BAS’ Vision for Beneficiaries (part 2): Benefit Levels
This is our second segment in our series of suggestions for the future based on our vast experience helping people on
benefits.
Our main & most urgent suggestion for changes in the system would be to raise benefit levels immediately.
Katarine cares for her children by herself and really struggles to meet all her weekly costs. One of her young children
has asthma, which has occasionally involved urgent trips to the doctor and hospital, with associated costs. Last year,
she got behind with her WOF and Rego. When she was parked outside the doctor’s office, she was given a ticket for $400,
which she was also unable to pay. This fine increased dramatically before she had the option to pay by installment and
now it will take years to pay this off. She needs her car for her family’s health and still struggles with its upkeep
costs. She often goes hungry trying to ensure her children have some nutritious food every week. We are able to help
people like Katarine receive food grants (if they have trouble), apply for TAS if they are eligible or temporarily
reduce advance repayments to WINZ so they have a bit more money each week. But the truth of the matter is that benefit
levels are just not high enough for many people’s basic needs and the juggling of finances and impossible decisions they
have to make will only make matters worse for them.