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Australians Working Together -
Helping people to move forward

The $1.7 million Australians Working Together package announced in the 2001-02 Budget underlines the Government's commitment to strengthening Australia's social safety net, valued by all Australians as one of the key strengths of our society. The package will reinforce the uniquely Australian values of self-reliance, a fair go, pulling together and having a go. It will provide more encouragement, support and incentives for all Australians of working age to take part in Australia's social and economic life: to get a job, to gain new skills and to be involved in the community. Some of the elements of the package of particular interest to women are outlined below.

Helping parents return to work

The Australians Working Together package is particularly relevant for women in contemporary Australian society. The participation rate of women in the workforce has grown steadily over the latter part of the 20^th century. More women have faced conflicting demands from paid work outside the home and from the unpaid work of raising a family. Many parents who spend time out of the work force caring for young children feel isolated from their communities, fear losing their work skills and lose confidence in their ability to compete in the labour market. A particular issue facing people receiving Parenting Payment while caring for children is that when their youngest child turns 16 they will be transferred to Newstart Allowance and face requirements to look for work and take part in mutual obligation activities.

Australians Working Together will help to address these issues by:

• encouraging parents whose youngest child is aged between 6 and 15 to start planning early for a future return to the workforce through annual opportunity planning interviews with Centrelink Personal Advisers;
• expanding the childcare and employment, training and education assistance currently accessible through the Jobs, Education and Training (JET) programme;
• building on the success of the JET programme to establish a new Transition to Work programme specifically designed to build the skills and confidence of people who have been out of the workforce for an extended period; and
• encouraging parents whose youngest child is aged between 13 and 15 to build or maintain work skills by requiring them to undertake 150 hours each six months of community work, study, or activity to improve their employment prospects, from July 2003.

As part of this package, out of school hours care will be available to more parents with school aged children: some 5,000 new places will be created from 1 July 2001 at a cost of $16.2 million over four years.

Making work pay: Working Credit

Australians Working Together contains a Working Credit initiative which, from September 2002, will encourage people to take up temporary or casual work opportunities. People on income support payments will be able to accrue up to $48 per fortnight from their income free area when they have little or no earnings-to a maximum of $1000-so that their payment will not be reduced as much when they take up work. This will be of particular benefit to women, who comprise a large proportion of the temporary and casual work force.

Better employment services to help people who help themselves

Australians Working Together will also provide more opportunities for people receiving income support to build new skills, maintain existing skills and stay connected with the community through expanded and enhanced employment services. The Government will spend:

• $19 million to create 30,000 extra Job Search Training places;
• $40 million to create 16,500 extra Work for the Dole places;
• $11 million to assist some 35,000 job seekers with Community Work placements;
• $16 million on personal job seeker skills development for eligible job seekers in their last week of Work for the Dole or equivalent Community Work placement;
• $50 million on Training Credits of up to $800 each for 64,500 eligible job seekers being assisted by Community Work Coordinators;
• $59 million on Training Credits of up to $800 each for indigenous and mature age job seekers in Job Search Training or Intensive Assistance;
• $9 million on 3,600 extra literacy and numeracy training places;
• $62 million for a new Personal Support Programme improving and replacing the current Community Support Programme; and
• $11 million for 42,000 assessments of Personal Support Programme participants by Intensive Assistance providers.

A fair go for mature age workers

People over 50 on income support payments-a growing number of whom are women-face a particular risk of losing up-to-date work skills, becoming isolated from the community, slipping into inactivity and ill health and running down their savings before retirement age. Retrenchment is particularly difficult for people over 50 because of prevailing attitudes to employing mature workers, as highlighted in the June 2000 House of Representatives Employment, Education and Workplace Relations Standing Committee Report: Age Counts: An Inquiry into Issues Specific to Mature Age Workers (the Nelson report). Australians Working Together will help address these issues by:

• encouraging active involvement in the job market and the community among income support recipients over 50. There will be no new entrants to Partner Allowance and Mature Age Allowance-payments which do not require recipients to look for work or take part in the community-from July 2003. Some 98 per cent of Partner Allowees are women. People currently on these allowances will be encouraged to transfer to Newstart Allowance to take advantage of the training and other services available with that payment;
• people on Partner Allowance, Mature Age Allowance and Widow Allowance over 50 will be invited to attend an annual interview. The interview will encourage them to take up opportunities to stay involved in the community, to build their confidence, to maintain their skills, to retrain and to undertake financial planning as they approach retirement age;
• providing better information to retrenchees about opportunities in the labour market and how to access assistance to set up their own businesses and building a more co-operative approach between business and government to promote best practice guidelines on managing retrenchments; and
• better assessing people's capacity to work and providing people with more employment, rehabilitation, training and education support.

The Government will spend a total of $146 million over four years in new assistance for workers over 50 and $163 million in improving disability assessment and expanding assistance for people with disabilities.