Sophie Conlon
The City of Mount Gambier will write to the federal Minister for Families and Social Services Amanda Rishworth to seek an urgent review into processing delays relating to the Age Pension.
Councillor Max Bruins, who works as a financial planner, brought the motion to council at the October meeting and said he was at his wits end when it came to waiting for applications to go through.
“This is one of those issues where you get to you wits end and you don’t know what to do,” he said.
“So I thought in addition to what I’ve already done what I’ve already done I will move a motion here and see if we can get some traction.”
The correspondence will also be sent to Member for Barker Tony Pasin, who Cr Bruins said he had reached out to privately regarding the issue.
“The more force we can get behind it the better,” he said.
Cr Bruins said there was currently staff shortages at Centrelink, causing processing delays which was ultimately putting strain on Mount Gambier/ Berrin’s elderly residents
“There is quite number of people in the community that are turning the age pension age and applying for benefits which they are well and truly entitled to to assist with the cost of living, but at the moment the processing for some of those has blown out to six months,” he said.
“I have had applications in for people since April that still haven’t been looked at, they’re just sitting there in the queue, waiting to be processed.
