Life on the Dole

The story of Abdul Nacer Benbrika, one of six Australian terrorists who were convicted recently in Victoria, appeared in last week’s news feed. Like many other Muslim immigrant families in Australia, Mr. Benbrika’s wife and seven children subsist on the dole.

But exactly how generous is that dole? Right Wing Death Bogan took an interest in that question, and did some extensive investigation into the benefits that are available to families like the Benbrikas. The results are posted in “A Benbrika With Benefits”:

A bit of an update to an interesting topic: How much are we paying terrorists and their supporters?

So one of our local terrorists, one Abdul Nacer Benbrika has been found guilty of terrorism charges, which to me would seem a foregone conclusion given his willingness to declare allah’s laws against the Laws of Australia all those years ago.

I wasn’t on the jury, so my opinion is only that; an opinion.

In my previous post, I had a quick squiz at what sort of benefits Mrs Benbrika would be getting, since by all reports she was indeed receiving them, and decided it was time to have another look.

Apart from all the money ( $25mil* and counting) spent on the trial, with more to come, there are still the day-to-day living expenses of the poor, impoverished families of Benbrika and co to consider.

I’ll take Mr Benbrika as my example, since I’ve been there before.

All my costings come from the Centrelink website, which is publicly available.

Now, in the time that our mate Abdul has been incarcerated, his wife has given birth to another child. She was, by all accounts, pregnant with this child when he was arrested back in Dec ‘05.

For this example, I’ll make an arbitrary guess at the ages of the children. It’ll have to be arbitrary because a)I’ve not got a clue and b)I have neither the time nor the inclination to go stalking through teh interwebz for this sort of detail. Plus, that could also constitute an invasion of the children’s privacy, and that’s not by bag.

But back to the lesson.

We have a woman on benefits. She has 7 children between the ages of 2 and 16, her husband is in jail.

What does she get under our current system?

Go over to Nilk’s post to read the details of what the Benbrika family is eligible to receive. But, by making an educated guess as to which programs the family is likely to be drawing on, here’s the fortnightly bottom line:
- - - - - - - - -

If this is a bit confusing, here it is again:

$472.80		parenting payment.
$338.10		FTB A (min rate)
$128.80		FTB B
$51.80		large family supplement.
$991.50		total benefits (so far at minimum rate).

Or we can look at it again with the maximum rate applied.

$472.80		parenting payment
$1047.34		FTB A (max rate)
$128.80		FTB B
$51.80		large family supplement
$1700.74		total benefits (so far at max rate)

But wait, as they say in the classics…there’s more…!

Since we know that the seventh child was born whilst Benbrika was in jail, we can have a look at what sort of payments are available to help with that sort of thing.

The Baby Bonus is currently standing at $5000 per child. If you have twins, that means you get $10000. Who wouldn’t get knocked up for that?

The Maternity Immunisation Allowance, which is a bit of a misnomer since you don’t actually have to get your child immunised, is a $243.30 one-off payment when your child is between 18-24 months and is (supposedly) up to date on all their shots.

[…]

So just to sum up, before I fry your brains with more figures, Benbrika’s wife, if she has no income apart from Centrelink, is potentially receiving between $991.50 - $1700.74 a fortnight. TAX FREE

That is between $25,779.00 - $44,219.24 per annum. Again, TAX FREE, and just from Centrelink.

The above figures are in Australian dollars. In Yankee dollars that’s roughly $21,580.60 - $37,017.70 per annum — tax free.

As Nilk says: nice work if you can get it.