Darren Chester MP: Hansard Extract - Petition on Youth Allowance
02-June-2009
This is the HANSARD extract from the House of Representatives Chamber yesterday. It details Darren’s first presentation of the Youth Allowance petition.
You will note there were only 206 signatures accompanying the petition because it had only been in circulation for 2 days before being tabled. There is now more than 2500 signatures which have recently been processed by the Petitions Committee and Darren will be presenting them at the next available opportunity.
Petition: Youth Allowance
Mr CHESTER (Gippsland) (8.34 pm)—by leave—
It is a pleasure to follow the Chair of the Standing
Committee on Petitions. I congratulate the member for
Fowler on the excellent work she is doing—and you
too of course, Mr Deputy Speaker Adams—with the
committee.
I rise to present a petition approved by the Standing
Committee on Petitions. This petition is in direct response
to the Rudd government’s flawed decision to
change the eligibility criteria for students seeking to
access the independent rate of youth allowance.
I join with the petitioners in highlighting the simple
fact that these changes to the youth allowance place
another barrier to university participation for students
in regional areas. They unfairly discriminate against
students currently undertaking their gap year and contradict
other efforts to increase university participation
by students from rural and regional Australia.
The petition currently contains 206 signatures, but
let me assure the House that such is the depth of concern
over this issue there are many more on the way.
My office has sent a further 2,000 signatures to the
Petitions Committee this week and I have been inundated
with emails and letters from concerned teachers
and parents, and of course the students themselves.
And on that point I will take up comments from the
Minister for Education who has responded to questions
in this place by claiming that the opposition is merely
scaremongering on the issue. The minister also said it
was a ‘very silly question’ when I asked the minister to
guarantee that the students currently on their gap year
would not be financially penalised under the government’s
changes. The petitioners who have already supported
this petition before the House tonight—and
those who have written letters or sent emails, all of
which I am forwarding to the minister directly—are
not being silly, nor are they scaremongering. I know
the minister is particularly busy, but I urge the minister
to stop playing politics with the hopes and aspirations
of country students and take the time to read at least
some of the letters from students, parents and educators
in Gippsland and throughout Australia.
Just by way of example, let me quote from a media
release distributed by the Baw Baw Latrobe Local
Learning and Employment Network on 22 May. The
CEO, Mick Murphy—a man who is also not in the
habit of saying silly things or scaremongering—said:
This policy discriminates against rural and regional students
and has taken a city-centric view of further education.
We also have the Isolated Children’s Parents Association
offering some forthright comments in a media release
on 20 May titled ‘Rudd giveth—Rudd taketh
away’.
The DEPUTY SPEAKER (Hon. DGH Adams)—I
remind the honourable member that his comments, I
believe, are to the statement that petitions be tabled.
Mr CHESTER—Thank you, Mr Deputy Speaker.
The association remarks in support of petitioners:
The move to a single criterion—
as referred to in the petition—
for qualifying for independent youth allowance of 30 hours a
week work for at least 18 months in a two-year period will
have huge negative impact on students from rural and remote
areas. Finding part-time work for 15 hours a week in small
country towns is difficult enough but 30 hours a week is
even tougher to do.
I do not believe that the petitioners are silly people or
scaremongers. I believe they are concerned that the
government is making it harder for country children to
achieve their full potential. Students themselves in addition
to signing a petition have written to me directly
seeking my intervention and urging me as the member
for Gippsland to encourage the government to change
its position. I have been receiving letters from people
such as Leigh Rogers who said:
I have been blindsided by the Labor Party’s new budget and
the scheme has been ripped from under me without any
warning.
Parents such as Les and Janice Barnett in Bairnsdale
have also signed a petition. They said:
This change will put university beyond the reach of many
rural students. It also places extra stresses on the students
especially those who have taken this year off in good faith
expecting to be eligible for the allowance in 2010.
There is a moral argument there that is put by the petitioners
that these students have acted in good faith, that
they followed the rules as they applied at the end of
2008 and deferred their studies to work hard and qualify
for the independent rate of youth allowance. I urge
regional MPs on the government benches to make the
point, on behalf of their constituents, that this particular
policy direction is actively discriminating against
regional students.
I offer the petitioners some comfort that this petition
will be circulated more widely throughout the community
of Gippsland in the weeks ahead. I urge people
who are interested to follow this process. As the Chair
of the Standing Committee on Petitions has referred to
already tonight, the opportunity to put their views to
the people’s parliament is a critical part of our democracy
and it has given me great pleasure to be a part of
the Petitions Committee and to participate in the debate
on behalf of my constituents.
The Petitions Committee, under the member for
Fowler, including you yourself, Mr Deputy Speaker,
has had many active discussions in recent times. The
committee has seen some very successful campaigns
conducted by residents right throughout Australia, and
I urge the Minister for Education to consider the
weight of this petition very highly. I know that similar
petitions are being circulated right throughout regional
Australia at the moment.
I will give the last word in this discussion tonight to
a student who attended the Gippsland Grammar School
in Sale last year. The Minister for Finance and Deregulation
himself may be interested, as this was his former
school. Another alumnus is a former school captain
Monique Lawless, who is working hard to overturn this
decision and is actively circulating the petition on behalf
of her colleagues. Monique wrote to me to highlight
her concerns:
I had no choice but to move away from home in order to
further my education, but did not want this to be a burden on
my family. Students like myself who have made a commitment
to meeting the independence criteria before heading off
to university have been left high and dry.
This is not silly. It is not scaremongering. It is about
country people standing up for a fair go, and I urge the
minister to reconsider the decision.
The petition reads as follows—
To the Honourable The Speaker and Members of the House
of Representatives.
This petition of members from the Gippsland community
recognises the importance of providing affordable access to
university for students from rural and regional areas.
Members of the Gippsland community draw the attention of
the House to changes announced in the Federal Budget on
May 12, 2009 which states that students will no longer be
able to achieve financial independence for Youth Allowance
and ABSTUDY by meeting the 2nd and 3rd elements of the
workforce criterion.
The petitioners believe that the Youth Allowance changes
proposed in the Federal Budget place another barrier to university
participation for students in regional areas; unfairly
discriminate against students currently undertaking a ‘gap’
year; and contradict other efforts to increase university participation
by students from rural and regional Australia.
We therefore ask the House to retain the 2nd and 3rd elements
of the workforce criterion so that a tertiary education
is accessible to regional students.
from 206 citizens
Petition received.
Source: Darren Chester MP
