Key findings:
- A range of factors influence uptake. Some are based on prior experience (demand-side drivers), others relate to supply-side drivers:
- Poor communication – A lack of awareness of available services was the most cited reason for lack of service uptake. Other communication issues included poor information provision on websites (jargon, poor navigation) and insufficient advice from service providers about additional services available.
- Complexity of service delivery – Complexity of service delivery was both a significant barrier to trust and constraint on service uptake. Simplification of application and compliance requirements are essential for improved uptake of available services.
- Access constraints inhibited uptake, including access to internet, transport, quality of shopfront experiences, literacy and language and time constraints
- Improved resourcing and service culture is essential for uptake – Service delivery delays, perceived poor treatment from frontline staff inhibited service uptake.
- Quality advocacy increases uptake. Service complexity, coupled with the push for online service delivery, inhibits many vulnerable people from being able to access services. Advocacy from family, friends, NGOs or service providers helps to navigate service delivery processes in a respectful manner.
- Poor uptake may have significant implications for individual and family wellbeing. The impact of not using services can be significant for individuals and their families due to their pressing need for financial, health, employment or other services.
- Locational effects crystallise around the nature of the local economy (e.g. seasonal economy) and the size of the informal “cash” economy.
A number of factors which affected citizens uptake of available services were identified (see Table 4), with few substantial differences across the communities except for two concerns7, cost and relevance of policies and programs for community needs which was identified by a small number of communities, particularly highly marginalised communities (eg. low SEIFA).
One participant identified that the cost of services (e.g. medial services, allied health etc) was prohibitive for them, despite the need, due to the need to prioritise basic living costs. Although other participants also noted that the cost of compliance with service requirements resulted in them excluding themselves from the service, despite the financial ramifications:
“Well just because it’s through the government doesn’t necessarily mean that it’s not going to cost you anything to access that service. And for many given reasons, sometimes you just can’t afford to pay that cost to be able to access that service so you’ve got more important things that need to be paid for like electricity bill or the food, rather than getting the help that you need, you need to pay for them way more.” [FG34]
“That was when they cut the payments off because I was in [regional town two hours away] and wanted me to come back. … So I was getting paid, I was doing three days’ work at the time, so I was getting about $450, and I was still paying my house off in town plus paying a house up there, so I just chose to go through struggle street rather than have to fuel the car up, miss a day’s [work], because I didn’t have the money to get back from there.” [FG6]
Another participant noted not only the cost of access services, but also the capacity of the services to actually make a difference for their lives:
“Make the services a little bit more serviceable. I mean, they’re just – they’re there, but man, you’ve got to take out a bank loan to get there or – it’s just – everything is just halfhearted, backhanded. I don’t think there’s anything genuine about much they offer really.” [FG9]
These differences are not minor and can inhibit citizens access to services and with that further embed disadvantage. While many government services are free to citizens (within eligibility parameters), it is not only the cost of the service that needs to be considered, but also the cost of accessing that service which can be substantial in regional areas due to the longer distances between service delivery offices – petrol, public transport, time and hence opportunity costs.
