This petition was first circulated at the height of the Pandemic.

I'm asking those of you who supported it to sign a new petition calling on the Government to inquire into the merits of Universal Basic Income (UBI)

Please use this link to go direct to the Government Petition:
https://www.aph.gov.au/e-petitions/petition/EN5308

More than 3.2 million people now live below the poverty line.  Homelessness and inflation in the cost of living are just two of the problems they face.  Could you live on $49.50/day (welfare)?

And what happens as automation, virtualization and AI comes for YOUR job... or partner or children or parents job, or your wider family or friends?

Everald Compton and Dr Karen Stenner have launched the petition asking the Australian Federal Government to inquire into the Merits of a Basic Income

To help promote the petition, please click on the Change.org link as well: 'Sign This Petition'.  And then also forward it to your contacts and post to your social media accounts!

The Petition is not seeking a UBI, but to determine the pros and cons in these uncertain times.

Universal Basic Income (UBI): The Why, What, and How:

People’s Vital Need for Money: Money has become essential for survival in modern economies, replacing the traditional self-sustaining lifestyle. Without it, people starve.

Living on the Brink: Imagine surviving on just $49.50 per day (current Unemployment Welfare rate in Australia), for everything from rent and food to medical expenses. This is 70% of the Poverty Level, yet it is the reality for many, especially during job transitions, illnesses, or caregiving responsibilities.

Systemic Poverty in Australia: Over 3 million Australians now live in poverty. Mainly single women and their children, disabled individuals, the elderly, and those between jobs, all of whom lack savings and family support. Living in destitution shouldn’t be the result of such circumstances.

Challenging the Status Quo: The conventional solutions of jobs, job guarantees, and welfare are inadequate for tackling systemic poverty. These approaches leave 12–14% of the population vulnerable and impoverished: people who cannot do paid work for a time. While the people constantly change, the percentage in poverty remains fairly static. This shows that it is a system problem. A UBI is the solution.

Defining UBI: A Universal Basic Income (UBI) is a regular unconditional payment to all adults, providing enough to meet their basic needs without means-testing or work obligations.

Affordability: Australia’s wealth can provide for all. The barrier isn’t financial but lies in outdated systems.

System Change: As this YouTube video explains, despite paying the UBI to all adults every week, our specific solution targets the money to those who need it. This would be done through the tax system. It requires no net increases in tax or debt, and can be implemented without causing inflation, or disadvantaging welfare recipients or those on higher incomes.

Phased Implementation for Stability: Gradually implementing the UBI over five years, starting at $10 per week, prevents economic shocks and allows adaptation.

It will be a Win for All: As it is spent, the growing UBI will encourage the market to increase capacity, without taking anything from anyone.

Broad Support for UBI: A 2020 YOUGOV survey [1] indicates strong support (58%) for a guaranteed living wage or UBI in Australia - once people are aware of the systemic nature of poverty. With further explanation and engagement, even more people can be convinced to back this transformation.

UBI’s Transformative Impact: Global experiments reveal UBI’s transformative potential [2][3][4]. It can combat poverty, crime, and social exclusion, while promoting well-being, sustainability, creativity, and democratic participation.

Empowering, not Discouraging Work: The experiments demonstrate that a UBI encourages responsible spending while maintaining participation in the workforce, contradicting fears of mass withdrawal. Because the UBI is not an alternative to work, it offers a foundation for individuals to build upon, rather than limiting their achievements.

Adapting to Changing Labor Markets: As automation and AI reshape traditional jobs, the UBI can be increased to support adjustment, preventing dislocation and scarcity. As the rate is raised, some people will drop out of the labour market, bringing it back into balance, with most people wanting paid work in a job, and most jobs filled. The rest will be doing other things with their life, as they choose. It will never be perfect, but it should work better than dropping interest rates to stimulate employment.

Refocusing Support to Long Term Needs: This gradual approach allows businesses and individuals to transition smoothly from traditional welfare-related services to more long-term help, aimed at providing the knowledge and skills to thrive. With less needed for emergency relief, more charitable resources can be devoted to helping those who cannot look after themselves for reasons of mental health, or addiction, or otherwise.

UBI is Only One Side of the Solution: UBI addresses demand by providing financial agency to all. Government responsibility lies in both regulating and providing housing, health, and education services, complementing the market’s response, to ensure supply.

In a world facing unprecedented challenges like automation, AI, and climate change, a UBI emerges as a powerful tool, not just to alleviate poverty, but to foster creativity, innovation, and social stability. But it won’t happen on its own.

TEXT OF ORIGINAL PETITION:

The Wage Subsidy Announced by Prime Minister Scott Morrison is a great initiative. It is important to keep people connected to their employer, or previous employer if already laid off.

