Hello dear Members!

I hope you're all well

As most of you know, the Seniors Discount Club is a growing online community for all Australians over the age of 60. We have been around for three years now and feel incredibly lucky to say we now have over 320,000 members!

With our online community growing, and with each and every one of you sharing some of your day-to-day struggles, we have decided to launch a few petitions. We believe with the number of members we have, there is potential for us, as a community, to hopefully inspire some change. We have just four petitions live at the moment, and we'd be more than happy to launch some more if there are any more topics you as a community feel passionate about. If you're interested in seeing the petitions we have live currently, you can see them below:

• Stop the transition to all self-serve checkouts: We think this one speaks for itself! For many of our members, their local supermarkets are quickly transitioning to fully self-served. We believe this is not only causing job losses, but makes the weekly shopping so much more challenging for Australians over 60... Not to mention, how fiddly and frustrating they can be to use! We are petitioning to keep traditional checkouts in our stores.
• Strengthen Aged Care Support, Funding, and Transparency: Sadly, I think I speak on behalf of most of our members when I say the current state of aged care in Australia is extremely concerning. We are petitioning to improve the quality of aged care provided to Australian seniors in facilities across the nation. At the end of the day, our population is ageing and if we continue to turn a blind eye to aged care support, Australians are in for a frightening future.
• Increase the Australian Aged Pension for a Better, Fairer Future: We hear every single day Australian news outlets discuss how Aussies are struggling with the current cost-of-living... But how about our pensioners trying to put food on their table, keep their lights and heating on, and pay for their medicine? The cost-of-living crisis is hitting Australian pensioners the hardest, and there is not enough being done about it.
• Protect the Right to Use Cash and Ensure Financial Inclusivity: Where do I begin?! Without cash, so many Australians suffer. Not every Australian has access to digital payment methods and banking and removing cash, and bank branches is making anything to do with money so much more challenging for Australian seniors. Cash should be kept alive for all Australians.

We know these four topics are just scraping the surface so if there is anything else you'd like us to put a petition together for, please let us know in the comments below.

As with all petitions, the more signatures we get on these, the louder we become! So please share this with all of your family and friends, whether they are a member of the Seniors Discount Club or not! The number of supporters in the top right corner of each petition will be manually updated by our team as often as we can, but our goal is to get 100,000 signatures on every petition!

I cannot thank you all enough for your ongoing support of us and our community. We appreciate each and every one of you!

Sign our petitions! Image source: Shutterstock.

Have a great day!
Maddie

 

[Penny4]

Signed all 4. Worthy causes. Thanks.

 

[KB792]

Digital ID for Australians
Hello, how are you?
I am reading a little bit about Digital ID coming to Australia. I feel personally that this would be a
mistake for especially us elderly people. What if one does their banking on their phones and I also
don't want my license sitting up there on my phone.
If you are scammed, phished or hacked, their goes all your sensitive information and many be all
your money in your bank account.
I don't know how others feel about this, but I am concerned.

I feel personally it is an invasion of privacy.

I also, would like more information on this misinformation act that has just been passed. It seems
we are only allowed to hear what the Government wants us to hear and not the truth. Maybe other
seniors might have more information on this. I would like to understand more on what is happening
to us as we are aging.

Thank you so very much,
Kind Regards.

 

[Penny4]

Digital ID for Australians
Hello, how are you?
I am reading a little bit about Digital ID coming to Australia. I feel personally that this would be a
mistake for especially us elderly people. What if one does their banking on their phones and I also
don't want my license sitting up there on my phone.
If you are scammed, phished or hacked, their goes all your sensitive information and many be all
your money in your bank account.
I don't know how others feel about this, but I am concerned.

I feel personally it is an invasion of privacy.

I also, would like more information on this misinformation act that has just been passed. It seems
we are only allowed to hear what the Government wants us to hear and not the truth. Maybe other
seniors might have more information on this. I would like to understand more on what is happening
to us as we are aging.

Thank you so very much,
Kind Regards.

Digital ID is already here. People can elect to have their driver's licence on the phone. Also, banking on their phone. You don't have to do either. You can still get a hard copy of your driver's licence to carry in your wallet. Plus, you can still get hard copies of bank statements for your savings or credit account. Going digital isn't mandatory. Some people may not even have an adequate mobile phone to support these software programmes as well.

