Adam Graycar

Non-Government Welfare

Within modern welfare systems a continuing debate is waged over priority in resource allocation: should priority be given to creating a protective infrastructure against poverty and inequality, or to immediate interventions to relieve pressing and destructive need. Traditional welfare state thinking has assigned the role of providing an adequate social infrastructure and environment to the state, and the role of crisis intervention to specific formal service structures, sometimes statutorily based, but more often located in charitable or voluntary organisations. These organisations were founded predominantly either by churches or small groups of concerned citizens to tackle problems through the work of volunteers and, to the degree they could be afforded and were seen to have a role, by paid professional and non-professional staff.

Social Policy, Social Justice and the Social Wage

Two traditions manifest themselves in writings on social policy. One tradition sees the objectives of social policy as a quest after social improvement, an exercise in setting desirable social objectives and in organising the mechanisms of social change to achieve these objectives. It is an optimistic activity, hoping to build a consensus related to solving the gargantuan questions of the theory of benefits and their distribution.

Employment in the Welfare State

The wellbeing of the people is not only determined by the extent of a country’s wealth but also by the way that wealth is distributed in terms of income, capital goods and services, all of which are necessary for people to live and to achieve and maintain an adequate level of social functioning. Production and distribution of goods and services occurs through the operation of the market forces and through decisions of governments, that is, through economic and social policies.

The Welfare of Young People

The welfare of young people has been one of the main concerns in social policy over the past two decades and at the forefront of public debate on social issues, but it is not easy to decide which age groups may be taken to constitute ‘youth’. For example, the operational parameters employed by the Youth Affairs Council of Australia are 12–25 years, but the definition used by the Commonwealth Office of Youth Affairs and by the United Nations’ International Youth Year Secretariat is 15–24 years. The rationale for using those or other parameters is not always clear. The age of 12 years is currently associated with entry into secondary schooling and 15 is the school-leaving age in all states except Tasmania where it is 16 years. At the age of 24 young people may still be eligible for programmes such as the Community Youth Support Scheme (CYSS), and at 25 a young person is considered independent from his or her parents for the purpose of the Commonwealth educational allowance (AUSTUDY) unless their independence is established earlier.

Characteristics of the Australian Population

Population characteristics change over time, and with these changes come, sometimes willingly and sometimes reluctantly, social policy initiatives and responses. As outlined in the previous chapter, the issues and problems for social policy have intensified over the past two decades and are likely to continue to do so into the foreseeable future, through a demand overload on public expenditure and a consequent claims crisis.

The Shaping of Policy and Policy Analysis

In this chapter we examine the nature and characteristics of issues and activities that together constitute a policy and more specifically, a social policy. First, we examine some of the issues that lead to certain types of policy, and we note the difficulties in defining a policy with clarity. We then identify the attributes and actors who play important roles in policy shaping — political parties, interest groups and research inputs. Later we look at policy as a process which entails four, usually sequential but at times contemporaneous, activities: planning, formulation, implementation and evaluation. The aim of the chapter is to provide a framework in which the role of government and non-governmental organisations in the provision of social welfare services is examined in subsequent chapters.

The Future of The Australian Welfare State

In the foregoing chapters we have examined social policy in Australia and its effects on people’s lives, their living conditions, their lifestyles and life chances. We have examined its effects on people through their life cycle — families, children, young people and the aged. Each of these groupings can be seen to have particular needs and each, as it were, makes claims on the welfare state to have these needs met, evoking certain policy reponses.

The Welfare of Australians

How people live and how they ought to live are the central concerns of planners and practitioners in the welfare industry. There are numerous systems of interpreting how people live. There are many criteria for measuring how people live. There are countless values, attitudes and prejudices which carry over into the realm of how people ought to live. As social administration is concerned with the aims and consequences of social interventions oriented to the enhancement of levels of living, especially for the weak and vulnerable, discussions of how people do live and how they ought to live form the substantive and theoretical underpinnings of our area of study.

The Welfare of Elderly People

During 1987, each day approximately 375 Australians turned 65 — the total for the year was 136,962. Approximately 81,500 people over 65 died in the same period, that is 223 a day. Thus our aged population increased by around 55,000 in the year or by 152 per day. When translated into goods and services and social facilities and supports, this warrants careful policy attention. Elderly people require a wide range of supports, especially income support, health services, housing support and social services. The public resources that are allocated are substantial, yet the range of incomes, access to services and housing situation of elderly people is probably wider than for any other population category. Our elderly population comprises a group spread across 30 or more years of life.

The Welfare of Families and Children

As we have already noted in chapter 2, the vast majority of the Australian population (90 per cent) lives in family settings (table 2.4), and the majority of families, both two and one parent, are family units with dependent children. It is most important to note that family units include units of all ages, including those of retirement age and thus unlikely to have dependent children. As can be ascertained from table 8.1, the proportion of families with dependent children decreased from 55.7 per cent in 1969 to 53.7 per cent in 1986. However, in families without dependent children, 20.5 per cent in 1969 were families where the husband was 65 years or over; this percentage had risen to 25.2 per cent by 1986.