Think Tank Urges Weekly Centrelink Payments to Combat Financial Stress
Australians who receive welfare benefits, like the Jobseeker payment, often feel intense f inancial stress, especially in the days leading up to their next check. Now, a top research group, the E61 Institute, has a simple idea to fix this: switch Centrelink payments from every two weeks (fortnightly) to every single week. This big change, according to the institute’s research director Gianni La Cava, would significantly ease money worries for millions of people and wouldn’t cost the government a single extra dollar. He argues that changing ‘when’ people get their money is just as powerful as changing ‘how much’ they get.
The Stress Evidence
While advocacy groups continue to push for a benefit increase, La Cava’s research indicates that the timing of payments may be just as crucial as the amount received. The E61 Institute’s findings reveal that Australian welfare recipients experience far greater spending volatility compared to their counterparts in New Zealand, where more frequent payments are common. This distress manifests as higher rates of cash withdrawals and elevated reliance on payday lending services and short-term credit specifically between payment cycles. The institute concluded that less frequent payment schedules directly correlate with elevated financial stress and a higher propensity for emergency borrowing. This is clearly demonstrated by Department of Social Services data, which indicates that over 600,000 crisis payments, each equivalent to one week of standard benefits, were issued to Jobseeker recipients during the review period.
Welfare Rolls Climb
The call for structural payment change comes amidst a rising number of recipients. Between September 2023 and January 2025, the national count of working-age Australians receiving welfare payments grew by 126,880 under the current government.
Debt Refund Probe
In related Centrelink news, Services Australia announced in October that it is investigating approximately 44,000 cases where recipients may have overpaid their debts through automatic payment systems like BPAY. A Services Australia spokesperson explained that while they process hundreds of thousands of refunds annually, some cases failed to follow the correct internal procedures, resulting in money owed to customers. The agency provided a breakdown of the potentially owed refunds, stating that fully 50% involve amounts under $50, and 80% are below $500. However, the investigation also covers larger amounts, with 2% of cases exceeding $5,000. The spokesperson stressed that in most instances when people overpay a Centrelink debt, the agency generally refunds the money or transfers the balance to another outstanding debt.
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