A Fairer Tax and Welfare System information session

Welcome and thank you for joining us to discuss A Fairer Tax and Welfare System for Australia.  

It is my pleasure to welcome my St Vincent de Paul National Council colleagues, who have journeyed from various parts of Australia to join us here today:

• Geraldine Hawkes, SA President
• Danny Cloghan, WA President
• Peter Houweling, NSW President
• Brian Stacey, Canberra-Goulburn President
• Barbara Anglin, Deputy President, Victoria, and
• Ryan Erlandsen, Secretary 

Special thanks to Louise Miller-Frost, Member for Boothby, for generously hosting today’s forum. It’s an honour to gather at Parliament House to reflect on fairness, dignity, and the kind of Australia we aspire to build together.  

Some may find it surprising that the St Vincent de Paul Society — known as one of Australia’s largest charities, with 45,000 Members and volunteers and 7,500 employees — is here advocating for tax and welfare reform. But ever since the Society’s beginnings in Paris in 1833 and in Melbourne in 1854, advocacy and service have been dual pillars of our mission, because the root causes of poverty must be addressed, not just its consequences. 

Today, the need for the Society’s work remains urgent. In our prosperous nation, 3.93 million Australians spanning all ages – from newborns to the elderly – live below the poverty line. It is a stark reality found in every community, in some electorates more than others. We are called to respond with compassion, and to seek real, sustainable solutions. 

Earlier this week, we launched our annual Vinnies Christmas Appeal, backed by troubling figures from a nationwide survey.  Nearly half of families with children under 18 worry about putting food on the table this Christmas, and one in three Australians — 32 percent — have skipped meals in the past year to afford essentials such as rent or electricity. Requests for help from our Vinnies Vans in NSW alone are up 20 percent compared to last year. 

Alarmingly, poverty is spreading not only among people on welfare, but also among lower- and middle-income working families, with up to one in five people seeking our help for the first time. 

It’s evident that Australia’s tax and welfare systems could be fairer. Experts agree more could be done to improve equity. From our perspective, reform is already overdue for the three-quarters of a million children in Australia who are living in poverty today. Each of these children has a name; each deserves an opportunity to thrive, not just survive. Each year of inaction robs them of that opportunity, costing the nation billions now and into the future.  

To find solutions, the Society commissioned this research led by Associate Professor Ben Phillips from ANU’s Centre for Social Policy Research. For years, the Society has called for increases to working-age income support payments. We could see no real progress, so we modelled how those increases could be funded through fair tax reform. Ben’s report shows that modest, budget-neutral reforms could lift as many as one million Australians out of poverty, while also increasing the superannuation balances of around 90 percent of everyday Australians. 

Ben will speak to the specifics of the modelling, but the findings are stark: 3.93 million people in Australia (14.2 percent) are living in after-housing poverty right now; 2.95 million (10.7 percent) are in adjusted poverty. Worst affected are renters, single parents and their children, younger people under 50, and welfare recipients. These are not just numbers; they are individuals in our communities, constituents in your electorates. 

The ANU study modelled four policy options designed to reduce poverty, from modest JobSeeker reform to a Guaranteed Minimum Income (GMI) at the current poverty line. A GMI would top up incomes for households below the threshold, including low-income workers not reliant on welfare. All four options are budget-neutral, funded by modest reforms to superannuation tax concessions and/or changes to thresholds for welfare payments to high-wealth households. 

By making modest changes to only the very wealthiest super funds, we can create a fairer safety net and boost retirement savings for the great majority. Millions would benefit; only the highest-wealth households – those with multi-million-dollar super balances – would receive a little less; a small ask that can be life-changing for families living in poverty. 

We welcome the Treasurer’s recent move to revise superannuation tax rates for accounts over $3 million and $10 million, which affects less than 10 percent of households, and stands to raise substantial revenue. The Society calls for this revenue to be redirected to Australia’s poorest families through prudent increases to working-age income support payments. In 2025, no household should face impossible choices between food and housing – but many do. 

The Albanese Government’s own Economic Inclusion Advisory Committee 2025 Report recommends raising JobSeeker and related payments to 90 percent of the Age Pension as its top priority. Its modelling shows that raising these payments would deliver a return of $1.24 for every dollar invested, through a healthier, more productive community. That’s good economic and social policy, now and in the longer term. 

I also restate the Society’s strong opposition to any broadening or increase of the GST, which would only deepen inequality. Ben’s analysis shows how regressive the GST is. 

Debating these reforms demands broad thinking and prioritising the common good. Australia is a generous nation, as the Society witnesses daily. 

This is a debate about our future. About becoming the nation, the Prime Minister pledged on election night — an Australia where no one is left behind. 

Thank you for hearing the Society’s call for fairer tax and welfare reform. We urge you to prioritise these overdue changes before more families fall into hardship. Lifting people out of poverty is a policy choice and we urge the government to make that choice.