The phrase “culture of dependency” is a classic, cynical political trope. It’s designed to conjure images of the lazy and the undeserving, a convenient scapegoat for complex economic problems. So, when Opposition Leader Sussan Ley wields this tired old trope, pledging to “wean Australians off reliance on government support,” it’s more than a policy announcement. It’s an admission of being profoundly out of touch with the reality millions of Australians are living.
This rhetoric isn’t just ignorant; it’s actively harmful. It frames needing help as a moral failing, rather than what it most often is: a rational response to an economic system that is failing them.
Let’s be clear about the “reality” Ms. Ley is ignoring.
This isn’t a culture of dependency; it’s a culture of desperation. It’s the single parent choosing between putting petrol in the car to get to work and buying fresh fruit for their children. It’s the aged pensioner rationing their heating through a bitter winter. It’s the young worker living in a share house with five others because a single income can no longer cover the rent, let alone a mortgage.
These aren’t people who need “weaning.” They are our neighbours, friends, and family members who need a government that sees their struggle and responds with support, not scorn. They are dependent on support payments because the cost of essentials – housing, food, energy, healthcare – has skyrocketed while wages have stagnated.
Ms. Ley’s comments reveal a fundamental misunderstanding of the social contract. Government support is not a handout that creates laziness; it is a hand-up that maintains dignity. It is the unemployment benefit that keeps a roof over someone’s head while they search for a new job in a tight market. It is the childcare subsidy that allows a parent, more often a mother, to re-enter the workforce and contribute to the economy. It is the aged pension that allows our elders to retire after a lifetime of work without falling into poverty.
To talk of “weaning” people off this support without first addressing the root causes of their need is not just callous, it’s illogical. Will she first wean landlords off skyrocketing rents? Will she wean supermarkets off record profits? Will she wean energy companies off exorbitant prices?
The solution isn’t to punish people for needing help in a difficult economy. The solution is to build an economy where fewer people need that help to survive. That means tackling the housing crisis, strengthening wage growth, and investing in services that make life more affordable – like childcare and healthcare.
True strength isn’t found in forcing people to struggle alone. True strength is found in community, in solidarity, and in a safety net that ensures no one is left behind. That is the Australian value worth championing.
Sussan Ley’s “culture of dependency” is a fantasy designed to divide us. The reality is a culture of resilience, where Australians are doing it tough and deserve politicians who have the courage to help, not the audacity to blame.
(Read the fine print: supporting struggling Australians does not feature in “Liberal economic values”):
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What was this bunkum about her being”less extreme” than the antediluvian Right of the formation?
If someone ever deserved to be “weaned off the public teat”, it would be Ley. Trumpian or Abbbotist in origin, it has the usual Murdochish attempt to split the commmunity on resentment and envy, altho how anyone could envy someone on the dole, defies an imagination. No doubt about them, they’ll always hit rock bottom when it comes to ethics.
The first entities that need to be ‘weaned off the public teat” are resource extractors, multinational companies and career politicians. That will leave plenty to take care of people who need it (for whatever reason).
The Libs appear to be reading a map of the locations of political landmines in front of them then stepping on each and every one in their race to be totally irrelevant.
Excellent work Michael, and your final line sums it up beautifully.
A culture of dependency suggests many interpretations and angles. All parties and candidates depend on support, donations, volunteers, legwork, contributions, faith, media, attitude, confidence, policy. Not all voters are doing well or are resigned to remain static. Even the odious and now forgotten Dutton depended on enormous levels of generosity and “charity.” So, could all office holders, even Ms.Ley, try to plan, give, find, share, consolidate, serve?
“culture of dependency”, “politics of envy” and “presumption of entitlement”; all platitudes spoken with affected wisdom and intended pejorative by persons completely devoid of compassion (concern for the suffering or misfortunes of others). Those with the self aggrandising “born to rule” arrogance seemingly have their noses in the air such that they don’t detect the aromas of reality that are commonly experienced by the socially disadvantaged “lower classes”. Yet they claim the right to rule over others for their benefit.
Mediocrates, these slogans are all designed to hide the fact that even the founders of liberalism (the forerunners of today’s ruling elite) accepted the principle that every person has a right to a share of the national wealth.
The economic system they developed to allow a minority a greater share in that wealth is buttressed by a “counter-principle” if you will– the imposition of a concept of mutual obligation that puts conditions on the vulnerable as they struggle to access their fair share.
There is a small truth in ‘culture of dependency’, some are too dependent on handouts. However, is it a ‘culture’. Not really, it is individual. So the word ‘culture’ is wrong.
Then what do the Liberals fund? Their rich mates. Corporations have a culture of dependency, from paying zero tax, so they are effectively taking money out of our pockets.
Everything is ultimately dependent on government. Government keeps the country running.
We can’t wean anything off that.
Reminds me of the 1970s disgraceful initiation of the term ‘dole bludger’ by Liberal MP Bert Kelly (also for a while by Labor’s Clyde Cameron). This was at the start of when ‘trickle down’ neoliberalism from America ripped the heart out of the Oz economy. ‘Ripping’; a cost for which we are still paying today.
And to add to that, lets not forget the filth of Liberal John Howard who tried to rip the guts out of unions with ‘Work Choices’, and introduced the pernicious and substantially unachievable ‘Mutual Obligations’ – it still exists, albeit is slowly being wound back. And it is the ‘Mutual Obligations’, unlawfully twisted and remanufactured by the Morrison govt that gave rise to the horrendous and devastating ‘Robodebt’.
It is patently obvious now that appartchik and temporary leader of the no-idea-lazy-opposition, Sussan Ley and her imputation of an Oz “culture of dependence” is pressing to take Oz back to a ‘blame the ordinary folk’ horrendous past of Robodebt, Mutual Obligations and Dole Bludger, rather than doing the hard yards (not ever in the LNP DNA) of removing the economy from the clutches of neoliberalism, reinstating proper governance and equity for all Australians, and most importantly, the increasingly needed care services.