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The quarterly ratings rank the performance of the jobactive providers in 1,700 locations around Australia, as well as the smaller disability employment services program.
Providers were told in early February that the suspension of the star ratings would last until the Australian Bureau of Statistics resumes producing a specific labour market dataset and the department was satisfied that the ratings could be calculated fairly. The final ratings until then would be from September 2020.
Some providers privately welcomed the suspension, having warned that the ratings would be compromised by the shifts in the labour market caused by the pandemic.
But Kristen O’Connell, a spokesperson for the Australian Unemployed Workers’ Union, said it exposed the “dramatic contrast” between how the government treated people on Centrelink payments and employment service providers.
“The slashed $615 per fortnight JobSeeker rate announced today [will] … trap 1.4 million people and their kids almost 50% below the poverty line.
“This is not a raise; it is a cut,” O’Connell continued, adding that it will “entrench poverty and lock people out of work for years or decades, as we have seen in every past recession”. O Connell warned of the impact of cuts on peoples’ mental health.
“We don’t believe the government should force anyone to live in poverty and we know the vast majority agrees with us.
“There are not enough jobs. Instead of handing billions of dollars to private organisations who bully, threaten and harass us, the government should be caring for people who are locked out of work,” O’Connell said, referring to the job providers who will be given more power to harass unemployed people.
The Morrison government has announced a permanent increase in jobseeker payments of $50 per fortnight – just $3.57 per day – when the coronavirus supplement expires at the end of March. Scott Morrison said the measure, to cost $9bn over four years, would lift unemployment benefits back to 41.2% of the national minimum wage, in line with the level during the Howard government. After Guardian Australia first revealed the scale of the base increase.
The permanent boost came after years of campaigning by welfare organisations, business groups and opposition politicians, but falls short of the rise many had been calling for.