27th May, 2005
Almost 10 per cent of Australians - as many as 1.6 million people - are living in poverty, according to a report from the Federal Parliamentary library.

The report, issued this week, found that Tasmania had the highest poverty rate of any state - 12.7 per cent compared to the national rate of 9.3 per cent. It was followed by South Australia (11.1 per cent) and Queensland (9.9 per cent).

Victoria and Western Australia shared the same rate - at 9.1 per cent - followed by the Northern Territory (9 per cent) and New South Wales (8.7 per cent) while the Australian Capital Territory had by far the lowest rate at 6.5 per cent.

Based on 2001 data, the report ranks Australia’s 150 federal electorates from richest to poorest.

It found the Tasmanian Liberal-held seat of Braddon had the highest rate of any in the country at 15.1 per cent while northern Sydney seat of Bradfield in New South Wales, also a Liberal seat, had the lowest at 2.1.

Rural electorates fare worse than city-based ones with the average poverty rate for those in country seats at 11.7 per cent compared with 7.6 per cent for those in the inner cities.

There are also proportionally more children living in poverty than adults - a difference most marked in the Northern Territory where 7.8 per cent of all adults and 11.7 per cent of all doing so.

The report defines someone as living in poverty if they are living in a household which has a disposable income half of that earned by an average couple with two children.

- DAVID ADAMS