The making of rural and regional Australia: An introduction

This chapter provides an overview of the Commonwealth welfare and employment policies and programmes that have influenced rural and regional post-war Australia in the pursuit of full employment and social security. The deterioration of farm income resulted in calls for farmers' eligibility for the unemployment benefit to be reviewed, and in 1976 provisions were introduced that enabled producers to be classified as unemployed if seeking full-time work off the farm. In 1992, the welfare component of the Rural Adjustment Scheme was shifted into the Farm Household Support Scheme, with the adjustment policy being used to address extreme events such as drought and 'exceptional circumstances'. Numerous programmes were introduced to address the growing phenomenon of rural and regional unemployment. Policy solutions took on an additional spatial focus in the attempt to address growing inequalities often clustered in communities of multiple disadvantages.