Senator MARSHALL (4:04 PM) —Originally, when the government introduced the Family and Community Services Legislation Amendment (Disability Reform) Bill (No. 2) 2002 [No. 2] into the parliament, it argued that its reforms were all about supporting people with disabilities in finding employment—a very admirable and acceptable notion. The government should be putting the economy to work for people with disabilities who want to work. However, there are no such proposals contained in this bill. Nobody disputes the need for welfare reform—Labor has been quite vocal in this regard for some time. Labor recognises that we need to increase the number of people on the disability support pension who work and it agrees that too few people with disabilities are working when they can and are willing to do so. However, this government's proposal does very little to facilitate this. In fact, the proposal does nothing to promote this goal.

Under the bill before us, an individual who was to find work and move off the DSP but who, for one reason or another, has to return to the support payment will lose benefits. For those currently receiving the benefit, this is a massive disincentive to move off it and find work. This is firmly in contrast to the supposed objective of the government, which was to support an increased participation of people with disabilities in the work force. What incentive does an individual have to get out there and seek work if there is a risk that they will lose their much-needed support if, for one reason or another, they need to rely upon it again? There is simply none. This is a fundamental flaw in the legislation before us.

This government's proposal is not about disability support reform. It is a full-frontal attack on a social safety net—the net that protects Australians with disabilities from impoverishment. Over time, Senator Vanstone and many other members of the government have made crystal clear their real rationale for these changes to the disability support pension. It is not about facilitation for people with disabilities who want to work. This government argues that many people receiving disability support pensions are no more than whingers, malingerers or rorters of the system who refuse to work. Senator Vanstone has cited that many people in receipt of the DSP have no better excuse for receiving it than having a bad back. How much further from the truth can that view get?

To receive the disability support pension in the first place now and before these proposed changes were to enter into force, people need to demonstrate to Centrelink that they have disabilities, illness or injuries that attract an impairment rating of at least 20 points on the impairment table and also be able to prove that they have been unable to work full time or be retrained for full-time work for at least two years due to their disability. `Full-time work' is defined as being able to work for at least 30 hours per week at award wages. The intention of the bill before us today is to reduce that 30-hour requirement to 15 hours a week at award wages. If the minister is satisfied that so many individuals are receiving a DSP for having no disability other than being plagued by a bad back, why doesn't she increase the capacity for Centrelink to undertake compliance investigations against those suspected of committing fraud of the system? It is interesting to note that the government has not increased its efforts in this regard; rather, it has decreased its efforts in stamping out Centrelink fraud and funding the compliance sector of Centrelink.

These reforms come from a government which promised before the last election that nobody's pensions would be cut. The Prime Minister, who spoke at the ACOSS conference on 25 October 2001, said:

It is another story of saying one thing before an election and committing to undertake exactly the opposite after the election. This is a government hell-bent on fulfilling its ideological agenda. This reform package has nothing to do with facilitating people with disabilities who can work to find a situation in the work force; rather, the package has everything to do with slashing the number of people in receipt of the disability support pension in whatever and whichever way it can. The government has recently demonstrated its ability to find the resources necessary to undertake a war, yet it cannot find the resources to fund the disability support pension. This is a strange set of priorities. I urge the Senate to again reject this bill. It is fundamentally flawed. It is an insult to the many people with disabilities in Australia who rely upon a fair go.