In the heart of Australia's Western Downs region, a volunteer firefighter's battle has highlighted a distressing reality faced by many Australians in times of need.

Andrew Burt, a dedicated firefighter and father of six from Goranba, Queensland, found himself in a dire situation when he was cut off from Centrelink support for weeks, leaving him and his family in financial peril.

Andrew's ordeal began when he sought to access JobSeeker payments after being emotionally and physically drained by traumatic events from recent fires.

Despite his service to the community, he was left unable to work in his full-time job in metal fabrication.

A firefighter from Queensland was unable to contact Centrelink for weeks. Image source: Shutterstock

His attempts to contact Centrelink for assistance were met with prolonged call wait times and disconnections.

‘I’ve been stuck in limbo for six weeks with no income, getting further and further in debt because everything is being deferred,’ Andrew stated.

The 50-year-old firefighter was previously receiving Disaster Recovery Payments, but those payments have now ended.

With no public transport available and the nearest Centrelink office nearly an hour's drive away in Dalby, Andrew's reliance on the phone and internet services became a frustrating and fruitless endeavour.

‘Not being able to get through for basic essential needs is breaking me even more. I was already broken with work,’ he shared.

The impact on Andrew's family was severe. Falling behind on mortgage repayments and personal loans, the financial strain was compounded by the inability to afford medication and groceries.

The stress of the situation was palpable, with Andrew and his wife, who is undertaking a traineeship, forced to borrow money and take out loans to make ends meet.

He admitted: ‘We’re about $2,000 behind on our mortgage repayments and another $1,000 behind on a personal loan.

‘We’re struggling and we’ve had to borrow money from family,’ Andrew added. ‘My wife has had to take out loans to make ends meet. We’re going further and further backwards.’

This story sheds light on the broader issue of Centrelink's accessibility, which has been a point of contention for many Australians.

In the six months leading up to December 31, only about half of the nearly 45 million calls to Centrelink were answered by an operator.

Millions more were met with congestion messages or terminated by customers in frustration.

Services Australia, the agency responsible for Centrelink, has acknowledged the problem.

General Manager Hank Jongen expressed apologies for the long wait times and assured that efforts were being made to improve the situation.

The agency has hired 3,000 new staff to help process claims and take calls, with hopes of seeing improvements by April as these staff members become fully trained.

Andrew's case was finally addressed after media intervention, with his claim processed the day after contact was made.

This resolution, however, came after weeks of unnecessary hardship and stress, raising questions about the efficiency of the systems in place to support Australians in need.

Key Takeaways

• A volunteer firefighter in Queensland has been cut off from Centrelink, unable to afford medication and groceries due to long call wait times.
• Despite living nearly an hour's drive from the nearest Centrelink office with no public transport, Andrew Burt could not speak to anyone in person to resolve his issue.
• After the media contacted Services Australia, Andrew's claim was processed the next day.
• Services Australia General Manager Hank Jongen apologised for long wait times and mentioned that 3,000 new staff have been hired to improve service and call wait times.

Have you had a similar experience with Centrelink? Share your story in the comments below.

 

[Rob44]

The story said: "Andrew's ordeal began when he sought to access JobSeeker payments after being emotionally and physically drained by traumatic events from recent fires. Despite his service to the community, he was left unable to work in his full-time job in metal fabrication."

He lived an hour out of Dalby. "Has he seen a doctor?" (Yes).
(Search for "Goranba" on Google maps).
Imagine being physically, emotionally exhausted, financially destitute, isolated by distance, and unable to access help via phone or Internet.

Your mortgage payments are overdue, and you are running up new debt - all because of being unable to contact the one service that is put in place to provide relief and support to him and his family.
That service failed him and it is still failing others.

I'll tell my experience in another post.
Andrew's experience was worse than mine, but mine is told for the record.

Centrelink needs to be returned to what it used to be - The Commonwealth Employment Service.
Having all of this under one umbrella is far too cumbersome to be efficiently managed.

Centralising Services like Centrelink, Banks and Healthcare may have certain efficiency savings, but the down-side is service suffers.

Post Offices have taken over from the greedy banks (thanks Christine Holgate) or there would be no banking services in the bush.


Banks have been centralised and disappeared from the bush, as have doctors and hospitals.

Some things cannot be rationalised and made more efficient.
To do so saves the Government money, but the downside is the unnecessary suffering caused to people who reach out for assistance, and cannot access it.

