Single mums slam Macklin comments

SINGLE mothers have reacted angrily at "appalling" and "degrading" comments by Families Minister Jenny Macklin, who said she could survive on the $35 a day Newstart allowance.

Ms Macklin made the comment on Tuesday about the federal government's changes to Newstart, which welfare groups estimate will make some families between $60 to $100 a week worse off.

Corinna Taylor, a 43-year-old Brisbane mother of two, who expects to be moved on to the new system and lose $90 a week, said the comment was "appalling".

"I found it quite degrading," she told AAP on Wednesday.

Ms Taylor said the new arrangements will force her to seek charity help or family loans.

It will also force many single mothers to rort the system, she said.

"But I would challenge anybody to live on $35 a day and not in some way have to rort the system."

The government's changes will put those in different circumstances in the same basket, she said.

"I now will live on the same allowance as my 19-year-old nephew but he rents a room for $120 a week," Ms Taylor said.

Office manager Cate Flaherty, a single mother of two, agrees.

"As a single mother who has always worked part-time and raised polite, considerate children, I feel that I am now being treated as somebody who adds no more value to society than some junkie who sits on the couch all day," she told AAP.

Ms Flaherty says her budget will now be cut by $230 a fortnight, almost double that of a non-working single mother.

"We've actually copped a bigger hit than non-working single mothers, and what's really bothered me is that they're saying it encourages people back to work, but they wouldn't be punishing the ones doing the right thing all along," she said.

"It's made it harder for me to work."

Ms Flaherty said she felt "gutted" by Ms Macklin's comments.

"It makes you feel worthless to society when you're doing such an important job," she said.

"I should be a die-hard Labor voter but I've put a boycott on Labor for the rest of my life."

Terese Edwards, chief executive of the National Council of Single Mothers and Their Children, said Ms Macklin's comments had been greeted with "great dismay and distress" by single mums around the country.

"It has resonated as salt in the wound for these mums who are facing such an uphill battle," she told AAP.

Ms Edwards said she went to a supermarket on Wednesday to check prices and found it would be impossible to make ends meet on $35 a day.

She said if rent cost a single mum $28 a day, plus school bus tickets for two children, cereal for breakfast, cheese sandwiches for lunch, and sausages and vegetables for tea, it would total nearly $54.

That was without fruit, toiletries or cleaning products, not to mention electricity, healthcare, clothes and the rest, Ms Edwards said.

Parramatta single mother-of-two, Luana Barrett, 41, said she would like to see Ms Macklin survive on the Newstart allowance and take care of her eight-year-old daughter, Mikayla, who has attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD).

"She's more than welcome to come to my home, look after my daughter, drive my bodgie car to work and try to make ends meet," Ms Barrett told AAP.

A casual shop assistant, Ms Barrett broke down in tears as she described how her family would try to cope with the cuts.

"I don't think I can afford to send Mikayla to dance class this year.

"It's only $20 a week.... I don't know how I'm going to find that money.

"We suffer mentally (worrying about our finances) but it's the kids who will suffer the most."

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