MIRABELLA PREDICTS GILLARD YOUTH ALLOWANCE BACK FLIP

24-August-2009

There is growing speculation today that the Education Minister, Julia Gillard, is limbering up for a back flip on youth allowance following the Government’s Youth Roundtable with hand picked students from Labor electorates according to Federal Member for Indi, Sophie Mirabella MP.

 “My office has been inundated with complaints about the unfair retrospective nature of the Government’s youth allowance changes, irrespective of their political stripes,” Mrs Mirabella said.

 On Thursday night the Government announced a consultative Youth Roundtable, but didn’t include any young people from Coalition seats that represent the vast majority of rural and regional areas.

 For months Mrs Mirabella has been representing the concerns of local students and their families, joining with her Coalition colleagues to campaign for the Government to overturn the retrospective changes to the youth allowance, which will withdraw eligibility from students currently on their gap year. For months Julia Gillard has refused to budge.

  “We all know what will happen next: After the Roundtable the Minister will claim she has listened to the concerns of young people and introduce some sort of measure to assist. It’s the classic smoke and mirrors we’ve come to expect from the Rudd Government,” Mrs Mirabella said.

 Just last week the Coalition’s attempts to facilitate debate in Parliament on the issue were shut down by Labor MP’s.

 “We can only hope that after months of campaigning against the changes, Julia Gillard will finally listen to the Coalition and amend her disastrous legislation.

 “Australia deserves a full-time Education Minister who would not have put rural and regional youth currently in their gap year through months of confusion and uncertainty in the first place,” Mrs Mirabella concluded.