You will find that a great many medical doctors do not want to work in rural areas as the intellectual stimulation from fellow doctors (wow!) and opportunities for big-noting for their careers and thus for making money are not there. Which is why rural Public Hospitals have to call on the locum doctor industry at considerable expense; and which is why if you end up in a rural Public Hospital you may not get that 400-500mile helicopter trip to a major city hospital so as to save your life. The Hospital Board and its CEO and administration will want to save money at your life's expense and the locum doctor on duty for a few days probably won't want to make waves on your behalf as he might not get invited back by the hospital's administration (Managers) to make between $1500 and $3000 per day plus travel and accommodation expenses.

I don't joke.

Odd how the modern "business" model has replaced the well-tested Gladstonian approach to ending corruption and incompetence in the Civil/Public Service.

 

[Ingot]

You will find that a great many medical doctors do not want to work in rural areas as the intellectual stimulation from fellow doctors (wow!) and opportunities for big-noting for their careers and thus for making money are not there. Which is why rural Public Hospitals have to call on the locum doctor industry at considerable expense; and which is why if you end up in a rural Public Hospital you may not get that 400-500mile helicopter trip to a major city hospital so as to save your life. The Hospital Board and its CEO and administration will want to save money at your life's expense and the locum doctor on duty for a few days probably won't want to make waves on your behalf as he might not get invited back by the hospital's administration (Managers) to make between $1500 and $3000 per day plus travel and accommodation expenses.

I don't joke.

Odd how the modern "business" model has replaced the well-tested Gladstonian approach to ending corruption and incompetence in the Civil/Public Service.

A great visionary leader - in the same mold as Ben Disraeli.
Apparently they don't cover the integrity and service models in modern Political Science 101.
The world is the lesser when we tolerate 'lesser' leadership.
Disraeli and Gladstone were on opposite 'teams' but both great statesmen who carried a torch for those whom they represented.

 

[yarratt]

I applied for Pensioner Education Supplement PES last year in January for a course that was starting 1 February.

After many trips into Centrelink, who continually told me that they don't process it, it is done outside and they couldn't do anything to help, I finally found someone who thought that a 6 month wait for a supplement that was to pay for my books and items for the course hadn't been paid for 6 months!

She made a phone call, and the application was processed over the phone immediately with the person on the other end apologising profusely.

Originally they had offered to escalate the application, until I told them that it had already been escalated three times and that wasn't working because no-one was looking at the escalated applications!

The impact on me was that I wasn't able to purchase the things that I needed at the beginning of the year when the specials were on and had to buy what I needed 6 months later at a higher cost. I also had to go without the necessary resources for half of my course because I am on a Disability Pension, so don't have anything spare from my pension to cover the extra costs.

I have applied again this year for my new course, which started in January, and true to form haven't heard even a whisper so far, but it's only been 2 months, so still have 4 months to go. But hey, by then my course will have finished and I'll be registering for the next course!? This is ridiculous!

 

[Hel]

The poor response of Centrelink towards people should impact the CEO and his manager's performance bonuses until there is minimum wait times and NO disconnections! And there should be a time span of not more than 3 months to fix this problem otherwise the CEO must resign or be sacked. They have had plenty of time to fix it but always have excuses.

Unfortunately most Aussies don't care because they haven't had the experience. When their time comes, they'll get it. I agree, why are they getting paid so well to do bugger all?

 

[Ezzy]

I applied for Pensioner Education Supplement PES last year in January for a course that was starting 1 February.

After many trips into Centrelink, who continually told me that they don't process it, it is done outside and they couldn't do anything to help, I finally found someone who thought that a 6 month wait for a supplement that was to pay for my books and items for the course hadn't been paid for 6 months!

She made a phone call, and the application was processed over the phone immediately with the person on the other end apologising profusely.

Originally they had offered to escalate the application, until I told them that it had already been escalated three times and that wasn't working because no-one was looking at the escalated applications!

The impact on me was that I wasn't able to purchase the things that I needed at the beginning of the year when the specials were on and had to buy what I needed 6 months later at a higher cost. I also had to go without the necessary resources for half of my course because I am on a Disability Pension, so don't have anything spare from my pension to cover the extra costs.

I have applied again this year for my new course, which started in January, and true to form haven't heard even a whisper so far, but it's only been 2 months, so still have 4 months to go. But hey, by then my course will have finished and I'll be registering for the next course!? This is ridiculous!

Ridiculous? I would say UNACCEPTABLE!

ARE THEY IN THOSE POSITIONS TO SERVE THE PUBLIC OR TO JUST SHUFFLE PAPERWORK TO BE SEEN TO BE DOING THE CORRECT THING FOR THE PUBLIC?