NOW is not the time to force single parents into the workforce, according to a leading voice in community care.
Under federal budget changes, single, unemployed parents on welfare could lose up to $120 a fortnight, forced off parenting payments ($648 a fortnight) and onto the unemployment benefit Newstart ($508) when their youngest child turns eight.
Ballarat UnitingCare chief executive Cliff Barclay said that with a shrinking job market, single-parent families would be worse off with the changes. We’re not in favour of it at all,” Mr Barclay said.
“Perhaps if there were more jobs around it would work, but what new opportunities are arising in the local employment sector?
“It looks like many parents are going to be at least $100 worse off.”
Mr Barclay said learning new skills was often a prerequisite for employment, and recent funding cuts to TAFE would make it even harder for single parents to get a job.
Census data shows the number of single parents in Moorabool increased by nearly 200 in five years, from 1002 in 2006 to 1198 last year. Eighty per cent of single parents are women.
But Prime Minister and Lalor MP Julia Gillard defended the changes, saying they were geared towards encouraging struggling single parents to get back into the workforce.
