ARE YOU UNDER 30?

What’s the problem we have to fix?

Well! Where to begin?

Young people are being hit hard by the economic fallout of COVID-19 and experts now fear years of debt and unemployment are ahead.

Every economic downturn hits young people harder than the general population. And after the Global Financial Crisis, young people never fully recovered. Underemployment for young people remained stubbornly high after the GFC, to the point that even at the start of 2020, before the coronavirus crisis had hit, nearly one in three young people still either had no job or not enough hours of work.

Now, young people are the ones most likely to have been in jobs shut down by the COVID crisis and they make up half of the 1.1 million casuals deliberately excluded from the Government’s JobKeeper support package.

According to ABS data, as of April 2020, nearly 4 in 10 young people are without a job or enough hours of work to make ends meet.

People who rent have been left in limbo, not knowing if they’ll be left facing months of crushing rental debt... Right now there’s no plan from the government to fix the housing crisis.

Currently, too many young people live in poverty. Before the coronavirus supplement, Youth Allowance hadn’t been increased in years and unemployed young people under 22 got no support at all if they couldn’t prove independence.

AND Don’t get us started on the crushing education fees, the housing market or the climate crisis. The list, unfortunately, goes on.

What sort of guaranteed jobs are we talking about here?

The Greens economic recovery plan will help create hundreds of thousands of jobs, including tens of thousands of new apprenticeships, but we’ll go further. Under our Jobs Guarantee, as the private sector gets back on its feet, the government would offer a job to any young person from 18 to 29 who wants it.

It would mean that as we wait for the economy to pick up again and offer young people decent jobs that meet their needs, you could choose to work on a project earning an industry-standard wage and getting the benefits of secure employment. You would also have a choice of mixing your current employment with a government-provided job, or better matching your study and your income, and of knowing that when you stand up to your boss on your hours, conditions or wages, the Government has got your back.

And it will be completely up to you, as there would be no consequences for deciding not to take up a Next Gen Guarantee job: your Income Guarantee payment and/or taking up a place in study would still be available. Work in a Jobs Guarantee job won’t be like ‘work for the dole’ programs. The government will be your employer. You will get full entitlements (like annual leave), full health and safety protection and have the right to join a union. It will be voluntary, secure waged work that makes a difference. There is so much that needs doing.

You’ll be able to apply for a job on one of the projects that are part of our massive investment in industries that tackle the climate emergency and build a more caring and creative society.

The areas that you could find work in include:
▲ Renew Australia - getting Australia running on 100% renewables
▲ Habitat Taskforce - restoring the 12.6 million hectares burnt in the recent bushfires and help make our rivers and lakes swimmable again
▲ Caring Society - expanding our aged care sector
▲ Education - growing our childcare centres, schools, TAFEs and universities
▲ Homes For All - building 500,000 new public and social housing homes over the next decade
▲ Manufacturing - setting Australia up to be a world leader in green steel and advanced manufacturing
▲ Creating Australia - regrowing the arts and creative sector

YOU CAN DOWNLOAD THE FULL PLAN HERE>>

What's a guaranteed livable income?

Currently, too many young people live in poverty. Before the coronavirus supplement, Youth Allowance hadn’t been increased in years and unemployed young people under 22 got no support at all if they couldn’t prove independence. The Greens will guarantee that every young person gets an income they can live on by abolishing the independence test and simplifying the framework, so that all young people 22 and over receive the same guaranteed income of $1115 per fortnight (whether they are studying or looking for work), and that young people between 18-21 are guaranteed at least $1012 per fortnight if they live away from home, and $854 if they don’t.

We’ll also ensure everyone has a strong guaranteed minimum living income based on the new JobSeeker rate of over $1115 a fortnight. Yep, we’ll keep Job Seeker. We cannot return to a world where unemployed people have to make impossible choices to figure out how to live on $40 a day. Everyone must be supported with a liveable income above the poverty line.