Budget 2016: Unions angry at '$4-per-hour' intern plan for young jobseekers

Updated

Scott Morrison's move to rethink Work for the Dole and pay Australian businesses to take on thousands of young interns has been slammed by unions but welcomed by Australia's peak social services body.

Key points: Government announces $804m program to get under-25s working

Jobseekers to be offered internships with $200 additional welfare each fortnight

ACTU slams the move saying it equals "$4-per-hour jobs for young people"

In a surprise move, the Government's pre-election budget includes $840.3 million on a new program to get people under the age of 25 into jobs.

The centrepiece of the move is a scheme to place young jobseekers in internships, working up to 25 hours per week and receiving an extra $200 per fortnight on top of their existing welfare payments.

Businesses that take them on will receive a $1,000 bonus and will then be eligible for a Youth Bonus wage subsidy of between $6,500 and $10,000.

Up to 30,000 interns a year could be involved.

Young jobseekers will also be told to complete six weeks of training under the new scheme, named Youth Jobs PaTH — which stands for Prepare, Trial, Hire.

Mr Morrison suggested the existing Work for the Dole scheme was not working and said the new program would give people "real jobs and real experience".

"It is worth trying new ways to get young people into real jobs," he said.

"I've listened to business people who said they want to give young people a go but they don't want to have to shoulder all of the risk and all the cost of giving them a go.

"We are de-risking that investment."

The Australian Council of Trade Unions criticised the move, branding it a "$4-per-hour jobs for young people" scheme.

The Australian Manufacturing Workers Union also criticised the move.

"We don't think that's going to do anything but provide yet another layer of unpaid labour which is actually going to be subsidised by the taxpayer," the union's national president Andrew Dettmer said.

"A young intern will be receiving perhaps $100 a week from the taxpayer additional to their unemployment benefit.

"The company or employer they're working for receives $1,000 and what do they get out of it at the end? We don't think there's anything they get out of it that will be of lasting benefit to them."

But the Australian Council of Social Services (ACOSS) welcomed the move.

"We are very pleased to see the new approach to helping young people into paid work," chief executive Dr Cassandra Goldie said.

"This budget recognises the failure of work for the dole, and has instead provided an opportunity for young people to get work experience in real jobs with a wage subsidy, something we have urged for some time and should be used more widely."

But she warned that the news elsewhere in the budget was not so good.

"The budget locks in $13 billion in cuts from family payments, income support for young people and paid parental leave, and adds a further $3 billion in cuts to payments and essential services. This includes cuts to Medicare and dental health and income support for people with disability."

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Topics: budget, government-and-politics, federal-government, unions, youth, industrial-relations, business-economics-and-finance, australia

First posted