Awareness
A lack of awareness of available services was raised by the majority of participants as reducing uptake of available services, with one participant describing services as an enigma machine, that it is “really cryptic to understand what the services are, where you can obtain them from and what you actually get out of it” [FG29]. This difficulty in accessing information is felt widely, with one participant claiming this lack of clarity is a deliberate management decision:
“I have been told there’s a policy that they actually are told not to tell you what you’re entitled to. You have to find out what you’re entitled to. They’re not allowed to actually tell you.” [FG30]
Others identified the need to know the right people who are aware of available services:
“A lot of the stuff, as I said, I wasn’t even aware of until I actually needed it. In that regard, as I said, very naïve in regards to what’s actually out there and what’s available until you actually need it. And then, if you don’t go to the right people, they don’t give you access to the right stuff.” [FG10]
“You do need a few dole bludgers in your life so you can find out all this information. That’s where I get it all from, it’s like people I know. It’s like oh, that exists, oh, interesting.” [FG10]
One participant with service delivery experience talked of the substantial impact of uncertainty around service delivery due to poor information provision and extenuating circumstances of some service users:
“So in my role as a [service provider] and also as a youth worker, I would have to sometimes physically take the person or client to the service and engage in the service with them because they were too anxious, nervous, to do it on their own, the fear of the unknown, depression is huge.” [FG29]
Experience
As described previously, poor previous service experience can reduce trust, with citizens hesitant to use services following a bad experience, although this can be mitigated by recent positive experiences across their social network:
“There’s a lot of water under the bridge that everyone’s had experience with, it’s not left a willingness to continue doing that. How do you trust the things that have been changed for the better until you start to hear better stories. So once you talk amongst your -and hear other people saying, oh no, “it wasn’t that bad this time. They’ve done this, they’ve done that”, then you might be more inclined. But I think at the moment, most people are saying “No way, I’m just not going to be bothered” and it gets put off.” [FG30]
“Sometimes people have been failed so many times by other services that they’re scared to use another one. … And they’re conditioned to have an anxious response because they think it’s just so negative.” [FG29]
Table 4. Factors influencing the uptake of available services
| Factors influencing uptake | Example(s) |
|---|---|
| Awareness | “And as I said, they make it very damn hard to access stuff. And a lot of the stuff, I didn’t even know was out there until we were about to go bum up.” [FG10] |
| Distrust of the government | “Just like, if you don’t trust your government, I don’t know, you know people who are like, “Oh, I don’t trust the government, you don’t know what they’re up to”, why would you use a service that they’re providing if you don’t trust them in the first place?” [FG34] |
| Complexity of accessing services | “You just end up trying to do without or not avail yourself of the – not inflict on yourself the need to deal with them, and so you’re doing it without the service that they provide if they feel like it. … It could be information, it could be money or it could be support, just because at my age I’m getting – I haven’t got the energy to jump through the hoops as well as everything else I have to do. And I think I’m doing marvellously well.” [FG8] |
| Cost of accessing or complying with services (time and money costs) | “And it’s the same when you deal with someone on the phone. The go, “Just pop down to your local [Financial Support Service].” And you go, oh okay, I haven’t got money for petrol or I haven’t got a car. … That’s only a three-hour drive there and three hours back. … Or I have five children and a full-time job and how am I going to get up there?” [FG6] |
| Ease of access | “In cities, if you have to see a person, if you have to go to an office, it’s much easier to get to it. Out here, if you can’t drive, tough. You’ve got to find somebody who will drive you to [regional town] or wherever you’ve got to go. Whereas in the major cities, well, you’ve got – not saying it’s the best transport system in the world, but it gets you around. You don’t have to drive. So it’s more easy to access shopfront services, if you like, for want of a better word. Whereas out here, if your internet’s down, you’re buggered.” [FG6] “Just call them when you’ve got four hours to sit there and do nothing.” [FG8] |
| Influence of politicians -instability | “I avoid it because there’s just too much drama. So I don’t really use many government services apart from the ATO or Medicare, and that’s, as everyone said, you can deal with it yourself.” [FG6] |
| Influence of politicians -Changes in service availability | “It’s all out for their own agenda, so usually if there’s something, say a good policy or something in place, or these people might need something for their policies, so then you’ve got to take it from somewhere. It’s like that sort of scale. So a lot of the times we’ll see good services that may be available and then the next bunch jump in and cut that and cut that, but they do this and do that.” [FG6] |
| Changes in rules | “Because the rules change, you maybe qualify at one time, and then they change the rules so you don’t, and vice versa, and so, and then it’s too late to do anything.” FG7 “I was on the disability pension until the government thought it was a great idea to make me not disabled anymore.” [FG12] |
