ICAN criticises decision to withdraw funding for financial counselling
The Indigenous Consumer Assistant Network recently released a 6-minute documentary, following the story of Patricia Wieben, legacy widow and Cyclone Yasi affected resident in Cardwell, Queensland impressing the urgency for financial counselling services to be maintained both to the Yasi affected Cassowary Coast and across Queensland.
The State Government’s decision to withdraw Cyclone Yasi related financial counselling funding from the Cassowary Coast has been described by ICAN’s CEO Aaron Davis as unfortunate and a short sighted false economy.
Mr Davis, head of the service providing financial counselling outreach to the Cassowary Coast, observed that given the long term average of 5 cyclones a year, Yasi and Oswald will inevitably be followed by other similarly destructive events and it makes humanitarian and economic sense for Governments to continue to respond with both immediate and long term measures.
Jon O’Mally, an ICAN Senior Financial Counsellor recently assisted Cyclone Yasi victim Patricia Wieben, to receive an $80,000 insurance claim payout – the insurance company had offered just $5,000. Ms Wieben’s case had been stalled in negotiations for over 13 months.
Yet financial counselling in Queensland is facing an uncertain future. Mr O’Mally said that the outcomes financial counsellors obtain for clients like Ms Wieben can only be obtained when funding for the sector is consistent.
“We’re losing our most senior financial counsellors” said Jon O’Mally.
“The stop/start nature of funding for financial counselling in Queensland in response to natural disasters impacts the service – both in the number of financial counsellors available and the ability to provide high quality financial counselling to clients” he said. “In Patricia’s case, that could be the difference between $5,000 and $80,000.”
Nevertheless funds provided for Cassowary Coast financial counselling of less than $1.25/per month for each person in the Region is due to expire shortly.
The return on the Government’s investment is obvious from cases such as Ms Wieben’s but others -while harder to quantify – similarly help to ease high stress and severe hardship.
Recent research revealed that “financial counselling aims to provide short-term crisis management as well as longer-term and prevention strategies to individuals and families” experiencing financial stress, but that the “adequacy and security of funding for financial counselling services is an ongoing problem.”
A recent Queensland Council of Social Services report highlights the increasing need for financial counselling services, however “the Queensland Government invests just over $550,000 per annum in financial counselling compared to the funding of more than $6 million by the Victorian, New South Wales and Western Australian Governments” said Fiona Guthrie of Financial Counselling Australia.
After nearly two years of rancorous dispute with the insurance company, Ms Wieben sought help from ICAN financial counselling and a settlement was arranged in a relatively short time (please see http://youtu.be/UHFHdXP9fq0).See more from ICAN here.