Unfortunately, the first payments to employers will not flow until sometime in MAY, at the earliest. In the meantime, employers are urged to pay the subsidy and claim it back.  The reality is that employers who have seen a massive drop in turnover, many to zero, simply cannot pay the subsidy out of their own resources, even with the support of their bank.

Many people need money TODAY.

This petition shows HOW we can make interim payments within a FEW DAYS

It requires no forms or applications, yet it is capable of being 'means-tested'. It is also directly within the power of the Federal Government.

Importantly, it can capture every registered adult (citizen or not) living in Australia, including the many 'edge' cases not covered by JobKeeper and JobSeeker payments.

In addition to people from NZ who are covered by the Wage Subsidy, we should also consider all the others from overseas who are 'trapped' here for the duration.  We have a moral obligation to care for them as for our own citizens.  Imagine too the goodwill we would create if we looked after our overseas workers, students and tourists!

THE IMMEDIATE SOLUTION
Use Tax and Centrelink data to create a list of unique bank accounts for each adult now living in Australia.

Those without an account can claim via Centrelink. A much more manageable number.  With the support of Home Affairs, this should include all those who are visiting Australia, working or not, even tourists who have no other means of support.

Within days, each account can be credited with $750/adult (and each week thereafter) until a person begins to receive their Wage Subsidy or until the crisis ends, whichever comes first.

Means-testing can be done retrospectively by adding the money to each person's income for this year and, if it continues, also next year.

We can decide to set a lower limit at (say) 70% of Median Wage. If the total income for the year (including emergency payments) falls below this, they get to keep the whole amount of emergency funding. Above the cut-off, the emergency money could be clawed back progressively up to a set income limit (say) 130% of Median Wage (or whichever amount people think is fair). Above that limit, all the emergency money would have to be repaid.

The money can also be treated as income paid to welfare recipients, in lieu of the additional money currently being paid.

WHERE DOES THE MONEY COME FROM?
The money does not have to be borrowed by the Government, or anyone. It can be created literally 'at the press of a button' by the Reserve Bank; in the same way that the Bank is now creating money to buy Government Bonds.

The 'new money' is just a number on the balance sheet of the Reserve Bank recorded in its computer.

If the new money is issued to all of us, it will enable US to signal OUR needs in the market TODAY, using shops to deliver food and other essentials instead of charities that can focus their resources on helping meet the other needs of our most disadvantaged and vulnerable residents.

If we treat the new money as 'debt', it will force FUTURE taxpayers to pay more tax to pay it off, or FUTURE Governments to curtail services.

FUTURE Governments should balance THEIR expenditures with THEIR revenues.

But why ask FUTURE taxpayers to reduce THEIR spending on THEIR needs and/or reduce FUTURE Government spending on FUTURE public goods and services, to 'pay back the money created to get people through the current emergency', when all such payment would do is reduce a number in the Reserve Bank's computer?

In due course, some of the money would be recovered via the tax system as people lodge their returns.

The rest will simply represent a permanent increase in the money supply.

As for inflation, with the level of national and world trade and employment likely to drop lower than Depression levels during the crisis; inflation will be the last of our worries for a long time.

Only if and when inflation does re-emerge will we need to worry about taking some of the money out of the system, which can be done by raising interest rates at the time.

TAKE ACTION
1. Sign this Petition

2. Please share this petition with your networks.
You can do this via change.org. As well, call people you know... and don't forget your partner and kids (if any)! If you share with 6 people who within a day also share with six people, and so on, in two days we have 36 more petitions, then 216... in a mere 9 days, you can reach 10 MILLION people!

3. Can you chip in $7 to get this petition on the agenda?
Within an hour, this petition could have thousands of more supporters if everyone chipped in the price of a coffee. Can you help reach this petition’s signature goal?

4. Please email your local State and Federal member and demand action by sending them a copy of this petition, using the 'share' links.

5. Please sign this other petition:

Extend COVID-19 relief packages to temporary visa holders

The petition is asking the government to extend entitlement to the JobKeeper emergency relief.  Because the petitioner has a wider network, it has already gathered over 10,000 signatures.  By joining forces we can help to lift awareness of the need and also, through our own petition show how to deliver the relief in DAYS for everyone.

Thank you

MORE WORK REQUIRED FOR THE LONG TERM
We must also recognise that paying people $750/wk is 'emergency relief'. It will not restore the economy.

It will, however, give us time to put other measures in place. This will need to include the bureaucracy and computer systems to manage large scale 're-capitalisation' of businesses (large and small) and to make up lost wages... all of which we should do.

After it is over, we will still have the resources, people, technology and organizations we had in place at the start of the crisis. The only thing that will have been 'wiped out' of the economy will be the lost money.

As we create money, we can use this power to re-set the economy.