Why call it suicide?

In Pakistan a bomber killed at least 65 people today at a public park in the Pakistani city of Lahore. The ABC, one of many, called him a “suicide bomber”. 

Why call him a “suicide bomber”? Suicide is not about what the Taliban praises as “revenge”. It is not a feeling of celebration. This was not suicide! 

In WWII the Japanese Kamikaze pilots called their flight into a ship as a “body attack”, but the English language called them “suicide pilots”.

We have to stop calling chosen death in war as “suicide”. Suicide is very different by the people – here and around the world – who take their own life because they don’t feel there is anything else to live for. A soldier who has played a “body attack” – like the Taliban person in Lahore – didn’t think that way. He thought that he was fighting!

The Sydney Morning Herald last year spoke about the “'Alarming' rise in suicide deaths by former military personnel”. That story opened eyes about 13 ex-service men who killed themselves in the five months January-May 2015. Aaron Gray, an Iraq war veteran who is suffering PTSD, said "We can't bring them back but I am doing my best to ensure their deaths have not been in vain." Would anyone want to bring back the Taliban soldiers who committed “body attacks” in Lahore? 

Why call them “suicide bombers”?

The News last month wrote an article titled “Suicide has claimed more Australian soldiers’ lives than any war since 1999”. David Wiseman, a former military investigator, committed suicide in 2006. He was also suffering from PTSD. Very few people understand that, understand why veterans unwound from the public life around them. 239 veterans committed suicide since 1999. We mourned. Who would want to “save” the ISIS “body attackers”? 

Why call them “suicide bombers”?

Do you know about Aboriginal suicides? Creative Spirits wrote “Suicide was unknown to Aboriginal people prior to invasion. Appalling living conditions and past traumas have led to a suicide rate that by far exceeds that of non-Aboriginal people.” Suicide is possibly the single biggest killer of Aboriginal people. If this was how the Taliban or ISIS men felt, why would they kill themselves in the middle of what they call a war? 

Why call them “suicide bombers”?

Wikipaedia defined suicide as “the act of intentionally causing one's own death. Risk factors include mental illness such as depression, bipolar disorder, schizophrenia, personality disorders, alcoholism, or drug abuse. Others are impulsive acts due to stress such as from financial difficulties, troubles with relationships, or bullying.” That sounds like sad reasons for committing suicide.  Suicide in Australia includes farmers, agricultural workers, police, construction workers, transport workers, builders, electricians and, said earlier, ex-soldiers and Aboriginals.

It doesn’t sound like some soldier thinking he’s done right, so why call them “suicide bombers”?

It is time that we come around to understanding the use of the word “suicide”. In our country, in predominantly the entire world, where people are committing suicide, they are taking their lives because they don’t see any future. The “body attacks” are done by men whose army does see a future, preferably, they think, better for them. It is not suicide. It shouldn’t ever be called suicide.

Please, ABC and any other news group on the TV, radio, internet, newspaper, magazines or any other way, please stop calling war-based individual attacks as suicide. Use “body attacks”. Use any other definition of that event. But please stop making our people who are worn down to suicide look like murderers.

They are not.

Call Lifeline if you need help: 13 11 14

Diff'rent Strokes

Have you ever read something like this? “Daughter left her mother dead in bed and continued on with her life for 6 months.” This happened two years ago, but this sort of “treatment” by a daughter is nowhere near “unbelievable”. It just happens in a different way almost every day. 

I read a blog by a writer who calls herself “She Cat”. She had written about the problem she had with her daughter, and she said she (She Cat) had PTSD. She had turned away from her daughter because of the problems that she felt her daughter had caused (this appeared to have happened over 5-6 years). Now she had chosen to leave her daughter because she needed to save herself. She worked (“Sitting home all day & thinking would drive me batty, so work is my savior these days.”) and I think she is very lucky to keep her work. 

The Australian, in November of 2013, had printed an article called “The deserted mothers' club”, where so many stories looked very much like mine. One woman told us that “[s]he left her husband after marrying too young and worked to support the girls she raised largely on her own. ‘I feel a great shame,’ she says. ‘You feel as if you've failed.’” Yes, I felt like I have failed. 

