The @antipovertycentre.org said it is “unacceptable” that people in poverty are being forced to “spend even more of the little money they have” on fuel or taxis. Read the full piece on The Point: https://theaus.in/47sa8u6

@tanyaplibersekmp.bsky.social Raise the rate

moar coverage: thepoint.com.au/news/260326-...

"For someone on jobseeker the cost of fulfilling mutual obligations has just skyrocketed past their ability to pay given the truly meagre level of jobseeker"

Good to see 3 different strikes this week. Vic school teachers, ABC journos and UTS staff.

Mutual Obligations for basic social security shouldn't exist. Work for the Dole especially shouldn't exist. Privatised Work for the Dole extremely shouldn't exist. Centrelink's fraud department is more than capable of catching actual systemic crime without torturing the working poor as well.

So, @pennyallmanpayne.com & @antipovertycentre.org wrote to the government, urging them to stop forcing welfare recipients into these stupid activities during a fuel crisis. Government response? "Just contact your job provider" Story here: www.theguardian.com/world/2026/m...

Please let us know if you’re being made to do in person activities that cost you money in fuel or taxis. You can reach us via [email protected]

The Minister is being asked to stop forcing people into Mutual Obligations during this fuel crisis bsky.app/profile/anti...

"Privatised welfare compliance should not have the power or discretion to force people to travel."

IF YOU HAVE COMPULSORY ACTIVITIES:

Compulsory activities (aka “mutual” obligations) aren’t even operating lawfully. And now welfare recipients are being made to pay an even higher price. Read the full statement: apcentre.substack.com/p/rishworth-...

Similarly I gave benefited from the discounted CGT and I am all for the scrapping of that benefit. If any investor wishes to diversify their assets, then CGT should apply equally across all classes of investments

Our family has benefited from the capital gains tax discount and I think it should be scrapped I'd rather the state invest, as @artistaffame.bsky.social says, "in things we really need, like public education, public housing and liveable Centrelink payments" End negative gearing too

We're calling on @AmandaRishworth to stop all payment penalties during the fuel crisis. We shouldn't be expected to pay high prices for pointless activities. Poverty payments are nowhere near adequate and the RBA governor is hellbent on making more people unemployed. #auspol

Last Thursday I was anxiously watching the petrol prices go up in Morisset as I was preparing to take my stepson to his Employment Plus appointment - that they cancelled just before we were about to leave.

We'd love to throw a party welcoming you to the club with the massive rate increase we got today but ...

Pod up! @squigglyrick.bsky.social talks about how covering robodebt radicalised him. Following the robodebt story absolutely did the same for me, I think for many around my age it will be a foundational political memory. Watch on YouTube. Listen on Spotify, Apple, all the other places. #auspol

The fuel crisis punishes welfare recipients in ludicrous ways Work for the Dole participants only get $10.40/week, which is supposed to cover fuel & travel Many thousands of poor people are forced to use their limited income on fuel to attend useless job agency bullshit

⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️ One of my favourite authors. @antipovertycentre.org @nobodyinpoverty.bsky.social ✊🏽

"There is no technically correct way to design a tax system. Like all public policy, getting it “right” depends on our collective values." – @warwicksmith.bsky.social

Tomorrow is the SIXTH anniversary of the Covid supplement and easing up on requirements for applications and reporting Will we see anything like that again? www.crikey.com.au/2025/03/20/c...

ABS has developed a new series of measures of labour force underutilisation. Looks at: underemployment (people who want to work more), reduced employment (people working fewer hours than normal), unemployment, and underutilisation (an aggregation of these measures) www.abs.gov.au/articles/und...

"Nobody left behind" is such a joke. Worse than that, a lie. I couldn't believe they were still using it for the last campaign. To keep saying it while they neglected the poorest in Australia is pretty shameless. Enough with the tweaks. It's not even touching the sides. Help those who need it most.