| Information of service available to individuals | “I find that you just don’t know what you’re eligible for. I’ve sat in many offices, I’ve done all the online tests and still don’t understand what I’m eligible for or what makes sense and I still don’t fully understand.” [FG16] |
| Service availability in local community (wait lists) | “Yeah. It’s way too late. You know, lots of those people, unfortunately, you’d be visiting their graves. It’s too late.” [FG11] |
| Poor information | “I just think that a lot of people don’t know what is available. It’s not out there enough about benefits and things that people can obtain easily enough. It’s all hidden information, and it’s up to the person to try and dig in and find out what is available for them, and I don’t think they should, I think they should be telling everyone what is available.” [FG19] |
| Prior experience | “No, I don’t. I’ve never used it since. I’ll be on the bones of my backside before I go back there. I just won’t. I refuse. I’ll go and get five casual jobs before I use it.” [FG16] |
| Effective Advocacy | “[Services are] too difficult for them to access, like they have to fill in forms that are too complicated or for some I guess … some people don’t have the skills to, like again with the aged care, a lot of older people just simply aren’t able to navigate that process. And don’t have someone to support them to do it.” [FG35] |
| Poor service culture | “It’s not personal. You are literally a number. There is nothing – people don’t know – you’re an object.” [FG20] |
| Pride/Stigma, or shame of needing service | “Yes. I know lots of people in this town, I’ve been here a lot of years, a lot of children, and I know just about everyone that works in that [Financial Support Service] office in town. I don’t want them to know my business. I feel ashamed that I have to go in there and stand in a queue and I’m sure from myself, I’m not the only that feels that way.” [FG21] |
| Poor eligibility criteria | “The [criteria] are prohibitive to actually giving the money away to people who need it …” [FG25] |
| Relevance to needs | “Because it is too difficult. They don’t meet my needs. We have needs as a family and what is offered in [community] does not meet these.” [FG27] “Make the services a little bit more serviceable. I mean, they’re just – they’re there, but man, you’ve got to take out a bank loan to get there or – it’s just – everything is just half-hearted, backhanded. I don’t think there’s anything genuine about much they offer really.” [FG9] |
Complexity
The complexity of accessing services was a common complaint amongst study participants, raised in all of the focus groups about a range of services. The complexity of services often resulted in participants avoiding accessing services despite their need or eligibility, which affected their quality of living (see also Box 8):
“I’ve avoided applying for the carer’s allowance for my daughter, because the paperwork is so long and the wait time to have it approved or unapproved is so long. And so, I’ve put it off and put it off and put it off. And it’s got to a point now where we absolutely need the money so I’m going through that process and it’s not easy.” [FG8]
“I haven’t even bothered because there’s just too many horror stories and like I said, I just can’t be -it was hard enough to go through the rigmarole of the disability pension. And then to be told that everything that’s been used to get that will now not be used for the new claim. Like it’s just a massive headache. And people just in the end, just give up and that’s what I’ve done. …. [It’s] majorly stressful.” [FG12]
“Based on my past experiences with [Financial Support Service], I’m not even looking into it. We’ll try and make it work on one income and just hope for the best. Because I’m like the hoops that I know that I’m going to have to jump through. … I’m just nup. I’m not even going to do it. We’ll just eat noodles and hope for the best.” [FG1]
For one participant, the complexity of accessing a service detracted them from using the service, instead they used that time to find employment:
“Yeah. I just got a job. It was a lot easier to just get a job. And I wasn’t trying not to get a job. I was just at a time where I lost my job suddenly and thought okay I guess I’ll go and sign up for this while I’m looking for work, even went to the group thing, I can’t remember what I was doing there, and then it was just such a process and I thought how about I actually just invest this time in going and getting a job and I did.” [FG12]
Access
The push from the government for online service delivery and information provision was identified as being problematic, with a perception that many potential service users do not have adequate access to the technology or the internet due to both the cost and rural internet access:
“A lot of it goes online, but the people that are in the lower economic group that it’s sort of designed for – a lot of these things -they’ve got no access to the internet.” [FG17]
“For important things it’s really hard to trust technology because it crashes. And where I’m out on a farm, like we have blackouts and stuff and you just never know. And I don’t have a top notch computer. I’ve got a decent phone, it’s not top notch either. It’s expensive. It’s expensive to get that stuff. [FG10]
This lack of accessibility is further exacerbated for those who also find it difficult to seek further support at a shopfront due to poor transport availability (noting the lack of public transport options in regional areas):
“…if you’re in a low income bracket or you need to get a lot of these different services, you possibly haven’t got internet anyway, so you’ve got to go into [Financial Support Service], you’ve got to find a way of getting to [Financial Support Service] … But there’s a lot of people that can’t get there to be able to use that, and they haven’t got the money to be able to have the internet. … we have people who cannot get in to do their things because they don’t have a car, because they can’t afford a car.” [FG28]
Box 8. Implications of complexity of service access on disadvantaged single mother
