LOCALITIES WITHIN JURISDICTIONS RANKED ACCORDING TO RELATIVE DISADVANTAGE
The level of social disadvantage in Australian society has been one of the hotly debated areas of social policy in recent years. The tempo of that debate will increase in the coming months, as our nation moves closer to a federal election in the second half of 2007.
This research investigation completed by Emeritus Professor Tony Vinson on behalf of Jesuit Social Services and Catholic Social Services Australia offers documented evidence that can help ground that debate and take it beyond different political affiliations and perspectives.
Click Here to Find out more about Tony Vinson
Using data provided by the Australian Bureau of Statistics, the Australian Taxation Office, Centrelink and the Australian Health Insurance Commission, and a broad range of departments from each of the state and territory governments, Professor Vinson has produced a map that can only assist federal, state and local governments to better grapple with the reality, often hidden from our eyes.
His two previous reports completed for Jesuit Social Services, Unequal In Life (1999) and Community Adversity and Resilience (2004) focused on New South Wales and Victoria alone. This third stage of our research covers all states and territories of Australia.
The policy and research arm of Jesuit Social Services, The Ignatius Centre, has developed a research partnership with Catholic Social Services Australia, the national peak of the Catholic Church's work in the social services and social policy.
Dropping off the edge contains not only statistically reliable and consistent information about every population centre in this country on more than twenty different disadvantage factors, but also an analysis of that data which provides an insight into the way in which social disadvantage can become entrenched, if not addressed in an integrated way by government authorities.
This national research study can show the links that exist, through statistical analysis of the data, between such factors as early school leaving, low job skills, long term unemployment, court convictions and eventual imprisonment. We can display these links for every population centre in Australia, from the inner city suburbs of the big metropolitan centres of Sydney, Melbourne, Brisbane, Perth and Adelaide, to the most remote rural communities in outback Queensland, New South Wales, South Australia, Western Australia and the Northern Territory.
Professor Vinson, as a former Head of School of Social Work at the University of New South Wales, was also the Foundation Director of the New South Wales Bureau of Crime Statistics and Research.
During an interlude from his professional role as educator and social scientist, he was invited to take on the administration of the New South Wales prison system in the 1970s, at a time of critical need. He saw there at first hand the ultimate consequences of failing to address social alienation and disadvantage in individuals, families and local communities.
Recently, I was present at a planning workshop in the United States that explained how the State of Louisiana was using the reading scores of ten to twelve year old children to predict how many prison cells they needed to construct in ten years time. Australians are rightfully shocked whenever I recount this story in this country. They know that there is a moral responsibility to ensure there is better early intervention to prevent this escalation of disadvantage and social exclusion.
Yet, with the statistical links that have been established between a broad range of disadvantage factors outlined in this research report, we could perhaps direct the same sense of outrage to Australian state and federal government authorities if they fail to address the early characteristics of disadvantage, such as illiteracy and early school leaving, and resort instead to the further expansion of prison systems around the country.
Professor Tony Vinson has provided the Australian community, through its elected leaders and policy planners and program administrators in federal, state and local government authorities, with a rich tapestry of data and information about some of the most damaging impacts of entrenched and localised poverty and disadvantage in this further study, Dropping off the edge. It is the expectation of Jesuit Social Services and its research partner, Catholic Social Services Australia, that this information be analysed and used to promote a unified and vibrant Australian community in the coming decade.
With the publication of this report we invite leaders of all political persuasions to draw upon the information provided in this national mapping exercise of disadvantage in Australia. Failing to address this invitation will pave the way for more and more young Australians to lose a sense of direction and the hope that they can make a positive contribution to the community in which they live.
We believe that a more collaborative approach between the three levels of government and the business, industry and community sectors in addressing the warning signs contained in this data would result in a more cohesive, united Australian community in the future: in other words, a ‘fair go’ for all Australians.
Father Peter Norden, S.J. Associate Director, Jesuit Social Services Project Manager, Dropping off the edge.
