Treasurer Jim Chalmers' plan to tackle disadvantage is no answer to the poverty crisis

In recent years we've seen a burgeoning philanthropy culture on this continent, as the billionaires who've stolen wealth from the rightful owners of lands they strip bare seek to sanitise their public image.

I haven't shaken a deep sense of despair since I read Treasurer Jim Chalmers' plan to pursue "co-investment with philanthropists and the private sector in 'place-based initiatives'". I was cynical about what a Labor government might mean for people in poverty, but they're exceeding my worst fears.

It's a disturbing state of affairs when the political solution to inequality is to outsource our wellbeing to organisations whose priorities change on the whims of unaccountable individuals.

Despite the Treasurer's claim, there's nothing new in his proposals.

These tired ideas are just the latest rendition in a long line of band-aids applied to gaping wounds the government itself inflicts on us. But band-aids are cheaper than surgery, and conveniently misdirect the attention of people who expect a caring government but aren't themselves experiencing poverty.

Relying on charity does little more than absolve politicians of responsibility, providing plausible deniability when people who are supposed to help us instead cause harm.

We're already suffering the consequences of decades of social services privatisation, with abusive (un)employment services and non-profit housing providers just two of many examples.

Targeted programs are no substitute for adequate income support, particularly when "community-led" initiatives rarely give people affected by these programs a leading role in their design.

Philanthropy is inefficient, unevenly distributed, influenced by donor prejudices and less reliable than public services. It provides cover for those who've seen world-leading acceleration in their wealth throughout the health and economic crisis, allowing them to shirk responsibility when asked to pay more tax for the benefit of us all.

The obsession with privatised social supports will further entrench so-called disadvantage.

It isn't what poor people asked for and it isn't what we need.

The reality is the pitiful rate of Centrelink payments and restrictive eligibility are the root of many problems Chalmers says he wants to address.

As the financial manager of a small non-profit told me, "They need to just give people money! Then sure, yes, please adequately fund support services, that'd be great. But keeping people in poverty makes our work harder and politicians know this."

There's no question some people and communities face complex challenges and work is needed to develop caring, holistic solutions. But confecting a widespread "wicked problem" is a cop-out designed to justify government-mandated impoverishment.

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People with complex support needs will never get adequate help while so many services are strained by an entirely unnecessary poverty crisis.

Welfare recipients aren't fooled by this latest spin about ending our woes. Reacting to the Treasurer's announcement, Jen Hogben said, "I'm in [Social Services Minister] Amanda Rishworth's electorate and more of the same is not going to get the people here out of poverty. Why don't they just trust us with the money to make our own spending decisions? Just looked at our bills for the next month and they exceed our JobSeeker income."

Politicians wring their hands about inequality as they continue harmful "mutual" obligations policies that make it harder to get a job. Poverty is also a barrier to paid work.

The first step on the path to greater economic participation is having enough money to live and more to spend in our communities. The Treasurer shouldn't need reminding that we're not the cause of inflation, but it does hit us hardest.

Boosting social security isn't radical - Scott Morrison provided relief to millions overnight when he increased JobSeeker to the poverty line in 2020. At the same time he removed "mutual" obligations requirements, and people on long-term income support felt better equipped than ever to get a job. It brought about a precipitous drop in property crime, the wicked problem du jour.

Unemployment is caused by structural factors beyond our control. Poverty disproportionately harms First Nations people, trans people, disabled people, refugees, criminalised people and those over 50. It causes and worsens mental ill health, leading to a suicide rate roughly double the rest of the population for people on an unemployment payment for longer than two years. Right now, that's 500,000 people, the majority of whom have a disability or chronic illness. People in the lowest socioeconomic areas die from COVID at nearly three times the rate of those in the highest.

Lifting Centrelink payments to at least the Henderson poverty line, which is currently $88 a day, is the fastest way to triage this poverty-fuelled social murder.

Returning the $550 JobSeeker increase "is absolutely the first and most decisive action the Australian government could take" to address the youth mental health crisis, according to Australia's Mental Health think tank. The next priority must be to acquire and build social housing until we return to at least 1990s levels, which have since halved.

Chalmers knows there are straightforward and effective ways to address inequality. Yet he wants to open the floodgates to tax dodgers and poverty profiteers in his so-called wellbeing budget. The last thing we need is to drift further down the path of the United States with its threadbare welfare state - we should be running in the opposite direction.

The welfare system is killing people. We cannot funnel more public money into social experiments run by unaccountable people. There's no time for flimsy responses to the cost of living and housing crisis.

Philanthropists and charities shouldn't deliver responses to structural problems. If they truly have good intentions they can work directly with people failed by government to bring about policies that will do away with them altogether.

Poverty is a political choice. We don't need more demeaning programs, mental health awareness, endless inquiries and committees. We need money.