard government gained an additional $391billion as a
result of increased tax revenue, resulting mainly from the resources
boom.

New spending decisions and tax cuts totalled $314billion.

Most of the money had been consumed by increases in government
spending, which had grown more rapidly in the past four years than at
any time since the 1990 recession. Much of the money had gone on
social welfare to the aged and families with dependent children.

There was a remarkable increase in the number of spending proposals
announced in each of the Howard budgets, rising from 359 in the
1997-98 budget to 825 in the last election year. Most of the
initiatives were small, with 90 per cent valued at less than $100
million over the forward estimates. However, the number worth between
$100million and $250million grew from 16 to 49 in the past 10 years,
while the number of $1billion-plus proposals jumped from one to nine.

Over the same period, the Howard government dropped the ball on
savings. "In the 1997-98 budget, close to a third of all measures had
a savings component whereas, more recently, savings measures have
averaged around 1.5 per cent of total measures," the report says.

There was also a rapid rise in spending on industry assistance, rising
at an average rate of 6 per cent a year since the commodity boom
began. Treasury warned this spending could distort the allocation of
resources.

- Additional reporting: Sid Marris

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On Mar 8, 4:43 am, "http://www.aussieseek.com" <nswa...@yahoo.com>
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Federal Opposition Leader Brendan Nelson has called on Prime Minister
Kevin Rudd to safeguard an annual payment to carers.

There is speculation the $1,600 payment will be scrapped in the May
Budget.

Carers have received the bonus since it was introduced by the former
government four years ago.

There is further speculation a $500 senior citizen bonus payment may
also be axed.

Dr Nelson has called on Mr Rudd to rule out ending the payment.

"Mr Rudd, please rule out an attack on carers, pensioners, the
elderly, the frail in this country, because in the end the measure of
a caring society, the measure of a caring prime minister is the extent
to which he will reach out to people to make sure their meagre family
budgets are secure," he said.

But Mr Rudd says there is no way carers will be left in the lurch.

Speaking in the Solomon Islands, Mr Rudd said a budget process is
underway where everything is being debated in a transparent way.

"What I can say to carers and pensioners right across Australia that
there is no way on God's earth that I intend to leave them in the
lurch," he said.

"We are there to extend a helping hand to those in need.

"They are at the forefront of our attention and that will be the case
as we frame this budget and that will be seen on budget night as
well."

On Mar 8, 12:44 pm, "Spam Free aus.radio.broadcast.moderated

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LAST December, shortly after Labor came to power, Ashley Norman, a 73-
year-old pensioner who is nursed by his wife, Pat, at home says he had
a "queasy feeling" about the security of the carers' allowance and the
$1600 bonus they had received for the past four years.

Norman, chronically ill, was concerned that his wife, who nurses him
24 hours a day, depends on the carers' allowance and was anticipating
the $1600 bonus from the Howard government, would miss out.

Norman was one of hundreds of thousands of pensioners and carers who
were fearful of losing support as the Labor Government vowed to cut
spending to fight inflation.

But he was one who was grimly determined to do what he could to fight
for the benefits for his wife. Although reliant on an oxygen tank
Norman began a letter writing and telephone calling campaign.

He admitted to The Australian yesterday that as time went on and his
seven letters to the Prime Minister received no response, he became
"more aggro".

"Well, who wouldn't?" he asked from his bed yesterday.

As Labor moved to earn a reputation as a "fiscal conservative" and
started to rack up $10 billion in budget cuts Norman became more
insistent and more persistent.

He rang and wrote to his local Labor MP, the PM's office, Jenny
Macklin's office and Joe Ludwig's office. In short, Norman became a
serial pest, the sort of person ministerial offices - and media
offices - can become inured to and turn a deaf ear.

Norman's seven letters to the PM went without a response, but he
managed to penetrate the PM's office and that of Macklin, the Minister
for Community Services, by telephone.

He got a sympathetic hearing but no reassurance that the carers'
allowance and bonus would not be slashed as it was reorganised. The
point of reorganising the payments was to save money and they were
going to be "slashed".

Having no satisfactory response, the pensioner became even more aggro
and decided to go public with his fears and his new understanding that
indeed their allowances would be cut.

On March 7 - almost exactly three months since Norman began his dogged
campaign from his modest suburban home - The Australian published the
story, after confirming from Government sources that the benefits were
to be slashed.

Norman's campaign had taken off and the first real sign began to
emerge that Labor was having trouble making the transition from an
Opposition and an Opposition leader in election campaign mode to a
functioning Government and a Prime Minister who needed political eyes
and ears everywhere and the ability to delegate decisions.

