Christians have had a mixed reaction to the Abbott Government’s first budget overnight, which slashed foreign aid, health and education spending but bolstered the Coalition’s commitment to funding school chaplains.

Family First Senator-elect Bob Day said overall he thinks the Government is “on the right track” with the Budget, “especially with getting rid of the duplication of Federal and State responsibilities in education and health.”

However, Day says that he is disappointed the Coalition is working around the edge of fundamental reforms, especially of the tax system.

Asked how he would score the Budget out of ten, he told Eternity he would give the Government a seven.

That’s unlikely to be anywhere near the score given from many high profile Christian groups and charities, who have bemoaned last night’s Budget as weighting the majority of savings measures to those who can least afford it.

Foreign Aid

One of the biggest losers in this year’s budget is foreign aid, with $7.8 billion stripped from the foreign aid budget over five years, accounting for almost a third of all spending cuts.

““It is disheartening to see that the poorest people in the world will foot the bill for Australia’s fiscal repairs,” CEO of World Vision Tim Costello says in a statement.

Christian global aid advocacy group Micah Challenge says the cuts are taking Australia in the wrong direction.

“We are a generous nation, and our aid program has done enormous good in our region and beyond,” says Micah Challenge coordinator Ben Thurley.

The Government has stepped back from its commitment to reach 0.5 per cent of Gross Domestic Income to go to foreign aid. “The aim was 50c in every $100 of spending. We reached 35c two years ago, but it will fall this year to 32c and with the cuts applied, it’ll fall to 29c three years from now,” says Thurley.

The Australian Christian Lobby says the foreign aid cuts and the decoupling of Australia’s giving to the global poor from Gross National Income is a broken promise, while Thurley says there’s a widespread perception that because there is no domestic constituency directly affected by cuts to overseas aid, it can be done at relatively little political cost.

“Aid is not a luxury expenditure, something we do when we can afford it. It’s an investment in the wellbeing, prosperity and security for vulnerable countries in our region and beyond, for whom poverty is not just something that exists on the margins but as a deep, disturbing reality for millions of people.”

Welfare and Disability

Meanwhile, welfare groups are disappointed with changes to welfare payment schemes suggesting the budget leaves the heavy lifting disproportionately to the people who can least afford to do it.

Lin Hatfield Dodds from UnitingCare says the government is clawing back $12 billion in a combination of changes to payment in indexation and arrangements, from families, pensioners, older Australians and young people, while wealthy Australians contribute only a quarter of that amount ($3 billion), and Australian business less than a billion ($845 million). “It’s a question of what’s fair and reasonable,” she says.

However, Hatfield Dodds commended the Government for its confirmation of the roll out schedule of the National Disability Insurance Scheme, which will not be delayed due to the tightening budget.

Mission Australia’s CEO Catherine Yeomans is concerned particularly for young people in this budget, saying that while the budget forecasts joblessness to rise, there is no investment in helping young people make the transition from education to employment. “With youth unemployment already twice the national average, and as high as 20 per cent in some areas, this failure to invest in young job seekers is short-sighted.”

Education and Health

While honouring its education commitment to the first four years of funding reform promised by the previous Labor Government, the budget signals a policy shift away from Commonwealth responsibility for education and health, with the intention to significantly reduce Commonwealth funding in these areas.

“It is a clear challenge to the states- that to maintain the effort in public education and health they will need to find new money to replace the reducing Commonwealth contribution,” says Christian Schools Australia CEO Stephen O’Doherty.

Similarly Stephen Judd, head of Christian aged services organisation HammondCare, says the states will be “scrambling and finding it hard in the health sector” to maintain services. “There will be no choice but to increase indirect taxation via the GST.”

O’Doherty says the Government is “redrawing battle lines between government and non-government schools” in its first budget, and suggested a transfer of non-government school funding to the states could be “disastrous for independent schools” and will mean a renewed argument over funding for state and non-state schools.

“Despite four years of relative certainty as to schools funding, the ideological battle looks set to continue,” he says.

The National School Chaplaincy Program, however, has been bolstered with confirmation of federal funding to the tune of $245 million over five years.

This is despite uncertainty surrounding the future of the program as a result of a High Court challenge to the Government’s funding arrangements. Proceedings for the case wrapped up last week, and a decision is expected to take months. But the continued federal funding from the Commonwealth Budget will allow schools to employ a chaplain for up to two days a week (through annual grants of $20,000 per chaplain), with the potential to support 2,900 schools.

“We understand that it is a tight budget, so the continuation of funds is confirmation that the government understands the value of the chaplaincy program,” said Scripture Union Queensland.