The Turnbull Government has announced Sydney's Canterbury-Bankstown area as the first of three locations for a controversial proposed drug-testing trial of new jobseekers.
The selection has been driven by a high number of new welfare entrants and an increase in ice-fuelled hospitalisations in the area.
Social Services Minister Christian Porter says the trial would be focused on helping jobseekers overcome drug problems and secure work.
"Millions of Australians work every day in employment conditions where they can be subject to drug-testing. Now no-one argues that there's any stigma working for Qantas or Linfox or Toll or at Sydney airport. This isn't designed to stigmatise or punish or penalise anyone. And that's why welfare is not cut off because of a positive test. Rather, welfare is managed if there's a positive test in a way that limits the amount of cash available, and, on a second positive test, we will engage in every endeavour to get that person the treatment that they need."
If welfare recipients tested positive the first time, they would be placed on a basics card, already being used in the Canterbury-Bankstown area and other parts of the country.
The basics card is effectively a cashless welfare system where 80 per cent of a welfare payment is put in an account only able to be used for essentials such as housing and food.
The other 20 per cent would continue to go into a recipient's ordinary savings account.
Human Services Minister Alan Tudge says it is an important initiative that addresses key barriers to employment.
"Now the purpose of that, of course, is that there's less money available for a person who may have a drug problem to be able to spend on their addiction and more money available to pay for the basics. And, after all, that's the purpose of welfare is to pay for those essential basics, not to support a drug habit."
Labor and the Greens oppose the trials, so the Government will need support from the Senate crossbench to get the program going.
Welfare advocates and medical groups have also widely criticised the plan since it was announced in the May budget.
The Australian Council of Social Services is among those organisations opposing the plan.
Chief executive Cassandra Goldie says the Government needs to talk with professionals involved in the field.
"We've got really excellent health professionals in this area, none of whom support this. I think it's extraordinary that the Government will not sit down with the serious experts in this area and design a package of approaches to drug and alcohol addiction where we have got the solid evidence about what works. This is going to be a waste of money. It's going to be damaging. That's what the experts are saying as well. We're very worried that people who do have an addiction, who can't get paid work, who are relying on social security to cover the basic costs, won't come to social security for assistance, will be forced into destitution."
Up to $10 million would be set aside to support jobseekers who tested positive to drug tests more than once.
The Government says all tests would be conducted in private by a suitably qualified representative from a contracted drug-testing provider.
And it says the results would not be shared with police.
The Government wants to roll out the two-year trial from January next year.
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