Q. To what extent is the level to which you trust government services impacting on the decisions you make in your life?
“[It has] definitely changed my decisions a lot. I struggle with paperwork and stuff and I do need a lot of help now and again depending on what paperwork it is and I’ve seeked help and they’ve just told me you need to do it on a computer. So you go to this address and do it on the computer. I go into [Financial Support Service] if I need help with [Financial Support Service] or I go into …
Q. so what happens when they tell you that? What are the consequences of that?
“It means I just don’t do it because sometimes I do want to go but I get so frustrated that I just give up. [The consequences of this] for me and my family, if I didn’t go and fix what paperwork I’ve had to do up, my kids wouldn’t get fed, my electricity bill, I’ve needed help with that so I’ve gone to [Financial Support Service] for that energy rebate thing.
Q. so when you have to go through this process as a consequence of that flow on of events, how does that make you feel?
“[It] makes me frustrated, very frustrated because my kids need food, need electricity like I’ve gone 3 days without electricity because of it, [I] very emotional, I feel like I’m failing as a mum” [FG4]
In remote communities, the reliance on online service delivery further inhibit service access due to inhibiting factors such as illiteracy and poor technical skills:
“I just wanted to make a point about you asked how we feel accessing these things, I think here we have to be very good at using online information and be very good at reading a lot of the websites and sending things away, and applying and doing a lot of that yourself because it is there, but there is no-one to help you. … If you’ve got a high level of literacy, both with reading, writing and also computer literacy – in other words, understanding how to use websites and how to submit things, upload documents – I think if you’re good and have that good skillset, it can be quite easy accessing these services, but for people who may not have that comfortable ability to go online and read lots and lots of pages of text and then follow intricate computer directions, it can be very challenging for those people within our community.” [FG25]
Accessing online services is even harder in remote communities who rely on community based resources for access, although it was perceived that for Indigenous citizens, phone services were also problematic which further affects uptake:
“At the end of the day, not many of them would have even a computer at home, so they’ve then got to rely on the people from the health clinic for what services they can access.” [FG17]
For some citizens, poor accessibility to government services promotes alternative income generation, including seeking employment, or using the black, cash-in-hand, economy. This was identified as being particularly pertinent for citizens with lower levels of literacy:
The issue is that if it’s such a [fight] to actually access some of these sorts of services and if you’re making enough money to keep the family fed, et cetera, there’s a lot of people just not engaging. They’re choosing not to engage. … It’s not that people don’t want to engage, it’s just that it’s complicated. The government makes simple things complicated.” [FG17]
“Maybe I’d say sometimes, but that could be part of the – they’re unable to go in there and – like you were saying, they can go out and go there and write their name, but they can’t read and write all the rest of it. … Yeah, the shame effect.” [FG17]
In some communities, the co-location of services was perceived to be detrimental to service access, with negative associations in using the shopfront and concerns associated with anti-social behaviour. While online is an alternative delivery approach for some, this is not an option for some Australians and does inhibit people from using available services (ie. Medicare):
“Honestly, it feels degrading. … As you go in now, there’s security guards. There’s people drunk, fighting out the front. You’ve got to go into a queue and then you will sit with all these drunken people screaming and shouting, security guards turfing people out...” [FG20]
“My 77 year old mum, when this all started when she first went to [Health service], which is in [Financial support service] … The day she walked in there was a couple who were fighting out the front. She was covered in blood, he was covered in blood. He was defecating on the footpath at the door. He’d been kicked out. She walked in and had to sit there for 45 minutes before she was seen. In that time, same thing, there was fights in there. My mum was horrified. … I don’t think my mum would set foot in there again now.” [FG20]
