By Casey Neill
Dandenong’s migrant population could be behind its place in Australia’s top 10 hot spots for dole bludgers who skip job interviews.
Human Services Minister Alan Tudge released figures on Tuesday 13 June that ranked Dandenong 10th in the country for welfare recipients who consistently failed to attend appointments or job interviews in the past year.
“We believe that in some locations a culture might develop where people deliberately flout the welfare system,” he said.
Across the 10 areas, 2241 people failed to turn up to five or more appointments.
Greater Dandenong Mayor Jim Memeti said Dandenong was a very multicultural community with a lot of new migrants.
“English isn’t their first language so I guess, I would think if they did miss their appointments it would be a misunderstanding,” he said.
“I do know that the people who are on the dole need that money to live or else they wouldn’t be able to live.
“There are people out there looking for jobs.”
Cr Memeti said he recently made an appointment with a man who turned up the following day, and he’d met many others who struggled to read complex forms.
Mr Tudge told journalists at Parliament House in Canberra on Tuesday 13 June that Australia’s strong social security safety net came with obligations for able people.
“There are obligations to look for work, to turn up to the job interviews, and to accept work when it becomes available,” he said.
“There are about 100,000 people who consistently and repeatedly fail to turn up to the appointments, fail to turn up to the job interviews and do not accept jobs when they are available.
“Perhaps half of those people may have something going on in their lives which may prevent them from doing that, and we need to know about that.
“But the other half, we believe, are people who are frankly taking the taxpayer for a ride and to date they have not been facing penalties for doing so.”
He said the Federal Government had designed a new system that “identifies earlier those people who need additional support, but is tougher on those who are deliberately flouting the system”.
“An individual will accrue demerit points for every time that they do not attend an appointment or an agreed activity,” he said.
Once they hit a certain number of points, they’ll be asked to attend a detailed interview at Centrelink.
They then risk losing a weeks’ payment if they offend again.
“The time after that, two weeks’ payment; and the time after that they will have their payments cancelled for at least four weeks,” Mr Tudge said.
“If a person does not take a reasonable job which is offered to them, and if that occurs and they do not have a reasonable excuse, then they will have their payment cancelled automatically.”
