Social Inclusion and the Church
Chain Reaction Breakfast, Sydney
+ Cardinal George Pell, Archbishop of Sydney
23 Feb 2010
The idea of social inclusion has been with us for some time and in Australia the last decade has seen a range of initiatives to incorporate it into government policy and programs. In 2002 the South Australian government established a Social Inclusion Unit which reports to the Premier in his capacity as Minister for Social Inclusion. In its seven years of operation the Social Inclusion Unit in South Australia has targeted homelessness, the problem of serious repeat offending by young people previously caught up in the criminal justice system, the reform of mental health, greater investment in Aboriginal health and education, and ways to increase school retention and completion rates by young people at risk. It has been praised by the World Health Organisation as a model for how governments can tackle social inclusion. It is worth mentioning two important elements of its approach. The first is what it calls "joined-up" responses. Because most issues are multi-dimensional-for example, a young person at risk of not finishing school may also have problems with drugs, mental illness or crime-the Unit ensures that different government services are co-ordinated so that all aspects of a problem are addressed, and also seeks the support of the community and business in delivery services. A second important element is the Unit's focus on monitoring and evaluating the implementation of its recommendations. This is consistent with social inclusion initiatives elsewhere, which generally emphasise the importance of an evidence-based approach to ensure that what is being done is effective and delivering what it was intended to deliver.
In other states social inclusion sometimes involves "compacts" between government and non-government or "third sector" organisations-what we used to call the welfare sector. These compacts often come into being on their own account as part of an attempt to clarify the relationship between government and non-government organisations. In New South Wales, where these is some scepticism about the approach taken to social inclusion initiatives in other jurisdictions, the compact operates as a set of agreed principles that should guide co-operation between government and non-government service providers. In contrast to the South Australian situation, the New South Wales compact is not integrated into government. It is does not have a dedicated minister to drive the implementation of the compact across government departments or to bring its priorities into cabinet discussions. A large part of its focus is on ensuring that the independence of NGOs is not compromised by closer partnership with government and the legitimate requirements for full accountability. At the same time, there is also concern about appropriate levels of funding, and the stability of funding for NGOs so that they can continue to work effectively and plan on a longer-term basis.
One element in the New South Wales approach to social disadvantage is the State Plan. The Plan states that "a society can be judged by the way it cares for its most disadvantaged and vulnerable members and creates opportunities for their full participation in economic, social and decision-making processes". Enabling the marginalised in our society to participate is at the centre of social inclusion. The New South Wales State Plan identifies a number of priority areas for attention, including Aboriginal health and education, increased employment and community participation for the disabled, mental health, and better outcomes for children through early intervention, both to address abuse and neglect and to increase learning skills at school entry. Catholic agencies in New South Wales are actively involved in addressing these priority areas and in the dialogue around the state compact. CatholicCare in Sydney, which is the Archdiocese of Sydney's welfare and family services agency, employs 800 staff and volunteers across 25 sites around the archdiocese-which is only one part of the greater Sydney area. It delivers over 100 programs and provides 220,000 occasions of service each year in the areas of ageing, dementia and disability services, support of children, young people and families, and employment training and support.
The approach of Catholic agencies to creating a just and inclusive society focuses on building capacity in disadvantaged communities. We are very happy to work in partnership with businesses committed to corporate social responsibility to help realise this vision. One example is CatholicCare's Refugee Employment Program which helps to provide employment, training and assistance for refugees. The goal is to support their integration into the wider community and to help them work towards better employment opportunities and better economic outcomes. The program helps refugees overcome some complex barriers to social inclusion by organising work experience placements, training programs, interview preparation, and ongoing support once they commence work. The Sydney Archdiocese is currently in discussions with a corporate partner about the possibility of supporting this program by expanding apprenticeship, traineeships and employment programs to specifically target refugees. CatholicCare would assist with additional support by providing mentoring to help them through the working and studying cycle.
The election of the Rudd government in 2007 gave social inclusion a new prominence at the national level. The government appointed the Deputy Prime Minister as Minister for Social Inclusion, established a social inclusion unit in the Department of Prime Minister and Cabinet and appointed an advisory National Social Inclusion Board. It requires all Commonwealth agencies to take social inclusion explicitly into account in preparing policy and designing programs by identifying groups at risk of exclusion, analysing the causes of exclusion and disadvantage, co-ordinating efforts across government and the non-government sectors, and seeking to reduce the factors which increase the risk of disadvantage and strengthen factors which protect against it. Clear implementation plans and monitoring the delivery of services and programs to ensure effectiveness are also required. A further element in the federal government's approach to social inclusion is the development of a national compact between the federal government and the non-government organizations, which will be launched later this year.
