Minister for Employment Michaelia Cash has ignored warnings from the Department of Employment that the PaTH program will cost 120,000 real jobs for young jobseekers, according to documents revealed under freedom of information by The New Daily.
The $752 million PaTH program creates $4 per hour fake jobs, and give employers a handout of $1000 of taxpayers money for taking workers on.
The scheme has been plagued by scandals, and borders on slavery.
Youth unemployment is in double digits nationwide, and well above 20% in many regional areas.
Replacing jobs that currently exist with fake jobs will only make things worse.
The Minister’s scheme exploits unemployed young people, and can even be used to cut people’s unemployment payments if they don’t attend meetings with job service providers.
Quotes attributable to Australian Council of Trade Unions (ACTU) President Ged Kearney:
“Michaelia Cash’s program is going destroy tens of thousands of real jobs and replace them with $4 per hour fake jobs.”
“This scheme is a cruel hoax that will simply make young people’s lives worse.”
“These documents confirm the Minister for Employment knew that her signature program to address youth unemployment was actually going to force up to 120,000 young people out of work, but she went ahead with it anyway.”
“This is nothing short of a scandal.”
“The Minister should be sacked for incompetence and this deeply flawed and unfair $4 per hour fake job scheme should be scrapped immediately.”
“If the goal is to help young people, we can create real jobs by restoring funding to apprenticeships, traineeships, TAFE and universities to give young people a viable path to employment.”
ENDS
