PRIME MINISTER:
Your worship, John and all the other Shire presidents and Mayors, it’s wonderful to be here with you. With Rick Wilson, your Federal Member and Alan Tudge, the Minister for Human Services.
As you know the Cashless Debit Card has been rolled out in Ceduna and the East Kimberly, and we’ve now had some time, its been done in collaboration and with the support of local communities and it has been a great success.
Alan can elaborate on this but we’re releasing today the final independent evaluation of the Cashless Debit Card trials, and its seen very substantial reductions in drug use, in alcohol abuse, in violence, its made a really positive improvement in those communities.
Now Rick has been leading the charge on behalf of your community to extend the Cashless Debit Card in the Goldfields area, in one of the Goldfields communities. And I know its been a very elaborate process, a very respectful process that Rick and Alan Tudge have worked on with you, John and other community leaders with leaders, with indigenous leaders, with elders to ensure that there is the support for this.
So we’re announcing today that the Cashless Debit Card will be rolled out in the Kalgoorlie Goldfields areas.
Now, all of the Shires represented here - bar one - will have the card extended to it. We had a meeting in Canberra recently with leaders from Ceduna and the East Kimberly and talking about the success of the card – Rick was there and with Alan - and the underlying importance of getting that community support.
You know this is fundamental issue of values, we don’t, nobody wants people spending their welfare money on booze and drugs, nobody wants that. Taxpayers don’t want it, and of course the families and the community don’t need it either. So this is about, this is an exercise in compassion. It’s an exercise in love.
Those people who criticise the Cashless Debit Card should really reflect, I believe, in what you do would do with a friend. If you had a dear friend with limited means and they were spending it on booze and drugs and gambling, what would you do? You’d say to them, “stop, don’t do that, how can I persuade you to stop doing that?”. So this is an act of love, it’s an act of strength, of building, providing the support that will enable people better to look after themselves and their families, and of course that’s reflected in communities.
So, I’m really delighted by the success of the trial in Ceduna and East Kimberly and I look forward to it being rolled out here with your support.
And again I want to thank Rick Wilson for the great advocacy he’s shown. Not just in making the case in Canberra, but above all, building the support in the community because it has to have that support to be as successful as it has been in the two previous trial areas.
So, I’ll close my remarks there and I’m delighted to be here and I look forward to having a good discussion.
[ENDS]