I have PTSD too. It reacts within me too often and it’s only moved inside of me within the last three years – from my ex-husband walking out, through diagnosis of my brain aneurysm, being fired (after 7 good years), ending up in hospital for brain surgery… and that same time I had my stroke. My daughter took charge of me in the hospital. She came to visit me almost every day for the next 6.5 weeks. She wrote an exposition for my book (“Aneurysms with Aphorisms”, to be published around May-June this year) and I understand how she felt. But now she either doesn’t understand or doesn’t care about how the financial situation I am stuck in works. 

She has now chosen to walk away from me. 

I know that my daughter and her partner earns (after tax) around 4-5 times as much as I do. I know that I did not ever ask for huge amount of support, as she has said. She had said that she would cut off my phone, and the other thing she helps with is my insurance so I don’t think I’ll be insured now, but that is what she wanted to do. I can’t work, I’m stuck on the DSP, I didn’t choose it, but it’s how I now live. 

Last night, after thinking most of the day about the verbal fight that morning, I have reached my best place for a long time. I don’t accept what my daughter has accused me of, because I know how my stroke affected me. I know that I can’t argue. I know that I cried during the meeting with her. That she has said she will leave me has relieved me from fights which I can’t do. 

I have looked for somewhere else to rent, closer to my southern-side friends. I have also checked out something else north of Noosa, which I will be looking at soon. I know I have 4 weeks to wait now for the decision, and I have no idea how it will come out, but think about it. Thinking is how I can relate. Speaking is not. I was expected to speak, but I don’t think I was ever expected to think. 

To my daughter: the very best luck in your future. I brought you up, I know you used to love me… and I still love you. Think of me sometimes. 

I’m now living.

I wish...

A couple of years ago I supported the Make a Wish group which raises funds to send sick children to whatever they wished for. This wonderful group was formed in 1985 and they “believe in the healing power of a wish”. It’s up there for young children and young people who have life-threatening illnesses. In the last 30 years they have given 8,000 wishes.

But it’s just for children - it doesn’t include adults.

The government Department of Social Services (DSS) has a website page Guide to the List of Recognised Disabilities. Part 1 Recognised Disabilities, has 18 in the list, and many of these break down their conditions. It’s a long list. Part 2 lists 11 under Medical Conditions and also breaks down. 

But it talks about children – it doesn’t include adults.

Adults are supposedly cared for by the government support. This morning, since I’m not eligible for a Make a Wish, I decided to do a search through the government pages to find out how I could get support and help to return to work. These days the number of adults who have life threatening and/or severely disabled illnesses has grown, but the government support has dropped. I was in the DSS website and looked further. If you’ve had a look through DSS, you may know just what I know. 

Within DSS there’s a page titled About Australian Disability Enterprises which tells how they support “people with disability to engage in a wide variety of work tasks such as packaging, assembly, production, recycling, screen printing, plant nursery, garden maintenance and landscaping, cleaning services, laundry services and food services.” Really? Is this looking at people who are brain-injured and paralysed and don’t have any experience in any other “tasks”? I have qualifications and many years of experience in administration, WHS, auditing, financial support... Would I ever be considered? 

There’s a link to the DSS talk about NDIS (National Disability Insurance Scheme) which says that “people with disability can already access supported employment in an Australian Disability Enterprise where the NDIS has rolled out”, but you won’t find out more about that until you click on the NDIS website link – and be told that “roll out of the full scheme in all states and territories (except Western Australia) will start progressively from July 2016”. Really?? And yet on DSS they say that “From 1 July 2015, the National Disability Insurance Agency will fund supported employment for participants of the NDIS who work in Australian Disability Enterprises.”  Are we waiting until July 2016 or is it already in place – without many people with disability?

