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6 - Income Support for Carers of Children with Disabilities in Australia

Background and Recent Reforms to Carer Payment (Child)

from Part III - Care and Support Policy Tensions in Two Liberal Welfare States

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  21 April 2022

Yvette Maker
Affiliation:
University of Melbourne
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Summary

This chapter introduces the first of two case study analyses presented in the book. The case studies explore how the care policy tensions manifest in different policy contexts and demonstrate how the principles might be used to amend specific policies. This chapter describes the history and key features of an Australian care and support policy that prioritizes one activity (unpaid care) over another (paid work) and one constituency (carers) over another (children with disabilities). Carers’ income support has been available to some citizens and permanent residents since the 1980s. Since 1998, Carer Payment (child) – a pension payment administered by Australia’s federal government – has been available to people whose constant care for a child with a severe disability or medical condition prevents them from supporting themselves through paid work. The most recent major reforms to the policy in 2009 introduced a new eligibility test that focused on the ‘care load’ that a child’s medical needs produce for the carer. This extended access to a greater number and wider range of people, although the payment is still only available to those providing constant care and have no, or limited, involvement in paid work.

Type
Chapter
Information
Care and Support Rights After Neoliberalism
Balancing Competing Claims Through Policy and Law
, pp. 139 - 149
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Print publication year: 2022

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