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Australia scraps plan for welfare recipient drug tests

A plan to test welfare recipients in Australia for drug use has been scrapped because the Senate would not approve a trial of the scheme.

The federal government had hoped to administer drug tests to 5,000 welfare recipients at three trial locations in Western Australia, Queensland, and New South Wales, starting in January 2018. The plan was to test recipients of Youth Allowance and Newstart welfare recipients for a two-year trial period.

Welfare recipients who tested positive would have had their benefits suspended, while recipients failing a drug test more than once would have been referred to medical professionals for treatment, after a needs assessment.

Social Services Minister, Christian Porter, said that the proposed trial program would be deleted from the omnibus welfare bill currently under consideration in the Senate but brought up separately at a later date.

“The bill will proceed, in all likelihood, [but] the drug testing component of the bill will be taken out for the time being,” Mr Porter said. “But we are absolutely committed to that policy of drug testing welfare recipients in a trial to see whether or not compelling people into treatment improves their employability and employment prospects. Those announced trials needed to be legislated and the reality is at the moment we can’t quite get the crossbench support that we need to legislate to make those trials a reality.”

Former Deputy Prime Minister, Barnaby Joyce, said taxpayers had a right to see that those receiving benefits were positioning themselves to re-enter the workforce. ‘You are not going to be ready for work if you are drunk… [or] smashed on drugs,’ he said.

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