Newcastle聽union and anti-poverty activists supported national聽protests against the federal government鈥檚 cuts to the JobSeeker allowance on September 25 by organising a snap action outside the Newcastle Centrelink office on September聽24.
The $300 a fortnight cut to JobSeeker amid a pandemic recession is cruel. The Australia Institute estimates that the cut will plunge 370,000 people into poverty, including 80,000 children.
According to the Anti-Poverty Network, 2.3 million people will have their incomes cut by $300 a fortnight 鈥 the size of the population of Brisbane or one in seven working-age people.
Pas Forgione, Raise The Rate community organiser at said on September 24 that he has received many stories about how the COVID-19 supplement changed their life.
鈥淔or the briefest of periods, and one of the only times in Australian history, job-seekers were living above the poverty-line. Not living luxuriously, just not starving ... I have no doubt the cut would have been more substantial, if it was not for months and years of tireless work by countless individuals and organisations.鈥
The challenge now is to stop any further cuts, such as JobSeeker returning to $40 a day straight after Christmas, Forgione said. 鈥淐an we lift JobSeeker and other payments back above the poverty-line? The well-being of millions of people is at stake.鈥