Papa Centrelink: Navigating the Australian welfare system
NOTE: Centrelink is an Australian government program which delivers welfare payments.
Centrelink is just like dad.
First, there’s the call-wait system, reminiscent of standing shaking in front of his raised newspaper, him in full knowledge that I am there, waiting. And waiting. Occasionally, he hums, as I yank at the hem of my school dress, my “dad, dad”, ignored as he appears to mishear or misunderstand me.
Just like the Centrelink voice verification system struggles with my ‘Australia, Australia’.
Finally, as I wonder whether to cut my losses and try again later, an abrupt rustle. His newspaper inches down, just slightly. Enough to see his eyes, narrowed, suspicious, already accusing.
In the same way that I will communicate with Centrelink employees decades later I rapidly launch in, knowing full well that I could get cut off at any time. I am desperate to cram my problem into that millisecond before he ‘remembers’ the list of wrongs I may have committed, recently, and/or years past, a point at which my current issue will be swiped aside by alarming official sounding ‘facts’ of which I have never been aware. All delivered in an ominous tone which makes me ashamed of whatever crime I never knew I was guilty of.
Periodically, like a governmental phone line, his words are buried in a startling crackle, as his white knuckled fingers agitatedly knead his paper, an emphasis to his points.
Slippery-slimy as our goldfish, the conversation darts around confusingly –
my current problem, my alleged crimes, my current problem…
Until, lips pursed thoughtfully, he squints into eternity, silently constructing my future.
As heart thumping, I breath-hold: Perhaps this time I have been heard, maybe. Maybe this time he will help me.
And, in Centrelink style, at that exact moment of tentative hope he pounces, blindsiding me.
“Where’s your report?”
Stepping forward, placing my school report into a menacing hand and taking a largish step back (a move repeated years later when reporting this, that and the other to Centrelink), I shiver, aware that my wellbeing hangs in the balance.
“If you failed anything, you lose your allowance”
Intense, silent scrutiny of that bit of paper as he attempts to find fault – any fault. Even a smidgeon. Anything at all to prove I am inferior, undeserving.
Whilst I stand silently beside his chair, cold sweating.
“You only got a C minus. I’m not sure you deserve anything. But, you didn’t actually fail I suppose. This time”.
Grudging sigh. Hay-feverish snort. Heft of buttock off chair as he yanks his wallet into view, plucks out a note, and waves it at me, a flapping reminder of his power.
“Don’t forget who gave you this, puts the shirt on your back and dinner in your mouth.
Without me, you’d be on the streets.
Slip up, and you’ll be out.”
A sentiment echoed decades later by Centrelink, the threat subtly implied through the choice of words in their communications.
A daily, destabilising knowledge.
However, whether it be from dad or (later) Centrelink, I am grateful that I get an allowance.
Plus, there’s the occasional job here and there, money zealously unspent, so I can save.
But, I can’t save. Cash slips through my fingers, one smooth motion, almost as it arrives in my stress-shaky palm.
“Is this really all nanna paid you for washing the car?
I’ll take one of those. You already get an allowance”.
He pauses.
I cower.
“Actually, don’t you owe me money? Didn’t I give you extra pocket money last week? No? Prove it, or you lose both dollars.”
And as my mouth opens, silently…
“Keep arguing, and I’ll deduct more for the times you might have got money from nanna that I don’t know about.
I’ll average across the last six months, to be fair.”
(an algorithm eerily like Centrelink’s debt collection calculations)
Rejecting my barely audible
“I am not a liar, I am not a liar”,
dad smirks,
“There must be something wrong with your memory.
Go whinge to your mother if you want to complain.”
And thus, begins our family’s version of the Centrelink appeals process.
“No, I don’t know where she bloody is. Find her yourself.”
Desperate, and never sure where to find my mother (a dubious avenue of justice), as I turn to peer down the dimly lit hall, instantly I am returned to my father by her shrieking face-less voice
“I don’t want to know about it.”
And, distant scuff of slippers on carpet, my mother is gone before she arrived.
A walking-talking 30-year precursor to the Centrelink process which, similarly, circling between departments, generally ends where it started.
My father’s newspaper creeps up, his voice now as distant as if from a call-centre in another state.
“Put the cash beside my bed. I don’t want to hear one more word about it”.
And, I am dismissed. Perplexed, sad-angry-scared-crushed, poorer, and with all avenues of appeal exhausted.
But, there’s no point in whinging. Right or wrong, you just never win against dad.
Don’t even try.
Because slip up and you will be out. On the streets. Shirtless. Hungry.
Speak up, and you may lose everything.
An uncanny representation of the Centrelink supported life.
And what have I learnt?
Money is language. And words can crush.