2.1
This chapter considers the key issues raised in submissions and evidence to the inquiry, including:
support for the Remote Engagement Program and its supplementary payment and cessation of the Community Development Program (CDP);
the adequacy of the engagement conditions for volunteers in term of payment and workers’ rights;
the pathways to future employment at the conclusion of REP participation; and
concerns around the co-design and consultation process.
Support for the bill
2.2
Submissions to the inquiry generally welcomed the government’s decision to cease the CDP, and instead introduce the new Remote Engagement Program (REP). Submitters particularly welcomed the fact that the Social Security Legislation Amendment (Remote Engagement Program) Bill 2021 (bill) would be co-designed with remote communities.
2.3
The government has acknowledged that the CDP has not fully addressed key challenges raised by stakeholders, including that there are often not enough jobs in remote areas, and that many people are unable to relocate to areas with more jobs.
2.4
Aboriginal Peak Organisations Northern Territory (APO NT) welcomed the decision to abolish the CDP, saying it had failed to address a lack of employment opportunities in remote communities, with an overemphasis on compliance while placing downward pressure on job creation.
2.5
Representatives of the Central Land Council (CLC) welcomed the decision to replace the CDP by 2023, seeing this is as important and positive step, with the bill before the committee appearing to have good intentions. The CLC urged for the opportunity to now make a real difference to remote Australia to not be squandered.
2.6
The Coalition of Peaks commended the government for taking steps to replace the CDP, and was encouraged by Minister Wyatt’s statements about the legislation in terms of consultation, co-design and financial and economic security. Mr John Paterson of the Coalition advised the committee that it supported moving the framework from a ‘welfare based approach to a real-jobs focus’, and said that:
The Coalition of Peaks commends the government for taking steps to replace the current Community Development Program. The need for real jobs and the building of local economies is essential to closing the gap in remote communities. The aspirations of systemic change, working in partnership and rewarding and sustainable employment, are shared by us as well.
2.7
Despite the CDP coming to an end, Jobs Australia stressed that CDP providers, the majority of which were Indigenous owned and controlled organisations:
remain committed to achieving results under the Closing the Gap framework;
are among the largest employers of Indigenous Australians – particularly in remote and regional areas; and
are key to the development processes for the new CDP.
Concerns with the bill
2.8
Despite welcoming the new REP program, some submitters raised concerns about the potential design of the program, including suggestions that the bill does not provide for adequate consultation with Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander communities, nor does it address the underlying issues of unemployment in remote Australia.
2.9
APO NT argued that the main cause of unemployment in remote areas is lack of available jobs, and therefore a lack of opportunity to acquire skills and experiences. APO NT suggested that the bill ‘does not address this challenge’ and that it instead ‘allows people to work in jobs that would normally be paid while remaining on income support’.
2.10
Jobs Australia also suggested that raising the income payment rate and helping someone with hosted employment would have considerably less chance of being successful than if the issues ‘upstream’ of employment, including housing, health, language, numeracy and literacy, were not addressed at the same time. Jobs Australia further recommended that any changes to the CDP should ‘not result in the redundancy of any Indigenous Australian employee’.
2.11
This point was also made by the Australian Human Rights Commission (AHRC), which said that the government needed to implement ‘structural reforms to target systemic inequality, discrimination and full-time employment opportunities’, and to do so:
… together with programs that involve Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples such as those introduced by the Bill. The Government should ensure that steps are also being taken to address the lack of economic and job opportunities in remote areas.
Supplementary payment
2.12
One of the bill’s aims is for an eligible job seeker’s income support, plus the new payment, to be approximately equivalent to the minimum wage for the hours of participation in work-like activities. The new payment will be paid at a fixed fortnightly rate and will be additional to certain primary income support payments and other supplements for eligible job seekers.
2.13
CDP provider My Pathway indicated its support for the proposed supplementary payment, submitting that it may help to secure participation in trial activities intended to enable real and sustainable jobs.
2.14
My Pathway agued, however, that the parameters of the payment should be carefully set to allow flexibility while ensuring it did not displace current workers or replace paid employment. Ideally, funding would support a broad range of activities that would test the most effective ways to assist participants into employment and help employers to recruit remote workforces locally.
2.15
My Pathway suggested that a limit of two years would incentivise participants to actively track towards an employment outcome, and argued that while it is clear that limiting the payment does align with the introduction of a new REP, it may also avoid a continued cycle of activity with no progress or goals.
2.16
Emeritus Professor Jon Altman et al. pointed out that it was not clear as to whether any additional earnings made by volunteers, over the legislated amount for the program, would be income tested. The submission also called for urgent clarification from the government on whether the payment would be subject to the existing income management arrangements (like the Cashless Debit Card).
