Independent representative for Tasmania Jacqui Lambie described her experience as a single mother receiving Centrelink payments in an impassioned plea to her parliamentary colleagues to reconsider the Social Services Legislation Amendment Bill.
The bill will freeze indexation of Family Tax Benefit payments to low-income families, the Huffington Post reported, punishing those Australians who are “surviving”, Lambie said during a March 22 session of parliament.
The former Palmer United Party member described her life after she was medically discharged from the Army as “tough”.
“There was a time where my fridge broke and for three weeks I kept the esky under the house so the ice would last longer,” Lambie said. “For four weeks one time, six weeks another time and 10 weeks another time, and I drove around without a registered car. On two separate occasions I drove around without a licence because I couldn’t renew it.”
Breaking down, Lambie described the Bill as “shameful”.
“What you are doing is shameful,” she said. “For you to take money off those people… you have no idea how tough it is.”
Living a life on welfare was like being in a “war zone”, she said. “I just wish you would reconsider what you’re doing because, you know, we’re not living when we’re like that, we’re surviving. That’s what it’s like to be at the bottom of the crap pile.”
The bill was debated in the House of Representatives on March 22 as part of the Turnbull government’s Jobs for Families Child Care Package.
According to a statement issued by Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull, the amendment would make the Australian child care system more “affordale, flexible and accessible” for families.