The federal government defines social inclusion as the means of ensuring that "people have the resources (skills and assets, including good health), opportunities and capabilities they need" to learn, work, engage with people and local services and have a voice in the decisions that affect them. To achieve these ends the government has placed a strong emphasis on partnerships with non-government service providers, and an integrated and co-ordinated response, particularly to entrenched disadvantage. These partnerships are meant to be collaborative, and so that more effective and simpler access to services and support is available for people, especially when they are dealing with a number of inter-related issues. Welfare and non-government agencies have to meet standards of efficiency, accountability and effectiveness. They have to demonstrate that they work from a strong evidence base, and are willing to re-organise their operations to ensure that the services they are providing are supported by sufficient resources. Funding from government increasingly depends on meeting social inclusion criteria.
Australia's approach to social inclusion follows the approach taken by the Blair government in the United Kingdom in the 1990s. It established a Social Exclusion Unit in 1997, developed a compact with non-government service providers and embedded it in government through the creation of a dedicated ministerial position for the third sector, and developed many of the elements for implementing social inclusion as a policy which Australian governments have also adopted. By different measures the UK approach has recorded some significant successes and it makes good sense for us to see what we can learn and what might work here from new approaches to tackling social disadvantage overseas. One of the enduring uncertainties or tensions in the British approach to social inclusion is the extent to which it exacerbates or diminishes the danger of non-government welfare services, including those founded and run by churches, becoming an extension of government itself. The emphasis on partnership and collaboration is welcome, as is the focus on effectiveness and efficiency. But while there has to be accountability and transparency, especially when taxpayer dollars are involved, it is not clear that the considerable administrative burden imposed on non-government agencies in acquitting these responsibilities has been reduced or streamlined significantly as a consequence of third-sector compacts or the focus on partnership.
The Productivity Commission's report on the contribution of the not-for-profit sector, which was released at the end of January, highlights some of the problems that inhibit non-government service providers from making an even greater contribution to addressing social disadvantage. The report found that the current regulatory framework for the sector "is complex, lacks coherence [and] sufficient transparency, and is costly" to non-government service providers. Harmonising reporting requirements and regulatory frameworks across the various state and federal jurisdictions would be a big help. It also highlights "overly prescriptive requirements [and] increased micro-management" of agencies contracted to government to provide services. Reporting and acquittal requirements vary considerably across different government departments. Contracts tend to be confined to the short-term and are not properly aligned to the time period required to achieve the desired outcomes. Funding of services is often less than the full cost of delivering them, creating substantial wage gaps for the workforce in the sector, which combined with the short-term nature of contracts and funding for positions, makes it very difficult to attract and retain staff, threatening both the sustainability and quality of services. The report's recommendations on some of these problems are a good start to addressing them.
Church agencies contribute to social inclusion in many ways, mainly through the delivery of programs, practical care and support to people who are disadvantaged. Research and policy development are also part of the Catholic contribution. The main body representing Catholic agencies and service providers is Catholic Social Services Australia. It comprises 63 member organisations which between them provide services to over a million Australians each year. In 2007, Catholic Social Services and Jesuit Social Services commissioned Professor Tony Vinson of the University of Sydney to study the extent of social disadvantage in local communities across Australia. His report, Dropping off the Edge, has given a major impetus to social inclusion at the level of government, and the report continues to be a important reference point in comprehending disadvantage in Australia. Professor Vinson used twenty-five economic, social and health indicators and counted the number of times different localities and postcodes were listed among the top five per cent with the worst rankings on each indicator. He found that in every state a small number of communities are massively over-represented in the factors that cause or indicate disadvantage and intergenerational poverty, such as low income, limited computer and internet access, early school leaving, physical and mental disabilities, long-term unemployment, prison admissions and confirmed child maltreatment.
