Australian employment services: Help or hindrance in the achievement of mutual obligation?

Abstract

The concept of mutual obligation underpins Australian employment services. In return for receiving income support, there are three elements of mutual obligation: to actively seek work; to improve one’s competitiveness in the labour market; and to contribute to the community. Failing to undertake mutual obligation activities results in sanctions, usually unemployment benefit suspension or cancellation. In the year 2017/18, one mutual obligation activity, compulsory employment service provider appointments, accounted for more than 93 per cent of sanctions. The study reported here explores unemployed and recently employed workers’ experiences of appointments and their attitudes to the concept of mutual obligation. The findings are that unemployed workers say appointments have little utility for advancing elements of mutual obligation and are psychologically harmful. Non‐attendance may be a form of self‐protection although seeking a medical exemption or dropping out of the system altogether also appears to be a common self‐protection strategy. We also find that non‐attendance at appointments cannot be conflated with a negative attitude to mutual obligation and that unemployed workers want services that are effective and psychologically positive to help them to fulfil their mutual obligations.

Australia’s Disability Employment Services Program: Participant Perspectives on Factors Influencing Access to Work

“…However, we found little difference in employment outcomes between respondents who were compulsorily or voluntarily engaged with DES. Our findings align with studies critical of ‘Welfare to work’ activation policies, particularly in contexts whereby underlying structural barriers to employment such as discrimination and the limited supply of suitable jobs remain unaddressed [ 39 , 47 , 48 , 49 , 50 , 51 ]. We also question what will happen to excluded voluntary DES participants who are willingly trying to engage with the labour market but need support to do so, particularly given employment plays a vital role in supporting socio-economic and health and well-being outcomes for people with disabilities [ 1 , 4 , 52 ].…”

“…This proposed program change requires more analysis of how this may influence employment outcomes, with research demonstrating job-seekers with disabilities feel less well-supported within the mainstream employment program [ 24 , 46 ]. More broadly, the even more stringent mutual obligations placed on mainstream employment participants have been found to undermine the well-being and confidence of participants to actively engage in the program and labour market [ 29 , 39 ]. While this proposed policy change may lead to desired cost-savings for the DES program, it is likely that these savings will be shifted to the mainstream employment program and potentially onto to other systems such as health because of the unintended consequences of participants having to work with providers less skilled in working with people with disability.…”

“…Given the national unemployment rate remained relatively stable since the 2018 DES reforms were introduced, the Review did not attribute the stagnation of DES employment outcomes to broader labour market conditions [ 35 ]. Rather, the Review attributed the decline to persistent issues with the program, including the limited disability expertise and labour market specialisation of DES providers, which undermines their effective engagement with participants and employers [ 36 , 37 , 38 ]; the requirement of DES providers to monitor participant mutual obligation compliance making it difficult for staff to develop supportive and positive working relationships with participants [ 39 ]; and the complexity of the system and reporting requirements continuing to reduce opportunities for more individualised and innovative service delivery [ 28 , 39 , 40 , 41 , 42 ].…”

Australian unemployed workers’ experiences of being parked and creamed by employment providers

“…We sought to understand these assumptions further by reanalysing field notes from previous focus group research (O'Halloran et al 2019) on unemployed workers' experiences of Australian employment services and then commissioning additional focus groups specifically to explore the issues of parking and creaming to consider the following questions:…”

“…While there is substantial research on the experiences of unemployed workers within marketised employment systems, including the authors' previously reported research (O'Halloran et al 2019), parking and creaming have not been explicitly examined from this perspective. This article reports on research that aims to fill this gap by examining the experiences of unemployed workers who report that they have been parked or creamed by their provider.…”