“People that want to access a Medicare service they’re not going to be very game to enter our [Financial Support Service] to do so, to be very honest with you. … Because the demographics of this area do not make for some very lovely interactions, there’s some very colourful people inside that building.” [FG9]
A significant barrier to the uptake of services, was the lack of available services within the local community. This was identified primarily around health services including NDIS support services and mental health services with patients often not prioritised, despite their urgent needs (see also Box 9):
“My partner tried to utilise drug and alcohol services, saying I have a problem and he didn’t have enough of a problem to help. And I think that’s the problem that you’ve got people on the edge going help me, but oh you’re not fucked up enough so we can’t help you, wait until you’re absolutely fucked and then come and see us and it will be too late.” [FG12]
Box 9. Poor access to associated services in regional Australia
My [relative] has been diagnosed with autism so, for him, it took them five months and his mother constantly ringing to find out when they were going to get anything through, whether he was going to get any funding, what funding and accessibility he was allowed to have or where they were going to be able to go for services or whatever. There are no services here in town so she has to go [regional centre] two hours away. If she doesn’t go to [regional centre two hours away], she goes to [regional centre three hours away]. That’s been knocked on the head now because it’s just too far and when you’ve got to get a little one up who’s just turned – he’s six, we’re on the road at 7.30 in the morning to get him up to [regional centre three hours away] by 11 o’clock. And then you’ve got the paediatrician saying to us, “Well, why are you here? Why aren’t you in [regional community]?” There are no services here in [regional community], in the rural towns, because they don’t have them.”
This issue of access to services can be compounded in remoter regional communities where the distribution of services is limited and who often have long wait lists for local services due to insufficient planning of resources for communities who service a large regional area:
“I would say from travelling personally and for work throughout the [State], services probably aren’t broadly enough distributed through regional areas, or for people to access them. So we’ve spoken about the difficulties in using online platforms. The added layers of internet not working in remote locations ... And potentially your culture means that you don’t have a fixed address, which means that you won’t receive your mail, or mail services to that area are restrictive. In terms of getting the message from Australian government services to those locations and being able to access those services, very difficult.” [FG19]
“I’ve been on a wait list for two years to see somebody [locally] and I can’t -the closest person I’d have to go to is [capital city 4 hour drive] … And I just feel like when you need the help you don’t get it. … It’s just - in the country we don’t get afforded the same opportunities as we do in the city. There’s only a few good psychologists, social workers and all that that are having to burden a whole town, and not only that, we are the gateway to the [Region]. So people come to [regional community] for essential services and are putting even more of a strain on them.” [FG12]
A number of participants identified time as a constraint to utilising services, including the time it takes to engage with service providers and the opening hours which are not conducive to working Australians:
“Probably time restraints, your ability to actually engage. Like, for a phone call you’ve got to have somebody in the office to be able to pick that phone call up and if a phone call takes an hour, potentially, and you’re supposed to be at work from 8 till 5 o'clock, their office hours might only be that.” [FG20]
“Monday to Friday [services are] open, and you don’t have a time to go there. So you have to go on sick leave, or annual leave, and then go there. And stand there for two, three hours.” [FG23]
“But even with [Financial Support Service] they most likely just refer you to the online callers where you’ve got to sit on hold for three hours and you can’t take a day off to sit on hold all day. … Yeah, well that’s the point, we all work and their office hours are our work hours.” [FG26]
Participants also talked about the need for extended office and telephone hours to enable better engagement from working citizens, including the potential for a call-back service that provides an estimated time of the call-back so as people can plan their day (following services offered in the private sector).
