On 27th September, JobKeeper is set to be reduced from $1500 to $1200 per fortnight nation-wide. 

JobKeeper was designed to keep people in jobs, to get them to "the other side" of this pandemic. It is there so that businesses can keep staff on their payroll for re-opening. 

In many states of Australia, businesses are re-opening (or have re-opened) and it makes sense to reduce the JobKeeper subsidy. 

However, in Victoria, many businesses will remain completely closed until October 26th (retail, hairdressers etc;) or November 23rd, 2020 (e.g. gyms); This is provided that the case numbers reach their targets (less than 5 cases per day and 0 cases per day over a 14 day period, respectively) so the actual dates could be much later.

Reducing the JobKeeper subsidy by $600 per month is a massive financial hit to the employees that have been stood down (some for many months now).

A decrease in JobKeeper will force employees to look for higher income opportunities to pay the bills, meaning these already hard-hit businesses will lose the employees the government intended for them to "keep". This will have a flow-on effect, making it harder for those already seeking employment to find jobs due to an increase in competition.

Reducing JobKeeper for businesses that have been FORCED to close in Victoria does not align with the purpose for which JobKeeper was intended.

I submit that businesses that remain closed due to government restrictions in Victoria should remain eligible for the FULL JobKeeper wage subsidy ($1500/fn) until they are permitted to re-open.