 

[Emwick]

Gamiry, go to the heading of all the 4 petitions above and click on them, it will take you to a page for each petition and then you just put in your details and hit send. I hope I am answering you correctly. That is how it works on my computer.

Thanks heaps for the tip! A big help to access, read each petition and sign. I went for all petitions! Emwick

 

[Veggiepatch]

Congratulations SDC on this initiative. Too many people are content to have a whinge in the comments section when, as it so frequently does, one of these issues is highlighted. There has always been strength in numbers and something like this has much more chance of bringing about change than any individual grumbling. I will also add my name to the petitions listed and would urge all subscribers to do likewise. Good move guys

I'm one of those whingers....

 

[Ezzy]

Thank you SDC for giving us, your readers, an opportunity to be a part of this very important campaign.

I signed all 4 petitions & found this very easy to do.

 

[Carsrme]

All petitions current are supported.
Carsrme

 

[Rosi Gordon]

I'm weary of signing any petitions as I have previously and then got bombarded with hundreds for every issue there was on earth. I was sent emails asking for money constantly to support issues and found that signing them does absolutely nothing to stop the problem.

 

[FozzieFozz]

JUST TO LET YOU KNOW THAT I HAVE SIGNED THE FOUR PETITIONS LISTED

 

[darx]

sign me up gladly.

 

[Brianlgrimmer]

This got me interested, but where do I sign the petition?

 

[Andrew]

Would if l could. Don't have a computer.

 

[JimmyFlatrock]

I think it incredibly important that inclusivity is built into all the choices Australians have for payment systems, so I am grateful for the opportunity to sign a petition that protects the right to use cash, and seeks to prevent the transitioning to all self serve checkouts.

The cost of energy these days also pushes a lot of seniors past the tipping point leading to a situation that excludes many from being able to keep warm or cool as the weather demands. For some seniors, being excluded from basic needs such as warmth can mean a lot more than just being uncomfortable. It can mean suffering an unnecessary degree of pain and distress. If the governments of any persuasion can't fix the price gouging energy suppliers, they need to increase funding for aged pensioners so they too can be included in the embrace that rays of warmth bring as well.

I don't really know much about Aged Care funding, but it seems not enough is being done. It says a lot about a country as to how it's elderly people are treated. The young don't often think about their own time as an elderly person, but it will come. Not all have the ability to get to near the top levels of earners, but most would have worked hard to contribute to the effort of making Australia a better place than most countries. So I think we can do better in respect of Aged Care facilities.

What SDC is doing here is a really good thing. It provides us all with the opportunity to make a difference. 100,000 signatories is a very tidy target and would make most leaders sit up, take notice and react accordingly. Even more so once the results are released in the main stream media.

I'm most happy to have signed the four petitions and I hope it will be successful.

 

[BabsL]

The USA, who started this self-serve supermarket rubbish, have admitted they got it WRONG! All US supermarkets are now removing all bar a few self-serve checkouts from every store. These are to be used in “emergency” extremely busy times, NOT as the principle way to make purchases.
American customers also loathed the move to all Self-Service checkouts, with some extremely violent results.
America’s National Retail Federation has announced the Self-Service Supermarket Checkouts are being wound back (removed). They hv listened to their customers!
It was in the March or April 2024 “Convenience World” publication.
It is a WIN for customers who still want good Service.

How long will it take Australia’s silly Coles and Woolworths to make the change back to human staffed registers?

 

[June E]

I have signed these petitions too. We need to let the authorities know what is best for the majority of us and not let them dictate to us what they think we need.

I doubt we are the majority I signed them all too.

 

[elaine41]

Sorry,l don't agree. Waiting in a long queue isn't fun either. There should be a choice.

So what don't you agree with? The petition is asking that the transition to ALL self-checkouts be stopped. That will give you the choice to go either to a manned or unmanned checkout as you wish.

 

[Bev49]

Keep the cash going

 

[Judy cooney]

I think we need more help when we don’t have supper

 

[siameezer]

I'm weary of signing any petitions as I have previously and then got bombarded with hundreds for every issue there was on earth. I was sent emails asking for money constantly to support issues and found that signing them does absolutely nothing to stop the problem.

You are right ... petitions don't work, but they do make people feel as if they have done something, even if it is ineffectual.

 

[mOiOz]

All signed for these very worthy causes

Me too...!