One participant expressed concern at the overall accessibility of government services, including information, service automation and inflexible service ‘boxes’ which don’t account for all citizens circumstances:
“With increase in population, public demand, public services have grown away with a lot of businesses we are very hard to contact, very hard to get information, it’s hard to find, and sometimes the variety of the information is confusing. We get presented with automated services when we get called which can be extremely frustrating, especially someone with a disability to go through that constantly for a variety of different services, can be really tricky and there is no other way around that. And individuals are very much expected to fit into boxes, and services sometimes aren’t flexible enough to adequately deal with the shades of grey.” [FG32]
For some participants, access to services is not about technical or logistical concerns but eligibility, with eligibility criteria limiting the services they are able to use:
“Sometimes there’s no choice. At the moment I’m going through a few health issues and was told yesterday by a fairly high up institution in the public health system that, “We can’t help you anymore, you’ve got to go elsewhere because your treatment categorisation doesn’t meet our service policies so we’ve got to hand you on pretty much.” So yes, there is no choice and I’ve got to go elsewhere to try and get help.” [FG34]
Information provision
The poor quality of information provision was often raised as a barrier to trust and uptake. The complexity of information, the jargon language, and poor presentation were all raised as barriers:
“… I will sit there and read everything digital and kind of go, “Really?” Because a lot of what’s there is not relevant, it’s not presented very well … not everyone’s going to sit in front of digital media to work out what their rights and entitlements are and all the rest of that, so it becomes really problematic.” [FG17]
“I am a fan of online platforms, but I would agree that how the information is portrayed isn’t always user friendly. And the information they do share isn’t necessarily the information you need, and the explanatory terms of what might be your needs and why you would need this service, it would be displayed in other language – not in other language, in English, but it would be in government terms.” [FG19]
One participant highlighted the need for improved information and contextual sensitivity as local conditions affect citizens’ capacity to access services:
“… if I wanted to go into [Financial Support Service] and sit down with somebody and say, “Look, we’ve got a client who’s having a bit of a problem with this, what do we give them as advice?”, our local [Financial Support Service] Aboriginal staff will be more than helpful considering everything that we need, throw a lot of brochures at us, which is completely useless because the person is illiterate, but educate us to do it. And if I were to do that on the phone; completely different story. I would get some lunatic from Tasmania.” [FG17]
For many participants, issues of data privacy were a barrier to uptake. Concerns were not necessarily about poor trust in the government with personal information, but concerns about future governments and potential changes and the selling of data:
“When it comes to giving things like my rights, and my information to the government, it’s not a question of can I trust this government with my information, it’s can I trust future governments. … So, would I trust this government? Yeah I probably would. But there’s no guarantee that it’s going to be the same government in 20 years time. It’s future governments I don’t trust. And also, systems are not perfect. Things do get hacked.” [FG24]
“I am not happy with it at all. So one of you brought up data leakage and how they’re collecting all your data, well with that data collection that they’ve done, it’s available to everybody and it can be very easily linked back to you, and they’re selling your information as well.” [FG26]
Alternatives to government services
For some citizens, poor accessibility of services encourages citizens to seek alternatives to government services. These alternatives may include other forms of income generation, including seeking employment or using the black, cash-in-hand, economy. The black economy was identified in every community, with communities with seasonal work, low incomes and highly remote8 using the black economy the most. This was identified as being particularly pertinent for citizens with lower levels of literacy:
“Maybe I’d say sometimes, but that could be part of the – they’re unable to go in there and – like you were saying, they can go out and go there and write their name, but they can’t read and write all the rest of it. … Yeah, the shame effect.” [FG17]
For some, extra assistance through other forms of income is critical due to the general cost of living:
