Centrelink rules enable coercive control

Queensland will introduce historic laws making coercive control a criminal offence carrying up to 14 years imprisonment, and these laws are welcome.

However, Centrelink rules enable the continuation of such coercion, and it is time Centrelink put a stop to it.

Under Centrelink rules, if one partner in a relationship is working past a certain income threshold, the non-working partner gets no financial assistance.

This means the non-working partner is completely dependent on the working partner, and has no financial independence.

It doesn’t take Albert Einstein to work out that this means the working partner can abuse that situation, and use it to control the non-working partner.

Indeed, in the 25 years I have been working in social justice, I have seen this many times, and written to Centrelink about the inadequacies of their rules. No responses from Centrelink.

Centrelink do have options where partners can say that they are no longer in a relationship, and receive independent payments, but the processing of these applications requires both parties to agree that the relationship is over, and can take weeks or even months to process.

That’s fine if the breakdown of the relationship is 100% mutual, but very few relationships seem to end on such a positive note.

This means that even to get out of a relationship, the non-working partner usually has to agree to terms set by the working partner if they are to meet Centrelink requirements.

The effect of Centrelink’s rules are that partners are often forced to stay together, even if one wants out because of domestic violence or coercive control. This is usually purely because of lack of financial independence by the non-working partner.

Centrelink needs to revise their rules so that both partners in a relationship are eligible for financial assistance, irrespective of whether one partner is working or not.

This will empower the non-working partner to be able to leave a relationship whenever they choose, and usually there is a serious reason why relationships break down.

Failure by Centrelink to do this is putting men, women and children in danger, by continuing to enable coercive control by one partner over another on financial aspects of the relationship.

Craig Hill is a Brisbane-based Social Justice Campaigner, Writer, Teacher and Business Consultant. He has campaigned for social justice in Australia, promoted human rights in China and worked with the homeless in Honolulu. He holds a Graduate Certificate in Business, a Graduate Certificate in Education and a degree in Management. He is also the General Manager of The Australian Business and Leadership School.

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