March 2021

Welcome to our new-look e-newsletter. In this issue, we feature two new studies of a distinctive early learning and parenting program, and another of a micro-enterprise program. We also report on analysis about variations in financial wellbeing and about who receives unemployment payments. And there are COVID-19 Insights about the impacts on low-income women and on 30-year-olds in our Life Chances study.

You can read more about our current work at www.bsl.org.au/research and also browse our policy submissions. 

Please share this Policy and Research Update with your colleagues and encourage them to subscribe.

REPORT: EARLY START ON A POSITIVE LEARNING PATH

A major longitudinal study of the Home Interaction Program for Parents and Youngsters (HIPPY) has shown that parents transformed the home learning environment, and children’s learning trajectories changed. 

Read the report by Julie Connolly and Shelley Mallett, Changing children’s trajectories: results of the HIPPY Longitudinal Study (PDF, 4 MB)

REPORT: PROMOTING PARENTS' INCREASED ECONOMIC PARTICIPATION

By enlisting and supporting parents as tutors, the Home Interaction Program for Parents and Youngsters (HIPPY) creates a transitional labour market that helps these parents develop their goals and improve their job opportunities. Our study shows multiple benefits.

Read the report by Julie Connolly and Roxanne Chaitowitz, Transforming employment aspirations: results of the HIPPY Tutors Study (PDF, 2 MB)

ARTICLE: UNEMPLOYMENT IS NOT LIMITED TO THE UNFORTUNATE FEW

Newstart data shows that many Australians have at some point experienced unemployment, according to a study by researchers from the Australian National University, the Brotherhood of St. Laurence and RMIT University.

Read the article by Peter Whiteford, ‘Our research shows more Australians receive unemployment payments than you think’, The Conversation, 15 December 2020

Delve into the team's full report, Everyone counts: uncovering patterns of Newstart Allowance (PDF, 634 KB)

REPORT: FINANCIAL WELLBEING AMONG AUSTRALIANS BEFORE COVID-19

Our analysis of Roy Morgan Single Source Survey data showed that financial wellbeing in Australia improved in the two years before the COVID-19 crisis, but not everyone experienced the same improvements.

Read the report by Emily Porter, Dina Bowman and Matthew Curry, All in it together? Financial wellbeing before COVID-19?  (PDF, 513 KB)

This project, Financial lives in uncertain times, is supported by ANZ through the ANZ Tony Nicholson Fellowship and the provision under licence of Roy Morgan Single Source Survey data.

REPORT: GRASPING THE CHALLENGES OF MICRO-ENTERPRISE

A micro-enterprise program for women from refugee and migrant backgrounds shows why it is important to tailor financial literacy and business training to participants’ contexts and to support multiple pathways to economic security.

Read Seuwandi Wickramasinghe and Maria Mupanemunda's  Stepping up for business: insights from a pilot program for migrant and refugee women (PDF, 526 KB)

COVID-19 INSIGHTS 

Our COVID-19 Insights highlight how various groups of Australians have been affected, and propose forward-looking policy responses. Read others in the COVID-19 Insights series.

ARTICLE: PRODUCTIVITY RATHER THAN PROTECTION: A SHIFT IN REFUGEE SETTLEMENT POLICY

Policy documents and personal interviews indicate that Australia’s approach to refugee settlement is increasingly focused on imperatives of productivity and self-sufficiency, rather than protection and support.

Access the article  'Now I'm just like anyone else in the community': work, welfare, and community expectations of refugees in Australia by Martina Boese, John van Kooy and Dina Bowman, in the Journal of Refugee Studies, 2020

You may also be interested in the authors’ earlier report Humanitarian migrants, work and economic security in the urban fringe (PDF, 1.6 MB)

​The Brotherhood of St. Laurence (BSL) is a social justice organisation that works to prevent and alleviate poverty across Australia. You are receiving this email as you have previously subscribed to the BSL Research and Policy Centre e-newsletter. To unsubscribe, please click on the link below.