More than 168,000 people are missing out on parenting, carer and disability payments worth $623 million a year because it is too complicated to claim welfare benefits that many eligible Australians are unaware even exist, the Australia Institute has found."That's a mean way for our government to aim to 'save' money,'' she said.
As the federal government moves to toughen access to the Newstart allowance, requiring new jobseekers to present fortnightly to Centrelink, the Missing Out report found the money the government saved because eligible people did not claim was 1½ times the amount it lost to cheats in 2008.
David Baker, an Australia Institute research fellow, said the government and opposition were ''playing to preconceptions of welfare recipients'' in an election year, but this only added to the stigma that stopped many legitimate recipients from claiming. The executive director of Anglicare, Kasy Chambers, said government assistance was provided for good reason and the system needed to be changed if people were failing to navigate through the bureaucracy.
Analysing four Centrelink payments, the report found the biggest reasons for people not claiming entitlements were the complexity of the claims process with long, elaborate forms; stigma; and lack of awareness.
One in five people who qualified for the carer allowance, worth up to $2615 a year, did not claim it, largely because they were not aware it existed.
The Australia Institute calculated that more than 30,000 families were missing out on the parenting payment, or 6 per cent of the 500,000 families eligible. The payment is worth $392 a fortnight for single parents and $165 for couples with young children.
The two-week bereavement allowance, paid to those whose partner had died, was largely unclaimed. Only $2 million was paid in 2007-08, far less than the $19 million the researchers calculated should have been paid if another 7100 people who were eligible had been aware of it.
Centrelink is increasing its data matching to identify overpayments and fraud, but the same methods could also be used to identify people who qualify for payments and were not receiving them, the report said.
It called for the Australian National Audit Office to investigate ways the welfare system could be simplified, as the British government has done through a ''simplification'' unit within its pensions department.
Employment services that the government contracts to place people in work under the Job Services Australia program could also assist people through the application maze.
Ms Chambers said the Henry tax review had also found the benefits system was inconsistent and complicated, and the Australia Institute report was further evidence it should be reformed.
The report found 26 per cent of pensioner and healthcare concession card holders were embarrassed to use the card, and 14 per cent of low-income households said they deliberately did not use their card because of the stigma attached.
''Increasing requirements to attend Centrelink when they have other things to do is likely to have a further negative effect on people claiming the benefits they are entitled to,'' Mr Baker said of the Newstart rule change.
Ms Chambers said the government had fallen silent on social inclusion in an election year."That's a mean way for our government to aim to 'save' money,'' she said.
Analysing four Centrelink payments, the report found the biggest reasons for people not claiming entitlements were the complexity of the claims process with long, elaborate forms; stigma; and lack of awareness.
One in five people who qualified for the carer allowance, worth up to $2615 a year, did not claim it, largely because they were not aware it existed.
The Australia Institute calculated that more than 30,000 families were missing out on the parenting payment, or 6 per cent of the 500,000 families eligible. The payment is worth $392 a fortnight for single parents and $165 for couples with young children.
The two-week bereavement allowance, paid to those whose partner had died, was largely unclaimed. Only $2 million was paid in 2007-08, far less than the $19 million the researchers calculated should have been paid if another 7100 people who were eligible had been aware of it.
Centrelink is increasing its data matching to identify overpayments and fraud, but the same methods could also be used to identify people who qualify for payments and were not receiving them, the report said.
It called for the Australian National Audit Office to investigate ways the welfare system could be simplified, as the British government has done through a ''simplification'' unit within its pensions department.
Employment services that the government contracts to place people in work under the Job Services Australia program could also assist people through the application maze.
Ms Chambers said the Henry tax review had also found the benefits system was inconsistent and complicated, and the Australia Institute report was further evidence it should be reformed.
The report found 26 per cent of pensioner and healthcare concession card holders were embarrassed to use the card, and 14 per cent of low-income households said they deliberately did not use their card because of the stigma attached.
''Increasing requirements to attend Centrelink when they have other things to do is likely to have a further negative effect on people claiming the benefits they are entitled to,'' Mr Baker said of the Newstart rule change.
Ms Chambers said the government had fallen silent on social inclusion in an election year.
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