Cashless Welfare Card

[moonflyte]

Could this be the end of the tragedy of alcohol fueled violence and child neglect.

A cashless welfare card aimed at stemming alcohol abuse would be rolled out across the country under a welfare reform the Turnbull government is considering taking to the election.

As regional trouble spots line up to be chosen for trials of the government’s new Healthy Welfare Card to begin next month, The Australian understands the Coalition may seek an election mandate to extend the card to welfare recipients across regional Australia if they achieve positive results.

Under the new system — proposed by mining magnate ­Andrew Forrest in his review of the welfare system in 2014 — 80 per cent of a person’s government payment would be ­quarantined to a bank card that could not be used to buy alcohol and gambling products, nor ­converted to cash.

The remaining 20 per cent could be accessible as cash.

http://www.theaustralian.com.au/national-affairs/national-cashless-welfare-card-plan-by-turnbull-gov...

[esayaf]

Turnbull is a joke. Here is an apparently intelligent man but what have we actually inherited is Abbott in a mask
Nothing he stood for when he was opposition leader just the same old same old but now with a grey haired smiling idiot

[icyfroth]

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@esayaf wrote:
How are those that rent from a landlord that will only accept cash going to pay their rent.
what about the shops that still don't have eftpos. Is pizza only for workers now.
This card will only increase the desire of welfare recipients to find some undeclared cash work. In fact it will make unscrupulous employers to be more likely to encourage it.
So many unthought of consequences

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you can get Centrelink to pay your mortgage or rent straight into your account.

[***super_nova***]

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@esayaf wrote:
I use eBay to buy cheaper parts to fix my car. How am I to do that. If I can't buy parts on eBay and my local car part store doesn't accept the card and have to pay five times as much to a mechanic that does accept the card then what do I eat? Grass!

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Also the cheapest and best  veggies are available here in Melbourne from Vic Market, and various Asian shops in Richmond, and similar shops across the suburbs.  Will these shops and markets accept  these cards?  I shop for veggies in our local market where fruit and vegetables are often less than 1/2 what Coles or Woolworth sells them.  If pensioners are forced to shop in the big supermarkets, their buying power will diminish.

Alcoholics who want to get booze and cigarettes will always find way, just like junkies will always find cash to get drugs, even if it means stealing. 

This proposition is terribly patronising and unfair treatment of the most disadvantaged people in the community; actually, one way to make it fair would be for all incomes to be treated the same way.     Why not have the food/necessities card for everybody?

[***super_nova***]

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@icyfroth wrote:

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you can get Centrelink to pay your mortgage or rent straight into your account.

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That makes no sense, that is what having this card is designed to avoid, because it is claimed that if alcoholic's rent was paid into their account, they could very well take it out and buy booze instead of paying rent. 

[icyfroth]

paid straight to the landlord or the mortgager, I mean.

[latina4621]

 The only thing i can see it will do is more crime.

really! what world do these politicians live in certainly not the real world.

[esayaf]

Wrong, my bank will only accept a direct debit from one of their accounts for mortgage payments. I can't pay into my mortgage account via any other means than via my bank account

[esayaf]

I know as I had to open an account with them to make my mortgage payments

[esayaf]

Most of my bills are already paid via centrepay but two of them have no centrepay option. How will I pay these?
Centrepay is a service Centrelink provides.
Everybody's situation is different. The government is now going to try to bash every different shape of peg into the same square hole.

[moonflyte]

I’m amazed you can afford to pay off a mortgage on the dole. Well done you.