About 80 per cent of frontline community services say they are not able to help all the unemployed Australians and single parents who come to them for help, a new report says.
The annual survey of the community sector found that nearly 50 per cent of services that deal with people on low incomes were unable to meet demand, while 72 per cent of legal services could not meet demand and 51 per cent of accommodation services reported they were turning people away.
The survey, conducted by the Australian Council of Social Service, spoke to about 1000 people who work in the community sector with a focus on younger and older unemployed people and single parents. It spoke to counselling, accommodation and childcare services as well as community legal centres and family support services.
Across the board, only 20 per cent of services said they were fully able to keep up with demand.
"From the coalface of community work, our findings are deeply concerning and should ring alarm bells for federal government policies that would inflict deeper pain on the people doing it toughest in our community," ACOSS chief executive Cassandra Goldie said.
Dr Goldie said she was particularly worried about the state of community legal and accommodation services.
"Despite the urgent need for these services in our community, they have been subjected to federal funding cuts and ongoing funding uncertainty."
The survey was conducted in the wake of the federal budget which proposed to make young people wait six months for unemployment benefits, tightening the eligibility criteria for the disability support pension and lowering the indexation of pensions.
Dr Goldie called on the Coalition government to end uncertainty about whether unpopular budget measures such at the GP co-payment and changes to Newstart and pensions would go ahead.
"The federal government needs to go back to the drawing board," she said.
