Billionaire Andrew Forrest report calls on Abbott to restrict dole to a “health welfare card”

PRIME Minister Tony Abbott and billionaire philanthropist Andrew Forrest visited Marist Youth Care in Blacktown to launch an indigenous jobs and training report today.

PRIME Minister Tony Abbott and billionaire philanthropist Andrew Forrest paid a visit to Marist Youth Care in Blacktown to launch Mr Forrest’s indigenous jobs and training report today.

Mr Forrest and his report called on the government and opposition to restrict welfare recipients’ dole payments through a new debit card system that prevents spending money on alcohol, drugs or gambling.

Mr Forrest said his report was written “on behalf of indigenous Australians who dream of a country without a disparity”.

“The ideas are theirs (indigenous people’s),” Mr Forrest said. “This is their review, their changes.”

The Forrest report is being considered by Mr Abbott, who said he agreed with the “bold” idea of income management to help fix some of the failings of irresponsible parents but he said he has ‘‘no plans’’ to introduce a change to welfare payments at the moment.

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Mr Abbott said we should “end the poison of sit-down money” because, “this is a debate we have to have”.

The new “health welfare card” could be rolled out to over 2 million Australian welfare recipients indigenous or not.

Marist Youth Care is running an indigenous employment program which aims to train and gain hundreds of people work based on the GenerationOne employment model developed by Andrew Forrest.