Rights of participants
2.17
Submitters had concerns about the status of volunteers in the scheme, and that they were not considered ‘employees’. For example, Emeritus Professor Jon Altman et al. remarked that:
While the EM does not say so explicitly, it seems that the volunteers will still be classified as ‘unemployed’ with the aim of the REP being to enable their transition to paid employment (when such standard employment conditions will be made available).
2.18
APO NT similarly noted that the bill explicitly states that ‘workers would not be treated as employees for the purposes of industrial legislation or superannuation’, and that those in receipt of the supplementary payment would remain in the income support system and would not have the entitlements, rights and protections afforded to other workers and minimum wage employees. APO NT continued that:
Workers in these new roles would receive substantially less than people working the same hours in government and community services elsewhere, even if we assume that they receive the equivalent of the minimum wage (not guaranteed under the legislation).
2.19
The AHRC considered that job seekers should be compensated with wages for the time spent participating in the program, ‘at the national minimum wage together with other employee entitlements, such as superannuation and leave’.
2.20
The Community and Public Sector Union (CPSU) also raised concerns about the rights of those engaged in the REP. The CPSU expressed concern that the while according to the bill, people could engage with the program voluntarily, the EM:
… explicitly states that payments are intentionally being kept low at the minimum wage to “enable transition to paid work”. The Bill also denies access to paid sick leave, workers compensation and superannuation to those in the pilot as they will be exempt from those relevant federal laws.
Given the Explanatory Memorandum states “eligible job seekers will voluntarily participate in a role in government services or a community organisation for between 15 and 18 hours per week building important skills and experience,” those in the pilot should be classified as workers with access to leave and work health and safety protections. They should be paid at the equivalent award or enterprise agreement rate for the type of work they will do, and it should be a genuine pathway to employment and should recognise Caring for Country activities.
2.21
The North Australian Aboriginal Justice Agency (NAAJA) and the Human Rights Law Centre (HRLC) contended that if people were working, they should be employed, and receive all the normal protections and benefits of employment as ‘anything less would risk undervaluing the labour of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people in remote communities, and would risk repeating the wage injustices of the past’.
2.22
Jobs Australia members were opposed to any program for Indigenous Australian people that is discriminatory, and continued that:
Providing hosted employment and paying less than the minimum wage for that contribution is unacceptable. The proposed notion, put by representatives that the hosted employment is “work-like” is profoundly rejected. Indigenous Australian people, like all non Indigenous Australian people are to be included under the Fair Work Act Australia and paid wages for their contribution to the work place.
Pathways to employment
2.23
The bill aims to build the skills and vocational capabilities of people in remote communities, with a view to providing a pathway for jobseekers to find a job.
2.24
The RASAC, while supportive of opportunities to develop the skills and experience of jobseekers, called for the government to consider the implementation of ‘flexible employment, training and support arrangements’ in order to meet the needs of ‘very disadvantaged job seekers in the most remote communities’.
2.25
Similarly, the Coalition of Peaks urged that reforms to remote engagement programs do everything possible to be ‘creating real jobs and reducing welfare dependency’. The Coalition of Peaks noted, however, that there was a lack of visibility around the program given more detailed aspects of it will be set out in legislative instruments and policy guidance.
2.26
APO NT went further and suggested that there was no employment pathway provided for by the bill, such as traineeships or apprenticeships, and the bill failed to ‘recognise that many who are in the CDP scheme have worked, and get work when it is available’. APO NT concluded that:
Against the backdrop of historical exploitation this Bill would re-establish a basis for Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people to do similar work, but receive less reward, than other citizens.
2.27
Similarly, Professor Altman and others observed that job outcomes were not guaranteed by the program, and suggested that:
Even if volunteers participate in the trials for two years and can build important skills and experience, there is no guarantee provided by the REP Bill that they will have a paid job at the trial’s completion. This approach does not, therefore, make suitable paid work available.
2.28
In appearing before the committee, the Australian Council of Social Service (ACOSS) also noted that there was ‘no financial commitment to investment in job creation in the legislation’, and that there was ‘no clear link between this initiative and any job creation programs in remote communities at all’.
2.29
ACOSS also expressed concern about the interaction between the supplementary payment and the income support compliance framework, which uses a ‘no show, no pay’ penalty regime. ACOSS noted it was unclear from the bill as to whether volunteers in the program would still be subject to those arrangements. ACOSS therefore recommended that non-attendance under the REP should be ‘dealt with through workplace relations provisions, not income support compliance penalties’.
Pilot programs and trials
2.30
There was a mix of views on the benefits of the trial process, to be in place before the 2023 full implementation of the program.
2.31
For example, My Pathway saw significant benefits in ‘conducting place-based trials or pilot projects to test the best possible solutions’.
