Zoë Wundenberg | Public figure

Zoë Wundenberg

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• Public figure
• Career counsellor
• Tutor/teacher
• Writer

25.01.2022 You ever read something and feel sick to your stomach at the absolute injustice of it, knowing that there is nothing that you can do about it? Look up the exit application for the cashless welfare card. Look at the criteria for exemption. Then look at the reports of what people trying to live on the disgusting card experience. Then come back and tell me that they aren’t first creating the problem and then punishing it. ... Because I sure as hell cannot see wtf this card is meant to do but increase the poverty gap and return our country to society highly defined by class and privilege. I feel sick. Column incoming.

20.01.2022 My column this week: yes this is a health crisis, but with economic fallout that cannot be (and shouldn't be) ignored.

17.01.2022 I have recently learned that of over 630 applications to exit the Cashless Welfare Card received since July, not ONE has been processed. In seven months. Not one. ... We are better than this. My column this week:

13.01.2022 This week’s article isn’t actually about toilet paper. Nor is it about Coronavirus. Not really. It’s about how we seem to have lost sight of what we used to be, and more importantly, what we used to be to each other. We’ve always been known as the nation who are ‘young and free’, but we appear to have crashed headfirst into early onset mid life crisis and it’s not pretty.

10.01.2022 My column this week: goals, blips and mortality.

10.01.2022 REGIONAL ANGER OVER SYDNEY POOL GRANT Indigo Shire Mayor Jenny O'Connor says the Federal Government needs to show more respect for regional Australia ...after a harbourside pool in Sydney received a 10 million dollar sports grant. The North Sydney Olympic Pool received the money under the Female Facilities and Water Safety Stream, which was meant to benefit rural and regional communities. Councillor O'Connor says the five pools in Indigo Shire are in urgent need of repair. Read more here: https://ab.co/388u8R3

09.01.2022 The University of Queensland's report shows that most people on the #CashlessDebitCard don't have a problem with budgeting, they just don't have enough money to... cover basic expenses. People forced to survive below the poverty line don't need to be lectured by the Government on how to manage their money.

08.01.2022 My column this week: welfare payments are not about helping vulnerable people, they are about helping the economy.

07.01.2022 We aren’t better than this. This is who we are. Time to look in the mirror and see how we’ve changed over the years. Those morons who keep going to the beach even under social distancing restrictions? Yep, that’s Australian. Those people refusing hand sanitizer and having their temp taken before entering the doctors or pharmacist? Yep, that’s Australian too. ... Believing that commercial renters should just pull money out of their asses to pay their rent even though their business are closed because of Coronavirus, because ‘what about me?’ Very Australian. Most of all, no really, MOST of all, those people suddenly being thrust into the ‘dole queue’ through ‘no fault of their own’ being genuinely pissed off about people in the same boat as them (only who have been there for longer) also getting the supplement when ‘their income hasn’t been affected’ are quite possibly the most Australian of us all. It doesn't even impact you. It’s just malice. Giving the supplement to existing welfare recipients as well doesn’t affect the amount that you receive. It has nothing to do with you. But STILL you have to ‘make a stand’ and harp on about how you aren’t the same as them. How you aren’t one of ‘them’ - somehow the misfortune you’ve experienced is more deserving that what has befallen ‘them.’ Privileged, entitled, judgmental (and yes I’m judging the living shit out of you - I’m Australian too) bullshit social classism at its level best. ***Remember all those comments I made about three months ago about how we should be kinder to people struggling on welfare because we are all one crisis away from Centrelink? Remember how you laughed at me and said ‘we’ve worked hard all our lives and have investment properties and jobs. That’ll never happen to me’?? How’s your entitlement feeling now, Karen??*** This is modern Australia. And we should ALL be ashamed of ourselves. https://www.canberratimes.com.au//coronavirus-job-losses/

07.01.2022 My column this week - it’s okay not to be okay. Are YOU okay?

05.01.2022 635 people have applied to get off the cashless debit card since July and not one application has been processed. Not good enough.

05.01.2022 This is so hard. It's hard because the damage this causes has faces. Families. I honestly don't know what I'd do if I was in government right now. I'm not afraid to state publicly that I don't envy our representatives their role right now. The cost of the support is an expense that will be shared by us all in years (and years) to come as the government seeks to recoup the devastating economic fallout of this pandemic. BUT... none of us should be left behind. I think this ne...eds to be considered a human cost that just cannot be hidden in a budgetary footnote. My column this week was about the economic strain of this crisis, so clearly I understand that there is a cost to be borne here - every dollar given out right now will need to be recouped later on. But at the same time, what is the cost of NOT extending this payment for casual workers? In my humble (if annoyingly persistent) opinion, the cost of NOT supporting our people is way higher than the financial burden of making sure we all have bread on our table. What is a government for if not to make sure that no one is left behind? After all, the measure of a nation is in the way it treats its vulnerable citizens.

02.01.2022 My column- Day 1: COVID-19 Lockdown https://www.canberratimes.com.au//coronavirus-lockdown-i/