MEMBER for Mallee Andrew Broad believes the proposed internship scheme will encourage young people to work by giving them extra money for trips to McDonald’s and new car stereos.
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Mr Broad spoke in favour of federal legislation to create the Youth Jobs PaTH program in Parliament on Tuesday.
“This bill is attempting to do is to create a pathway for those young Australians to go from being effectively unemployed to being in gainful employment,” he said.
“Keep in mind that, as I said, 600,000 Australians are in households where they have never seen a model of working people.”
The government proposes to spend $752 million on paying young people $200 a fortnight in addition to unemployment benefits to complete a 12-week internship.
Businesses that take part in the program would also receive money for each participant.
Mr Broad said the prospect of a little extra money would tempt young people to break their cycle of unemployment.
“You give them a little bit of extra money and, suddenly, yes, they are tired, but they get to take their girlfriend out to Maccas,” Mr Broad said.
“They got to put a new stereo in their car.
“It actually starts to light the fire in the eyes of young Australians who never thought they could aspire to something—now, they think, perhaps they could aspire a little bit more.”
Labor Member for Bruce Julian Hill said he agreed with some of the things Mr Broad said.
However, Mr Hill said he did not believe that the PaTH Scheme was the best way to tackle youth unemployment.
“The government claims that PaTH is the way to solve welfare dependence among young people, but at the same time provides businesses incentives to churn through low-paid interns every 12 weeks, giving them $1,000 with each new intern they take on,” Mr Hill said.
“What's to stop employers from picking up a new intern every 12 weeks, relying on this cheap labour, and repeating the process over, and over.”
Unions have criticised the internship scheme for offering a pay rate of just a few dollars and hour above the Newstart allowance, and have pointed out there is no guarantee of a permanent job.
Mr Broad acknowledged that some young people would not get a job after their internship.
“If at the end of that 12-month period, or even less than that time, that person through no fault of their own is sacked—and that does happen at times—that person does not have to go on a waiting list to receive unemployment benefits,” he said.
“That young Australian will be able to go straight back on to unemployment benefits while they look for another job.”
Mr Broad said the PaTH scheme was similar to what he had done to help young people with work on his farm.
”I would take some of these young unemployed kids out to my farm and get them on a handpiece, doing pretty hard physical work,” he said.
“They would say to me, 'I'm a bit disadvantaged. I've got ADHD, I've got difficulty with my concentration, I'm hyperactive.'”
“But, after dragging sheep out and crutching them all day, they slept at night. They were very tired.”