"We won’t get there with policy tweaks designed to be inoffensive to the most powerful people in the country. We need a different approach – one that doesn’t keep handing money to investors while so many of us struggle." #Budget2026 #auspol

“As we approach the Federal Budget, speculation is swirling about changes to the Capital Gains Tax (CGT) discount and negative gearing,” writes Mel Fisher, an antipoverty activist with the Antipoverty Centre and the Anti-Poverty Network South Australia. Read more: https://theaus.in/3PJKg6E

“It’s the people on the frontlines of the housing crisis that are leading the charge.” Hannah Garvan on the last twenty-five years of the housing struggle.

I did a thing

"The political process seems designed to make us think of these policies in the abstract... But the CGT discount and negative gearing aren’t just accounting tricks, they affect us all." – @artistaffame.bsky.social on what we should do with $21 billion instead of the CGT discount + other tax breaks

‘Keynes predicted we’d have a 15-hour work week. The robots HAVE been taking our jobs — but instead of redistributing the labour, we’ve simply made up completely meaningless, pointless jobs.’ - David Graeber

Perhaps I shouldn't be surprised by this, but 10% of employers just flat out admitting they won't consider hiring Aboriginal & Torres Strait Islander people is actually a bit surprising to me. I've no doubt anti-Indigenous racism is actually worse than 10% but admitting it is a measure in itself.

I dunno. Maybe the ruling class consensus is that disciplining the labour market & maintaining a permanent underclass is vital to profitability & the (more) stable reproduction of capitalist social relations.

Iran has succumbed to the unrelenting pressure from the RBA and will open the Strait of Hormuz before interest rate rises damage the regime’s investment property portfolio in Australia.

the unemployment will continue until morale improves

When you ask most people, they just want people to contribute to society. We need to recognize that unpaid labor is a contribution to society. We all agree a mum raising a kid is contributing so why should other unpaid work be seen as less than?

And if the economy is so reliant on unemployment to keep everything else running then stop demonising the unemployed and raise the rate!!! 🤬🤬🤬

latest edition of "unemployed people are doing the job of keeping inflation down and should be paid enough to live" just dropped

"People often get a bit confused about why the Reserve Bank raises interest rates. They themselves will talk about “excess demand” or a “tight labour market”. What they really mean is they think there are too few people who are unemployed."

You’re hearing it more and more. Poor people are doing the job of disciplining paid workers who fear the horrors of the welfare system.

As trite as it sounds, just bringing visibility of the existence of people with severe disability in our community is so incredibly important. We refer to the bad old days where people were institutionalised and neglected and abused, yet we teeter on the brink of a similar reality.

"A belief in this scarcity, as real as it may feel, is conceptually deformed." Don't let anyone convince that solutions to ensure we can all live a decent life are too complicated. It's about political choices.

So @themandarin.bsky.social have a few articles on NACC's crappy Robodebt findings All free to read but a couple need logging in

Thanks & solidarity to @chexabonus.bsky.social @kathmadgwick.bsky.social for your relentless pursuit of justice for Robodebt victims. We are sorry for this devastating outcome, but your actions and those of everyone who stopped this scheme reverberate in the ongoing fight for a safe welfare system.

The Albanese government cannot pretend to care about poor people while it continues to force people to live in poverty, refuse to act on Robodebt royal commission recommendations, and inflict millions of penalties a year – many unlawful – on people with compulsory activities.

NACC report on its investigation into the 6 persons referred by the Royal Commission into the Robodebt Scheme is here: www.nacc.gov.au/investigatio... Found Mark Withnell (DHS) and Serena Wilson (DSS) engaged in serious corrupt conduct. Other 4 were found not to have engaged in corrupt conduct.

You don’t need to make poor people jump through hoops to access special loan schemes or subsidies they can’t afford, you can simply organise and pay for things to ensure homes are safe. Instead our government is spending billions of dollars on battery subsidies for people who already have solar.

The government must prioritise meeting the material needs of people in Australia, including by increasing all Centrelink payments to at least the poverty line and ensuring everyone who needs income support can access it via @antipovertycentre.org

It is morally abhorrent to support the US and Israel's imperial aggression. We urge organisations across civil society to join us in demanding that the government cease its support for war, and to do its job by ensuring that everyone struggling with high living costs has their needs met.

Reports now that welfare recipients are spending 4-5 hours on hold to Workforce Australia, trying to avoid payment suspensions, and get demerits overturned Is this your experience?