Norman became an instant media attraction as ABC radio, the Nine
Network and Network Ten pursued the story. The Government's official
response, from Macklin and acting prime minister Julia Gillard - Kevin
Rudd was visiting Papua New Guinea - was that they could not confirm
or deny budget speculation, although reports continued of further
confirmation of the cuts to the allowances.

Macklin said the previous bonuses had been "one-offs" and the changes
would provide permanency and security for carers, but she didn't say
they wouldn't be cut and she didn't say no one would be worse off.

When he returned from the Pacific, Rudd guaranteed no one would be
worse off and went further in parliament on Tuesday vowing no carer
would be a dollar worse off under the new arrangements.

But the Opposition, which had followed Norman's campaign, insisted
that carers needed a lump-sum payment up front because they had come
to rely on it for necessities and had built it into their own budget.

Rudd's image was being damaged, Brendan Nelson's image was being
helped and there was a popular outcry that the budget cuts had been
directed at the most vulnerable in society.

Labor also faced a check after the budget with the Opposition and
media trying to find someone who was a dollar worse off among the
400,000 recipients of the carers' allowances. Having tortured the
Coalition on Australian workplace agreements and Work Choices with
people who were "worse off" the ALP knew the likelihood was high that
there would be sick and disabled people after the budget who were
worse off.

It would put Rudd in a poor light in regard to compassion and social
justice. The issue of carers' allowances was akin to the young and
unprotected exposed to unfair industrial relations laws; voters didn't
have to feel directly affected to feel anger towards the Government.

On the Tuesday night Rudd capitulated after the television news
bulletins and let it be known, officially, that he wouldn't expose
himself to the "worse off" test and the $1600 carers' allowance would
not only be delivered upfront and in a lump sum but also entrenched in
the budget.

Slashed welfare spending, destined to save money, had turned into an
additional budget cost of almost $2billion because Norman had a
"queasy feeling" in his stomach and wouldn't get off the telephone.

There is more to this than just a heart-warming story of determination
and personal success.

If there hadn't been a political failure of attention in the first
place, if warning signs and letters hadn't been ignored, if there
hadn't been sympathetic people in the Government and if Rudd hadn't
felt the public pressure and caved in on his tough leadership on
fiscal conservatism there could have been very different outcomes.

As one former minister pointed out this week: "If you had gone to John
Howard with a proposal to cut carers' allowances he would have said to
just cut your throat."

It's one thing to cut benefits to people on higher incomes and in
better circumstances; it's just plain dumb to cut the carers'
allowance.

Rudd maintains he didn't know about the detail of the cuts and acted
belatedly to fix a major political problem. It's also true that his
sense of control prevented other ministers in his absence from killing
the speculation or the decision.

The fact the cuts leaked to the public, first in the form of Norman
and then the media, has also deeply concerned senior Labor figures.

It's a natural and normal process for long-term oppositions to have
trouble settling in to government but to be railroaded by a 73-year-
old pensioner into reversing budget cuts exposes weakness of political
astuteness and a preparedness to undermine cost savings that has
alarmed some in the new Labor Government.

FOOTNOTE: Norman received a phone call this week from the PM's office
assuring him they had not lost his letters and he received a letter
from Macklin saying she would consider his concerns raised in a letter
he sent on February 19.


On Mar 9, 1:55 am, "Spam Free aus.radio.broadcast.moderated

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Govt urged to reform aged pension


A Senate inquiry has recommended an urgent review of the aged pension.

A Senate inquiry has recommended an urgent review of the aged pension.
(file photo)

A pensioners' lobby group says the Government needs to increase the
base pension and means test allowances if it wants to ease the cost of
living for older Australians.

A Senate inquiry has recommended an urgent review of the aged pension
and the way it is calculated and indexed.

A discussion paper released yesterday by Professor Ross Garnaut also
warned that low-income earners will need special attention from the
Government as an emissions trading scheme is developed.

Paul Versteege from the Combined Pensioners and Superannuants
Association says if the Government must look for savings in the
welfare budget, it should means test concessions and allowances.

"What it should do, is make sure that the poorest of the welfare
recipients receive an income that is adequate for them, and then
what's left over can be distributed among better off pensioners and
other welfare recipients," he said.

"We really think that the Government, in combination with state and
territory governments, need to look at concessions and benefits and
who gets them."

He says increasing the base pension could make all the difference.

"[It needs] an increase of about $80 a week, so that they will be able
to buy decent food, put a roof over their heads, and pay bills on
time."

A Government spokeswoman says they acknowledge many older Australians
are under enormous financial pressure, and they will examine both
reports very closely.

But it is pointing to a range of schemes that have already been
introduced, including a $500 utilities allowance, and a $500 bonus
payment in the Budget

On Mar 14, 3:22 am, "Spam Free aus.radio.broadcast.moderated

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