On to a different government website, the Disability Employment Services (which I had to find through Google). The DES said that “Disability Employment Services (DES) helps people with disability find work and keep a job.” As I said, I found this through Google – not through information given to me by the health department which I have been involved with for two years; not from the support groups I’ve already been enrolled with; not from Centrelink. Their page gave a link to Job Access, which doesn’t really help people like me. JobAccess said “the average participation of employees with disability across industry sectors is 10%”. In my opinion, 90% of the rest is far too high. 

Just a note on an ANZ video that is linked on the DES page. I did a mentorship last year where my mentor was an ANZ employee. I have never been offered a job there, nor do I know how I would apply. This video on the DES page gave me the following message: “Error loading player. No playable sources found.” Perhaps that’s just me. 

There is also a link to the Employment Assistance Fund page, where people with disability can apply for funds to “purchase a range of work related modifications and services for people who are about to start a job or who are currently working, as well as those who require assistance to find and prepare for work”. They offer help for modifications within the physical work environment (I usually work on my computer and definitely need a decent office chair), information and communication devices (I certainly need a new computer to keep working!) and, for me, disability awareness training. Except in the EAF guidelines section 2.1(f) said “To be eligible for assistance a person with disability must … be a Self-employed Worker who has been working at least 20 hours per week over the last 13 weeks and earning an hourly income that is at least equivalent to the National Minimum Wage”. 

For me, that stops me getting any EAF assistance because, even though I write most days, I don’t receive anything near “an hourly income that is at least equivalent to the National Minimum Wage”. 

The other government job source I found is called jobactive, apparently run by JobSearch which also seems to provides job searching for people with disabilities, but you need a jobactive provider. You know what? By this time I became extremely frustrated! What is the difference between JobAccess, JobSearch and jobactive? Why three different job sourcing sites? Do they really work?? 

Okay, so I went into the jobactive provider search and found 1386 nationally, and 23 providers within 25km from Redcliffe – 1 x Employment Option, 2 x STEPs (which I am already registered with), 2 x IPAR Rehabilitation, 3 x Epic Employment Services, 3 x Red Cross Employment Services, 4 x MAX Employment, 8 x HELP Employment. Perhaps if I hadn’t known STEPs – and had a very bad experience with MAX in Inala before I went into hospital - I might have contacted any of these providers, and yet I know that the “providers” don’t do work. Many of them – I’m sure you unemployed people know – just make their own money. Still, I went on in the JobSearch job seekers search, and couldn’t find any jobs for people with a disability… like me. There were a heap of positions in Brisbane, but only two in Moreton Bay area – one for a casual pub assistant and one for a trainee to do Cert III administration! I guess my 40 years administration wouldn’t count. 

This information has frustrated me because it does not seem to be where people with disability who are not entirely website aware can go on to find any employment which will certainly be for disabled people. DSS, employment, Job Access, jobactive and jobsearch are five different websites which promise some sort of work for disabled people, and yet promote employment to every unemployed person. Why does this government need too many websites? Why does this government say that much of the work is for disabled? Why does this government advertise “support” (providers) for people with disability which is either not advertised or useless? I don’t know if I will continue to look through these sites because if I can’t find a job, why do I keep looking? 

I wish I was eligible for Make a Wish for adults.

 

No party in Ceduna

On 19 August 2015, the LNP government introduced the Social Security Legislation Amendment (Debit Card Trial) Bill 2015. In the House of Representatives between 19 August and 15 September 2015 this was read 3 times and subsequently passed onto the Senate. It was read there on 16 September, 13 and 14 October 2015, and assented 12 November 2015.

The Department of Social Services (DSS) said “The Australian Government is looking at the best ways to support communities where a lot of people are on welfare, and alcohol, gambling and drug use are causing harm.” DSS also said that “people who receive payments from Centrelink like Newstart, Disability Support Pension, Parenting Payment and Carers Payment” would be involved. 

In January this year The Australian reported that this new system was proposed by mining magnate Andrew Forrest in 2014 in his review of the welfare system. It seems that “80 per cent of a person’s government payment would be ­quarantined to a bank card that could not be used to buy alcohol and gambling products, nor ­converted to cash”. Assistant Minister for Social Services Alan Tudge, who was overseeing this trial, thought that the card would “prove the measure can be the ‘solution’ to alcohol-induced social harm”. 

