This article is more than 1 year old

This article is more than 1 year old

The government’s proposed changes to how job seekers are made to look for work while receiving welfare have been mostly welcomed by stakeholders – although it’s also been warned against creating another “robodebt” scenario through an overreliance on automation.

Kelly O’Dwyer announced the biggest overhaul in mutual obligation requirements for 20 years on Wednesday, with the government to free job seekers from having to apply for 20 positions a month, as well as allowing job hunters to look for work online.

While the Australian Council of Social Service welcomed the move to reform an outdated system, it also warned of unintended consequences given “the reliance on automated compliance and digital platforms”.

“A big risk with the proposed online employment services system is that penalties for non-compliance could be automatically imposed without any human intervention,” the Acoss CEO, Cassandra Goldie, said.

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“This can have unfair and incredibly damaging outcomes for people, as we’ve seen with ParentsNext, and the Robodebt debacle.

“It is vital that the government avoids creating a digital divide in employment services, by isolating those who can’t access the internet, or use online platforms.”

O’Dwyer said the reforms would not leave anyone behind, stressing the new model had a “more comprehensive assessment system to better determine the level of support” clients needed.

The changes came after a review of the $1.3bn Jobactive system found it too restrictive for both job seekers and employers, with the 20 jobs a month requirement having turned into a “tick the box” exercise, which led to people applying for jobs they were not suited for, just to meet their obligations.

O’Dwyer said the changes would make “mutual obligation activities more effective and targeted”, as well as reducing “unsuitable applications to small businesses, reducing their burden and removing red tape.”

The switch to digital was also expected to make job hunting easier, with savings to be reinvested in increased support for disadvantaged job seekers, with Adelaide’s southern suburbs and the NSW mid-north coast to serve as the trial sites, ahead of a national rollout.

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“The digital system will also mean that job-ready job seekers will no longer have to attend regular appointments with [an employment] provider, giving them the flexibility to fit their mutual obligation requirements around the other commitments in their lives,” O’Dwyer said.

The Australian Chamber of Commerce and Industry embraced the changes, which it said “should be better positioned to tap into existing job vacancies and to better connect with successful programs”.

The Business Council also welcomed the greater flexibility in the new system, which it said would ensure employers could “find the right candidates” for job vacancies.

But Labor said the changes would do nothing to fix the Work for the Dole or controversial Youth Jobs PaTH intern programs, which have both been drawn in for criticism in recent years.

“The youth unemployment rates means there’s more than 250,000 young people who are looking for work and haven’t got it,” the shadow employment minister, Brendan O’Connor, said.

“… The government must say how it will reform Work for the Dole and its youth program, PaTH, to make them safer, and more likely to get people into work.”

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The Greens also responded with scepticism, with senator Rachel Siewert saying she had “little confidence” the digital transition would “address the broken Jobactive system”.

“The government has an extremely poor track record of providing digital services and automated systems and making more people rely on it for important services is problematic,” she said in a statement.

“During the Senate inquiry we heard that around 5 % of employers actually used the Jobactive scheme. But apparently job seekers are going to be able to ‘find’ employers through an online portal?

“How is the government going to ensure the privacy of jobseekers? Are there just going to be lists of unemployed people on the internet waiting to be picked up by employers?

“The system is completely undermined from the outset because it prioritises compliance over genuine assistance and it needs a complete overhaul.”