Many of Uniting Communities’ clients are people for whom maintaining their wellbeing and a decent standard of living is a daily challenge as they are reliant on receiving social security payments, which are too low and do not enable them to live a decent life.

Our organisation supports this Bill and its objectives of ensuring that ‘the living standards of people relying on social security payments reflect the broader changes in community living standards and maintain purchasing power, in line with wage and cost of living increases (Explanatory Memorandum – Section 3: Principle Object)’.

To this end, Uniting Communities supports the establishment of a Social Security Commission that is to provide the Parliament with independent advice on the minimum levels for social security payments, such that all recipients can meet an accepted contemporary minimum standard of living.