It failed, but the trial was extended at the end of last year to Ceduna in South Australia, the East Kimberly region and Goldfields in Western Australia and Bundaberg and Hervey Bay in Queensland. The whole of the Northern Territory and in Cape York are also slated to be placed on cashless welfare payments.
The CDC program forces welfare recipients, including disability and aged pensioners, to accept compulsory income management, administered by the private financial services corporation Indue Limited.
It means that 80% of the Centrelink payment is “quarantined”.
Rent, utilities and other direct debits are paid by Indue which, in turn, is being paid up to $10,000 per client by the federal govenrment to administer the scheme.
Marginalised People Are At Risk From Woolworths’ New Cashless Policy
Prohibiting customers from using cash will make buying essential items harder for sex workers, homeless Australians, and precarious workers.
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Back in July, Woolworths revealed that six of its Metro stores across Sydney and Melbourne would go completely cashless. These stores would not provide options for customers to pay with cash, only card.
Woolworths has 1,050 stores Australia-wide. 99.4% of them still offer a mix of cash and electronic payments. Stores trialling cashless policies included Woolworths at Yarraville and Caulfield North in Victoria and Rosebery in New South Wales.