MPs ‘can’t live on JobSeeker’, says Barnaby Joyce

Coalition MPs have conceded they could not live on the current fortnightly JobSeeker rate of $715.70.

Nationals MP Barnaby Joyce. Picture: Alex Coppel

Coalition MPs have conceded they could not live on the current fortnightly JobSeeker rate of $715.70, amid divisions over whether Scott Morrison should permanently increase the welfare payment.

After Reserve Bank governor Philip Lowe endorsed increasing JobSeeker, saying it was a “fairness issue” and not based on the potential economic impact of withdrawing support to the unemployed, Liberal and Nationals MPs were concerned a higher payment might discourage Australians from finding work.

However, Nationals MPs Anne Webster and Barnaby Joyce, from Victoria and NSW ­respectively, and Victorian Liberal MP Russell Broadbent acknowledged the existing rate is not liveable. “I can’t live on that number, I’d never even thought for a moment I could,” Mr Broadbent said.

“I’ve always believed it should be increased (from the pre-COVID rate of $40 a day).”

Mr Joyce, the former Nationals leader and deputy prime minister, said if he was in a decision-making position, he would extend the current rate beyond March but said compliance for jobseekers should be bolstered.

“If people don’t take a reasonable job that’s offered to them, send them back to food tickets and rent tickets, don’t put them on the street but say ‘It’s not the role of other people to work for you. Other people are not your slave,’ ” he said.

“I would never be so bold to say I could live on $715 a fortnight. If your rent is $250 a week, cheap rent is $300-400 a week, you won’t get by on that. You’d have to be living with other people.”

Dr Webster said the “live­ability” of JobSeeker depended on a person’s geographic location but pointed out that unemployed Australians could also receive extra payments, such as for rent and parenting responsibilities.

“People need to be able to live on JobSeeker. If you’re paying rent in Melbourne, I don’t know (if it’s sustainable),” said the member for Mallee, in far northwest Victoria.

“I take seriously that RBA governor Lowe has said he thinks it should be raised, that it’s not high enough.

“He’s an expert in his field. I’m listening to that but he’s also optimistic on the jobs market.”

The $150 fortnightly corona­virus supplement, which has been paid on top of the $565.70 JobSeeker payment during the COVID-19 pandemic, is due to end on March 31.

At the height of the pandemic, the combined supplement-­JobSeeker payments were worth $1115.70 but the government ­reduced the amount in the ­December 2020 and March 2021 quarters.

Scott Morrison is awaiting JobSeeker data from December, which Treasury is expected to receive within weeks, before finalising any decision.

Liberal National Party MP Andrew Laming, who chairs the House of Representatives standing committee on employment, education and training, has ­calculated that people on JobSeeker were $9150 better off than they otherwise would have been if the corona­virus supplement had not been introduced last year.

The faster-than-anticipated fall in the jobless rate to 6.6 per cent and the “reasonably even economic recovery” meant a ­continued tapering of JobSeeker “is the right thing to do”, he said.

However, Mr Laming would not say whether it should revert to the pre-COVID rate.

Queensland Nationals senator Matthew Canavan, who chairs the party’s backbench policy ­committee, said many of his ­colleagues had called for a ­permanent increase before the pandemic hit but he believed that support had waned since the country had accumulated $1 trillion in debt.

“I don’t think we can afford any material increase,” Senator Canavan said.

NSW Liberal MP Jason ­Falinski, whose seat of Mackellar takes in part of Sydney’s northern beaches, the epicentre of the city’s outbreak before Christmas, said a permanent ­increase would not give people an incentive to go back to work.

He said the government should instead be looking at ­income tax credits or a universal basic income.

“I know that on the northern beaches, people are still finding it difficult to get people back to work and there are significant ­labour shortages right across the economy, particularly in rural and ­regional areas,” Mr ­Falinski said.

“What we do know is income and welfare payments have a mat­erial impact on the cultural drivers of whether people participate in the workforce or not.”