Upcoming Events and Training

Thank you to those who attended the professional development session ‘Family Violence and our Social Security System’ on 15 June 2023 delivered by our community lawyers Eloise Cox and Kristen Densley. If you attended, we ask that you please complete the feedback surveys provided by FCVic.

In August we’ll be running a further session through the FCVic training program. This session will be focussing on the age pension and health care card including how they interlink and will also explore how superannuation and other assets affect the age pension.

This professional development session is scheduled for Wednesday 2 August 2023. Registrations are via the FCVic Training Calendar, and we hope to see you there!

Member of a Couple – Amendments to Social Security Guide

Social security law is based in case law and legislation, and the Social Security Guide summarises relevant information and provides guidance on how the law ought to be applied. It is published quarterly and is used as a resource by advocates as well as decision makers at all levels (within Centrelink and at both divisions of the Administrative Appeals Tribunal).

On 8 May 2023, the Social Security Guide ‘Determining Member of a Couple Relationships’ was amended after extensive advocacy by Economic Justice Australia (‘EJA’), SSRV and other member centres of EJA.

The amendments provide decision makers with guidance to consider family violence when they are assessing whether two people are a member of a couple, and further provide examples of family violence and how it may be a relevant consideration in their assessment.

Furthermore, family violence is now explicitly listed in the Social Security Guide as an example of a ‘Special Reason’ for a decision maker to exercise a discretion to treat that a person as a single person and not a member of a couple for the purposes of social security law.

This is a very significant achievement and SSRV would like to acknowledge and celebrate the work by those involved. You can read more about this topic on our website and the further advocacy being undertaken in this space by EJA and other member centres.

Centrelink Working Group

We would also like to remind and encourage you to attend the FCVic ‘Centrelink Working Group’ where financial counsellors, community advocates, social security lawyers and guest speakers meet to discuss policy concerns, trends in casework and challenges/successful outcomes.

You can join through the FCVic membership portal, by emailing [email protected] or emailing the convenor Elizabeth Stary at [email protected].