“It's the only way some people survive. Because if you've got your own house and you're on the dole or something like that, by the time you pay your rent and your electricity, and you see some of these people, they're getting $400 electricity [bills] and they have jack shit on and it's like – how can you afford that? And you've only got a certain amount of time to pay it.” [FG14]
Others chose to use the black economy due to the complexity of accessing services:
“The issue is that if it’s such a [fight] to actually access some of these sorts of services (112:50) and if you’re making enough money to keep the family fed, et cetera, there’s a lot of people just not engaging. They’re choosing not to engage. … It’s not that people don’t want to engage, it’s just that it’s complicated. The government makes simple things complicated.” [FG17]
“No, I was earning more doing cash in hand than what I would get from Centrelink. [without] having to sit in line.” [FG14]
Other alternatives to public service delivery identified during the focus groups included simply going without, using community sector services (eg. community transport buses to enable people to access health and other government services in regional centres), local community fundraising (see Box 1), and using the support of family, friends and other local networks. The use of private services was not identified by many due to the high costs associated with private services, despite their pressing need (eg. mental health services where local services have high wait times).
The use of alternative service pathways and the potential role for local community members and organisations highlights the need for place-based services that understand the community needs, service gaps and community capacity to fill these gaps. With this understanding, alternative pathways can be promoted, and alternative pathway systems provided with adequate resources that enables them to support citizens effectively. Such alternative pathway systems are typically bespoke to their community, which may be based around a geographic location or based on various cultural or demographic characteristics (eg. Indigenous, women, youth). Given these various communities within any geographic location, it is important to be mindful of what resources are within the broader communities and how they can be shared (where appropriate).
Demand for services
Participants did not often identify services that they felt were needed in their community that they could not already access, with most acknowledging that the vast majority of Australia public services were available either within the community, online or over the telephone: “There shouldn’t be in today’s society with technology and all we should be able to access everything.” [FG24]. There may be shortages of service availability delays in delivery of services (e.g. passport) due to their remote location:
“Doctors won't come here. They see us as a backwater and they want to obviously live the life or whatever in a Metropolitan area.” [FG14]
“… a lot of it is because people don’t want to come here. They’re happy in [capital city] or [major regional town]; … and they don’t want to come up to [regional town]. [FG35]
Services that were identified as not being provided were typically health related (e.g. access to specialists, mental health service providers and associated services (see Box 8) or related to internet access, with reliable internet difficult in remote Australia.
For others, the small gains from accessing the service were not sufficient to bother navigating the system:
“Yeah, I went in to get a carer’s allowance for my daughter, and I had like 70 pages to fill out, so it wasn’t enough for me to bother. And I was separated from my husband at the time, and it involved all the assets and everything, so I thought “No”.” [FG19]
“Not worth the jumping of hoops for what you are getting.” [FG25]
One focus group participant preferred not to access eligible services as they valued their personal freedoms and did not want to be trapped by service obligations:
“A treasure for me is the word “freedom”, and I feel every single time I enrol myself in one of those services, I feel almost like I’m trapped, and this may be the wrong word, but as long as I can do what I need to do to live okay within my financial means, I’ll do so. I like the freedom that I don’t feel obliged or that I maybe not a burden to the government in general. All the other people, because people, some of them desperately need them and some people maybe not but they get them anyway.” [FG22]
7 Another concern raised which differed across communities was access to health services, especially specialist services. However this is a State government issue and hence is not discussed in this report.
8 This is not always for income generation, may also be to support friends and other community members and receive a small amount of money as a thank you. In remote communities was often to share resources/skills etc that were difficult to access.