WELFARE cuts to single parents introduced this year have coincided with an increase in shoplifting and petrol theft offences among women in two states and the ACT, police statistics show.
Welfare advocates have linked the rise to changes to the parenting payment on January 1 when about 60,000 single parents, mostly women, were moved onto the unemployment payment Newstart allowance.
The change means some now receive between $60 to $100 less a week than before.
As well, many single mothers have used up their access to emergency assistance from charities.
"Desperate times just leads to really unusual and desperate responses," National Council of Single Mothers head Terese Edwards told AAP on Friday.
"Watching your child go hungry is heartbreaking."
The crime statistics for Queensland, Tasmania and the ACT for the first couple of months of 2013 can be broken down by age and gender.
But it's not possible to ascertain whether offenders had been affected by welfare cuts.
In Queensland, 71 women aged 25-29 were charged with shoplifting in January, up from 47 last year. There was also a modest increase in shop lifting in older age groups.
In Tasmania, there were 44 shop lifting offences committed by women aged 25-34 in January and February, up from 23 cases, and 42 offences by woman aged 35-44, up from 22.
There were also 33 cases of shop lifting committed by Tasmanian women aged 20-24, up from 16.
In the ACT, there were 12 cases of shop lifting by woman aged 25-34 years between January and March, up from seven.
There were six cases of shop lifting by woman aged over 45 in the ACT between January and March this year compared to two for the same period in 2012.
There were also two cases of petrol drive offs in the ACT committed by woman aged 18-24 and two cases by woman aged 35-44 between, compared to zero last year.
St Vincent De Paul chief executive officer John Falzon said the charity had helped several single mothers who had resorted to petty crime out of desperation.
"Sadly this comes as no surprise whatsoever," he told AAP.
"Where people have been plunged more deeply into poverty they will do whatever is necessary to put food on the table for their children."
Crime statistics were unavailable for other states and territories.
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