Professor Vinson's research represents a major contribution from the church to understanding the extent and depth of social exclusion in Australia. When you look at the most disadvantaged communities which Vinson identifies, talk of social "exclusion" is no exaggeration. The impact of disadvantage is so profound that it acts as a barrier to people participating in the prosperity and opportunities which we take for granted and which we assume are every Australian's birth right. Among the recommendations of this report are measures to improve outcomes for children in the very first years of life, especially to prevent or address the health, language and behavioural difficulties which often compromise their readiness for school and work powerfully against them completing it. Professor Vinson also highlights the importance of social cohesion-strong levels of trust and interaction with other people and involvement in a local community-in protecting against social exclusion. Trust and reciprocity are interpersonal. It is hard enough to restore them between people when they have been lost, let alone when they are simply not the norm in the area where you grew up. It is clear, even obvious, that social cohesion fosters social inclusion, but how do governments and non-government service providers get people to the first building block of social cohesion, to trust each other?
There are things that can be done, and New South Wales has developed community strengthening programs which seem to have some good effects. Noel Pearson has put his finger on a crucial piece of the puzzle in his vehement rejection of the claim that alcohol and substance abuse in Aboriginal communities is best understood as a symptom of a wider malaise among Aboriginal people, perhaps caused by the injustices of the past and present. Pearson argues that the combination of welfare money, free time (caused by unemployment), greater access to addictive substances and a permissive attitude towards them were the fire starters for the conflagration that has overtaken Aboriginal communities, and he emphasises that as the social chaos grew it was not just the vulnerable who were "sucked into the vortex of dysfunction" but people from relatively stable backgrounds as well. Pearson's words are well chosen. Once it reaches a certain point, social disadvantage and dysfunction become a vortex. They determine the rhythms of life throughout a community and establish norms which perpetuate disadvantage and dysfunction. It is precisely for this reason that some researchers suggest it is much better to grow up in a troubled family in a good neighbourhood-a community with strong social cohesion-than to grow up in a good family in a troubled neighbourhood. When norms in a community have become dysfunctional, the pressures to conform are enormous. This makes it much harder to be different: to work at school, to stay out of petty crime, to stay away from drugs. It is not impossible, of course, but it is more difficult-in some places, even dangerous-to stand out from the crowd.
Australia has largely followed the British lead on social inclusion, and if David Cameron's Tories win this year's election in the UK it will be interesting to see if this pattern continues. I hope it does because the Tories have spent their long winter in opposition productively. In 2004 former Tory leader Iain Duncan-Smith established the Centre for Social Justice, which has become one of the most important sources of new research and policy proposals to address social disadvantage in the UK. The Centre for Social Justice has identified what it calls "the five drivers of social breakdown"-family breakdown, economic dependency, educational failure, addiction and debt-and developed a raft of new initiatives to tackle these issues in a creative, compassionate and practical way, which the Tories will take with them into government (if they win the election). I do not know whether addiction and debt would be in the top five causes of social disadvantage in Australia-they could well be, but this would have to be tested. I have no doubt, however, that family breakdown, economic dependency, and educational failure are among the leading causes of social disadvantage in Australia. The difference is, however, that we do not talk too much about the first one-family breakdown. It is often the missing link in discussions about social inclusion and social cohesion, even though stable, loving two-parent families are a major factor in giving children the best chance of avoiding social exclusion and disadvantage, and one of the key foundations of strong communities. We have learnt about social inclusion from Tony Blair. It will be interesting to see what we might be able to learn from David Cameron if we are serious about taking social inclusion to the next stage.
Whatever of this, and whatever the ultimate fate of the idea of social inclusion, the poor and disadvantaged will always be with us. The Church has been with them since the very first days of its existence in the darkness and squalor of Imperial Rome, and most of us do not realise that concern for the poor is not something that occurs naturally in human society. That most Westerners, even those a long way away from any religious belief, continue to believe that it is important to care for the weak and those in need, is the result of the role Christian belief played in shaping our culture. This debt to Christianity is often unacknowledged, and we need to ensure that the commitment to social justice and social inclusion Christianity has given us is renewed in each generation. It should not be taken for granted, because it is not something that is re-produced automatically. Things could be very different, and become so in a very short time frame historically, reverting to the more general pattern of human history which is to exalt the strong and discard the weak. For this reason you can be sure that the Church and its agencies, will continue to call people to faith in the one true God of love, and to the Gospel which inspires and sustains us in serving the poor, caring for the marginalised, defending their rights, and working to enable everyone to participate freely and fully in our society.
