Who will pay & who should pay in the budget

ACOSS (Australian Council of Social Services) has reacted to sloppy Joe's speech this week and put together a detailed list of policies that will impact the poor most, whilst also detailing policies that could be done away with as they go to people who are able to cop it, so to speak. Remember, the DSP is less than $20,000 a year. There is not the slightest room for cuts, and anyone who doesn't think so should try and fuckin live on the thing. We shall see how accurate this list is I guess post budget: 

Who will pay? 
• The introduction of a $6 GP co-payment will impact on low income people most and those with chronic illness and is likely to lead to reduced visits to doctors and greater pressure on hospital system; 
• Proposed changes to eligibility for the Disability Support Pension will require more frequent medical assessments and shift many people onto Newstart Allowance which is $166 a week lower, without addressing barriers to work;
• Increasing the Age Pension eligibility age will force many older people to struggle on the $36 a day Newstart payment for longer; 
• Proposed changes to indexation of pensions to prices instead of wages will cause payments to fall behind community living standards and lead to an increase in poverty amongst older people, people with disability and others relying on pensions; 
• Abolishing Medicare Locals will reduce the access to primary health care services for those on low incomes; 
• Abolishing the low income superannuation contribution will effectively penalise people on low incomes for saving for their retirement; 
• Abolishing the Income Support Bonus Payment would reduce assistance to people on the below poverty line Newstart payment by $4 week; 
• Cuts to Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander organisations, including legal services and peak representative bodies and community legal services will all reduce access to essential services to some of the most disadvantaged members of our community. 

Who should pay?  
While the Government has signalled a reduction in ‘corporate welfare', the Government has been reported as refusing to touch expensive tax expenditures or poorly targeted payments, which benefit those who are wealthier, driving greater inequality in Australian society, including: 
• Superannuation tax concession, of which one third go the top 10% of wage earners, now cost the same as the age pension, around $40 billion per year; 
• Housing tax concessions, which also largely benefit those on high incomes and contribute to house price and rent inflation which is locking many low and middle income households out of the market, at a cost of more than $8.3 billion a year; 
• The assets test for eligibility for the part pension, by which people with investment assets of more than $1 million, in addition to the family home, are eligible to receive a part pension - causing rapid growth in uptake of the pension; 
• The Seniors Supplement, which extends to those who are too wealthy to receive a pension; 
• The Private Health Insurance Rebate for ancillary cover; and 
• The tax treatment of private trusts which largely benefit those on high incomes. more