Senator Doug Cameron

I was pleased to be asked by ACOSS to addres their National Conference in Adelaide on the 25th of May. The following is an extract from my speech:

One of the fundamental outstanding issues is to ensure that the Newstart allowance is sufficient to allow families who are dependent on government help to survive with some dignity and respect.

I have yet to hear the evidence for the right-wing theory that forcing individuals and families into poverty and on to charity will improve their capacity to find employment.

Simply asserting that it is "self-evident" or "beyond dispute" is not sufficient grounds to force children into poverty.

Frankly, I think too many parliamentarians are unaware of the hardship and social isolation caused by poverty and unemployment.

There are not too many John Curtin’s in parliament, politicians who experienced poverty and deprivation and developed an outrage at injustice.

The great Labor Prime Minister Curtin described his poverty as "tea without milk, bread without butter".

Too many Australian children whose parents are reliant on Newstart are still having their tea without milk and bread without butter.

Curtin set out to uplift and empower the poorest sections of society declaring citizens can only make a contribution to society when he or she was adequately remunerated, educated and housed.

Bob Hawke, despite the controversy around his child poverty statement in 1997, was correct in raising the need to address child poverty by 1990.

Here we are in 2013 with far too many children in poverty.

Some in the political class try to convince themselves that Newstart is a temporary allowance and that an allowance 30 per cent below the poverty line is fair reasonable and equitable.

It is not!

As the former US President, Theodore Roosevelt said:

"This country will not be a good place for any of us to live in unless we make it a reasonably good place for all of us to live in"

This applies equally in Australia in 2013 as it did in the United States of America in the early 1900s.

The issue before us is how to develop a community consensus for a strong, modern welfare state.

Unfortunately, neoliberal economic theory and globalisation which promotes international economic integration and a race to the bottom in taxation policy and welfare payments is still the dominant approach in English-speaking nations.

When you add to this the massive power and influence of Australia's mining and media corporations the opportunity for progressive economic and social policies is constrained but not defeated.

Financial risk has been shifted from corporations to the state and from the state to the individual.

This shifting of risk has created significant insecurity for many Australians at a time of great economic growth and wealth.

This insecurity manifests itself in a focus on the individual at the expense of the collective good.

The key issue for progressive social forces is to develop an alternative economic model and a voice which challenges the dominance of the Friedmanites in politics, government bureaucracies and the media.

We must have a compelling argument as to why the collective good requires a new analysis and debate on the role of taxation as a tool of nation building and the collective good.

The Nobel prize-winning economist Prof Joseph Stiglitz, in his book, The Price of Inequality draws attention to the argument that taxes required to finance social benefits stifle growth.

According to Stiglitz, over the period 2000 to 2010, high taxing Sweden, for example, grew far faster than the United States – the countries average growth rates have exceeded those of the United States – 2.31 per cent a year versus 1.85 per cent.

Stiglitz quotes a former Swedish finance minister telling him "we have grown so fast and done so well because we had high taxes"

Stiglitz argues that it is not that taxes themselves led to higher growth but that the taxes financed public expenditures – investments in education, technology, and infrastructure – and the public expenditures are what had sustained the high growth– more than offsetting any adverse effects from the higher taxation.

Where should the money come from to fund a substantial increase in Newstart and other important welfare reforms?

I cannot remember the last time I spoke to anyone who did not harbour the aspiration for our country to be a good society; one that is without peer when it comes to looking after people with disabilities, taking care of the elderly and building a public education system second to none.

There is almost universal acceptance that we should do these things.

But manifestly it seems there is almost universal timidity when it comes to the question of how we pay for them.