2.32
Dr Douglas of the CLC observed that there was a lack of information and consultation regarding the trial process, including the potential locations, saying:
We don't even know where the trials are going to be taking place. Four trials have been identified. In terms of the consultation that supposedly happened, we don't know where the trial sites will be. There could potentially be one in the Northern Territory—in the Barkly—but nothing's been confirmed. The issue is that there is no co-design in those trials.
2.33
The AHRC also noted that the bill does not indicate how many pilot programs there will be, or where they will be located. The AHRC agreed with the comments in the EM that ‘it is important that there is capacity to trial different approaches in different sites, provided they comply with basic human rights requirements’, and recommend a sufficient number of pilot programs be established in a range of locations across Australia.
2.34
While open to the use of trials to test elements of the new scheme, within an agreed national framework (such as the National Agreement on Closing the Gap), APO NT was concerned that there was insufficient time to consider ‘early learnings’ from pilots, saying:
… consultations over the ‘early learnings’ from these pilots are scheduled to end by April 2022, before the program is finalised in July 2022. In other words the processes of co-design, implementation and findings from the trial must be completed in less than 6 months.
The consultation and co-design process
2.35
As noted in the EM, the bill allows for the development of pilots of the program, which will be co-designed with remote communities and the outcomes of the pilots then informing the further design of the REP prior to a national rollout of the program in 2023.
2.36
There were a number of views put forward in evidence about consultation around the new REP and the co-design process, and the role that the National Agreement on Closing the Gap could play in the continued development of the REP.
2.37
For example, the Regional Anangu Services Aboriginal Corporation (RASAC) suggested that the co-design process ‘must provide the opportunity for communities to have input’ into how the REP supplementary payments are applied.
2.38
The Coalition of Peaks suggested that for such significant reforms as the new REP, it was important that the National Agreement on Closing the Gap (National Agreement) be ‘used as a guide on how to progress’, as it ‘provides a negotiated position between Australian Governments Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people not just on measuring progress but on how to do things differently’. The Coalition of Peaks went on to note that as the new REP would primarily impact on Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people, it was important to:
Ensure that community led solutions that have been in development for many years such as the Fair Work Strong Communities Scheme be considered in design of the program given the large numbers of community-controlled organisations involved in its development.
2.39
Aboriginal Housing Northern Territory (AHNT) submitted that there is currently no mechanism for genuine, shared decision making with Indigenous people and their representatives (as is required under the National Agreement). However, it supports the Government’s intention to engage in genuine co-design. AHNT suggested that over the last few years many of the decisions made about remote employment programs have been made by government officials. AHNT indicated that this has sometimes happened without warning, and ‘usually without listening to what Indigenous people and their representatives are saying’.
2.40
The Northern Territory Council of Social Service (NTCOSS) also drew attention to the National Agreement, and suggested that it was clear that the bill had not been designed in collaboration or consultation with Aboriginal people, communities or representative bodies. NTCOSS argued that it therefore fell short of addressing the lack of access to paid employment in remote communities.
2.41
Jobs Australia indicated its members view’s that any model, pilot, or other re-imagined employment services program needed to be ‘intrinsically linked to the Closing the Gap framework’, as well as the metrics used to evaluate the new program's performance. Jobs Australia contended that it was also vital that any new program continued to use the current CDP providers and their Indigenous employees, ‘as part of the assets required to bring about sustainable change’.
2.42
The NAAJA and HRLC did not support the bill on that grounds that it:
dishonours the Federal Government’s commitment to formal partnerships and shared decision-making contained in the National Agreement on Closing the Gap; and
would pre-determine a welfare-based framework for the pilot programs with payment of a small supplement for at least 15 hours of ‘work-like activities’ per week.
2.43
APO NT contended that the bill provides ‘no mechanism for shared decision making with Indigenous people and their representatives, as is required under the National Agreement on Closing the Gap’.
2.44
APO NT also took issue with the consultation process thus far, suggesting that the despite public comments around co-design and piloting a range of options, the bill had been ‘tabled without discussion with Indigenous representative organisations, and includes only one option to be piloted—an additional income support payment’.
2.45
Further, Mr Paterson of APO NT told the committee that APO NT did not support the bill in its current form, and advised of the organisation’s concern that elements of the final program appeared to have been pre-determined, without consultation. Mr Paterson advised that:
We think this bill pre-empts decisions on some elements of any new program and, as such, the opportunity to design and develop this new system has already been missed. Neither the Coalition of Peaks members in the regions operating CDP nor any other community controlled organisations appear to have been part of designing the process for the program change, pilot sites or this legislation. That is of concern to us.
2.46
Similar views were put forward by Dr Josie Douglas of the CLC, who, when asked whether the program development involved co-design, said:
It absolutely is not co-design. The government has committed to co-designing the program that will replace CDP, yet the government has not engaged with key representative bodies—for example, Aboriginal Peak Organisations Northern Territory—or the Coalition of Peaks, prior to the introduction of this legislation.
