Supporting Jobless Families
We're here to support you in enhancing your family's wellbeing.
Introduction
Supporting Jobless Families is a three year trial that will offer additional support to Parenting Payment customers. The trial is designed to enhance child health, early learning and development and support family wellbeing.
We understand everyone wants the best for their children but some families have trouble finding or accessing education, health and support services available in their local community.
We understand that financial assistance with child care fees would support some families in accessing education, training or employment.
We want to help give children the best start and will be offering eligible families additional support that connects them with family programs and service providers in their local community.
Eligibility
You are eligible for this trial if you are a Parenting Payment (Single or Partnered) customer with a child five years of age or under, and have been receiving income support for two years or more or are under 23 years old and not working or studying, and you live in one of the ten following areas:
- Bankstown, Shellharbour and Wyong (NSW)
- Logan and Rockhampton (QLD)
- Playford (SA)
- Burnie (TAS)
- Greater Shepparton and Hume (VIC)
- Kwinana (WA).
If you are already part of the Helping Young Parents trial, you will not be asked to participate in this trial.
If you are eligible, you don't need to do anything – we will call or write to you to let you know about the additional support available to your family as part of this trial.
How can we help your family?
Research has shown that engagement in pre-school activities, good health and comfortable interaction with other children by the age of six years are some of the best indicators for your children doing well in primary and high school and getting a job as an adult.
It also indicates that early intervention programs like this one can support parents and carers to help their children meet these developmental milestones.
We want to support you in a way that is best for your family, and to do that we need to talk to you about your family situation.
We will ask you to attend interviews and workshops so we can chat with you about early childhood development, immunisations and health checks for children and the importance of social activities like playgroups and pre-school that can help your children get ready for school.
If you choose to, we can also help you access approved child care in your local community.
We'll also chat with you about accessing education, training or employment activities to help you think about what you may want to do when your children reach school age.
We're here to support you in enhancing your family's wellbeing.
Your family's journey through this trial
This trial is about finding the best way to support you and your family. The number of interviews and workshops we'll ask you to attend depends on the age of your children. If you have a child in more than one of the listed age groups below, we'll combine interviews for your family.
We'll ask you to attend workshops based on the age of your youngest child.
| Age of your youngest child | Interviews and workshops |
|---|---|
| Ages 1-2 | Annual interviews so we can talk about child health, early development and link you to local support services. |
| Ages 3-4 | Bi-annual interviews to chat about early childhood health checks, pre-school activities and connect you to support services in your local community. |
| Age 4 | Workshop 1 to talk about children's health and development, the importance of social activities and services that can support your family. |
| Age 5 | Workshop 2 to talk about pre-school activities, developmental milestones and to help you think about education, training and employment opportunities in your local community. |
If your family could benefit from additional support, we may ask you to attend quarterly interviews when your child turns four and five. You can also ask us for extra interviews at any time.
Family interviews in this trial are longer than the standard interviews and meetings you may have had with Centrelink in the past. We've made more time available to chat with you so that together, we can talk about your family's experience and current situation.
These conversations will help us check that your family is receiving all benefits that you are entitled to, and help us provide referrals to relevant services in your local community that may be able to offer additional support.
We’ll also ask you some specific questions to see if your family could benefit from more frequent or longer interviews, and to help us offer the most relevant workshop to you in the future.
What you need to know
If you are eligible for this trial, your attendance at interviews and workshops is compulsory. It is important for you to let us know if you will not be able to attend an interview or a workshop.
You will also need to sign a Participation Plan, which is a document that you can use as a guide for your family's journey through this trial. You can make a note of any of the programs and services discussed in interviews and workshops to help you remember the support available to your family so you can give your children the best start to school.
Your Participation Plan will only include the interviews and workshops as compulsory activities.
If you choose not to sign the Participation Plan, or fail to attend your interviews or workshops, your payments may be suspended. Please talk to us about any concerns you may have about the Participation Plan, interviews or workshops.
We're here to support you
This trial is about finding the best way for us to support you in enhancing your family's health and wellbeing.
We want you to know that we can support you in accessing childcare and playgroups, health services for your children, and education and training for you so you can start to think about what you may want to do when your children start school.
If you have any questions about this trial, want to provide feedback or want to talk to us about additional support we can offer, we'd love to hear from you.
Talk to one of our staff members at your next interview or workshop, call us on 136 150 or visit your nearest Centrelink Service Centre.