Just a few days before Scott Morrison’s Hawaii-bound plane rose above the bushfire smoke, the prime minister wished Australians a Merry Christmas and promised a busy 2020. On his legislative agenda is a host of laws set to worsen everyday life. Among them are a “religious freedom bill” (designed to protect bigots), a tweaked set of anti-union laws (already voted down once), and reforms to Australia’s welfare system, Centrelink.
Although the changes announced on January 28 may appear benign, welfare advocates and experts have urged scrutiny and suspicion and have called, once more, for increases to the shockingly low payment, which now amounts to only 75 percent of basic living expenses . This is a good start, but we must go further. We know from the Liberal Party’s track record that whatever Morrison proposes, it will only change a punitive system for the worse.
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