Treasurer – meet the real world

Very occasionally, the real world forces its way into the deliberations of federal policymakers, and when it does it’s a mildly shocking thing, like an open window bringing breeze and car horns and birdsong into a muzak-filled air-conditioned shopping mall.

This week it arrived in the form of Terese Edwards, from the National Council for Single Mothers and their Children, who was giving evidence to a Senate inquiry about a government plan to cut $4.8bn from family payments – which adds up to cuts in payments to a single parent with two children between 13 and 18 of about $3,000 a year, including axing a twice-a-year top-up payment.

The treasurer, Scott Morrison, quite correctly says the top-up payment was introduced because many families were finding themselves with a liability after being accidentally overpaid by the government because they had underestimated what their family earnings would be. Now that technology has overcome that problem, the “Christmas and July bonus payments have outlived their purpose”, the treasurer insists. The government also argues that once children are in their teens mothers can, and should, go back to work. Which, in an ideal world, is also true.

But these arguments ignore one big thing. For mothers who cannot find well-paid work, the current family payments – even with the bonuses – are barely enough to get by on.

Edwards explained that low-wage jobs and unemployment benefits left single parents with so little that they now relied on the “bonuses” for pretty important purposes – paying for any out-of-the-ordinary costs, such as car registration or replacing an appliance.

She gave the results of a 2014 survey of single parents, in which 74% said they had trouble paying utility bills, almost 14% said utilities had been disconnected, 58% said their children had given up sport or other activities because they couldn’t afford the equipment or fees, 62% said they could not afford health or household insurance and 57% said they struggled to keep their car on the road.

And she read from stories the single mothers had sent her to pass on to the inquiry.

“My son never passes on school notes regarding anything that costs money. I’ve found them ripped up in his school bag, hidden in this room, etc. I think he has noticed my hands shaking so many times from monetary stress that he will do anything to keep things like this from me. He’s 13 and has desperately wanted to get a job since he was 11. He constantly asks why I hardly ever eat dinner but, fortunately, he still seems to believe that I absolutely love toast and two-minute noodles when I do eat.”

Or: “Please, please, please tell them ... all the pollies … that we will go over the edge if there are any more cuts. My luxury is our 18-year-old Corolla.”

Or: “Jack is great at sports, he pretended that he was injured so he would not get picked for the inter-school competition. It was $35. We just don’t have the spare cash.”

According to the government, the family benefit cuts – first announced in its disastrous 2014 budget and recently softened to try to win parliamentary approval – are the only way it can pay for a plan to spend an extra $3.5bn on childcare.