This week saw Ceduna in South Australia put on a Cashless Debit Card trial without any agreement or support from beneficiaries in this area. 

I’m in Brisbane. I’m on DSP. I have no idea if that card will be here, but I have a bad feeling. What has this government done to take people off their cash and give them a card? What does the government think the people have done? Or what do they think they have done?

I am very much concerned that the government is shoving real people off the real benefits and making decisions that real people should be able to make. Up until now I have been aware of what is going on with the “job support” companies who work with beneficiaries, but I wonder if anyone realises that what is paid to these companies, and what is now paid to the cashless card, Indue, are digging a very, very deep hole into this country’s economy. I have heard too many people blaming the beneficiaries for whatever happens in this country, yet they don’t – or won’t – blame the extremely well-paid people in the government who simply don’t think.

I Googled for information globally to find out which country paid and how much, and which country would use a card similar to the one trialling in Ceduna. Most of those using a card were, for many years, viewed as “third-rate countries”: 

   India – ration card 

   India – health card 

   Philippines - beneficiary card for after storm

   South Africa – SASSA Debit MasterCard for beneficiaries

   Kenya – food aid card 

   African – cash transfer cards 

I found European countries which supported their beneficiaries and didn’t use a cashless card, for instance:

   Germany – good set up for social security and employment benefits 

   Italy – unemployed registration card (benefits paid as 30% of previous 3 mths) 

   Sweden – no card, unemployed paid through their insurance 

Unfortunately, three western countries seem to be using cashless cards, including: 

   NZ – Work & Income payment cards; 

   USA – SNAP cards for beneficiaries for food – not essential;

   and Australia 

USA says $US981 a month is poverty line. That is $1,283 in AUD. Australian unemployment benefits are paid below this line so are in poverty. Newstart is $523.40 fortnightly - $ 1,134 per month – and is 88% of the poverty line set in USA. Payments can include rent allowance but $129.40 is the maximum every fortnight for a single person.

In 2014 the Australian National Commission of Audit wrote a report about unemployed benefits minimum wage (in the last two years these figures may have changed dramatically). The NOAC reported on Potential areas for reform and mentioned “cash bonus payments, relocation assistance and the Job Commitment Bonus”. I have no idea if any of these still exist. 

They looked at the level of minimum wages for people for work, and came to a suggestion that Newstart income should be set at 44% of that. The suggestion of increasing with the CPI recommended “less than 1 percentage point” for 10 years, but with no mention or understanding that less percentage would reflect in the future.

In March 2015 ABC interviewed Bill Shorten, ALP leader, about the increase of unemployment supposedly caused by the minimum wages increased. This was updated in March 2016, and ABC said there was “more to the story”. Personally, I agree with Shorten. There is no issues with the minimum wage which result in unemployment increases. What I believe happens on unemployment comes from overseas ‘employers’ who take on their own countrymen in our country and pay them $2 a day! That causes people to be made unemployed. That is the excuse why minimum wage should be reduced. And that, I believe, causes people to be on ridiculously low benefits which the government is ‘trialling’ with a cashless debit card. Why? 

The Australian National University, based in Canberra, provided a report (undated but included a 2006 graph) where they said that “[s]ince most workers would obtain a wage higher than the minimum anyway, the effect of imposing a minimum wage is to increase the wages only of those who would otherwise receive the lowest wages. The effect on the average wage is small and, thus, the impact on total employment and unemployment is also small.” 

Back to Ceduna, where the Newstart-DisabilitySupportPension-ParentingPayment-Carers payment receivers have been issued with the cashless card and are part of the trial. I would like to ask every person in Centrelink, every person in the Ceduna council, and every person who agreed to this trial: do you understand the worst scenario of the cashless cards? Back towards the start of this blog earlier I wrote “I wonder if anyone realises that what is paid to these companies, and what is now paid to the cashless card...are digging a very, very deep hole into this country’s economy.” I do still wonder. I don’t believe everyone knows. 

I don’t believe that every person cares.