2.47
The views of APO NT and Dr Douglas were shared by the Coalition of Peaks, which submitted that neither its members:
… in the regions operating CDP nor any other community-controlled organisations appear to have been part of designing the process for the program change, pilot sites or this legislation is however of concern to us. To our communities it suggests the new program has already been agreed.
2.48
APO NT put forward a number of recommendations for the government to consider in the design of a new remote program, under its Fair Work Strong Communities proposal, including:
administration by an agency that is Indigenous led;
social security and mutual obligation arrangements that are no more onerous than those applying in non-remote areas;
systems and processes that are fit for purpose for remote Australia; and
greater local capacity to exempt people from participation where they have been unable to access proper assessments.
2.49
The NIAA advised the committee that as part of the co-design process, there were a ‘number of building blocks that communities can draw upon when co-designing their pilot’, of which the Remote Engagement Program payment was one. Mr Blair Exell, Acting Chief Executive Officer of the NIAA, went on to explain that:
This bill provides another of those building blocks: an option for a new incentive payment in the social security system for jobseekers to take on a placement in a local community service, such as a school or in local government, to build their skills and experience and put them on a pathway to employment in the open labour market. However, it is important to stress that we don't want to pre-empt the outcomes of co-design. Some pilot sites might choose to test this approach; others might not.
… The bill should not be seen as pre-empting co-design, either of the programs or of the final program. The bill has been specifically designed to facilitate co-design. The legislative instruments are an important feature that will be informed by the outcomes of co-design in the pilot sites.
2.50
Mr Exell also pointed out that the co-design process was yet to commence, but when it did there would be two layers of co-design—an ‘immediate local pilot and a national co-design process’, and that:
Both layers of co-design will draw from the principles agreed under the Closing the Gap agreement. For the local pilot, we will be inviting relevant community controlled sector organisations to nominate a member to join a co-design working group. We will also ask the relevant state or the Northern Territory government to nominate a member to the working group. We will also write to broader stakeholders, inviting them to express an interest to join that group. This might include local service providers, local governments or land councils. Then we will repeat this process at the national level, convening a national co-design working group. The Coalition of Peaks will be central to this, as will other Indigenous organisations, businesses or groups. Then we intend to publish the outcomes of that co-design process to support full transparency.
2.51
Mr Bulman of the NIAA further confirmed that the NIAA intends to publish and make available the outcomes of co-design in each pilot, and will do so again when the national co-design process is underway.
Committee views
2.52
The committee offers its support for the aims of the bill and the benefits of the program in helping people on a path to rewarding employment, that they may not have otherwise had. The REP will provide a flexible approach to the development of vocational skills in remote areas.
2.53
The REP properly takes into account the unique challenges of the labour market in remote areas to engage people in the program and ensure they develop the necessary skills to explore further employment pathways further to their participation in the REP.
2.54
The development of the REP has been a result of ongoing reviews of previous programs, including the CDP, to ensure the new program, once implemented, will take the lessons from such programs. The government will continue to engage in extensive consultation to determine the employment and support needs of remote communities, throughout the two-year trial period.
2.55
It is clear that the NIAA has a forward program of consultation and engagement to advance the co-design process. The committee commends the NIAA for undertaking co-design at both a local and national level, and for advising that it will make the outcomes of the co-design in each pilot program publicly available.
2.56
The pilot programs as supported by this bill will provide a vital step in ensuring that what works and any lessons learnt are taken into consideration when developing the final program framework for 2023. By listening to, and engaging with, the Indigenous experience and expertise in these areas, the government will be able to develop an effective new approach, via the REP, of providing real jobs and building local economies.
2.57
The committee sees the bill as striking an appropriate balance between establishing the legislative framework for the pilot programs to commence and the co-design process to continue, and giving further consideration to the program’s qualification criteria and payment structures moving forward towards more permanent implementation in 2023.
2.58
The future legislative instruments and other policy guidance issued for the program will therefore offer flexibility in finalising it in a way that is properly informed by the outcomes of a co-design process in the pilot sites, and nation-wide.
2.59
Some concerns were raised during the inquiry that the REP would not address some of the underlying issues with the availability of employment in remote areas. The committee notes, however, that the REP is but one of several mechanisms available to communities in working with government to co-design and develop employment pathways, operating alongside other programs such as non-vocational support, vocational skills and training, and support in finding long-term employment and apprenticeships.
2.60
The committee acknowledges the support put forward during the inquiry for a new form of a remote engagement program, noting the cessation of the CDP, and recognises the key role that the National Agreement on Closing the Gap has played, and will continue to play, in the continued development of this and similar programs. In light of the significant benefits to remote communities in implementation of the REP, the committee recommends that the bill be passed.
2.61
The committee recommends that the Social Security Legislation Amendment (Remote Engagement Program) Bill 2021 be passed.
Senator Claire Chandler
Chair