Single parents forced to move interstate after Labor's reforms to Parenting Payment system Sole parent Jitana Lyall - with her children Leon and Sienna - had to move to Batemans Bay because she couldn't live in Melbourne under existing parenting payments. MORE than 63,000 single parents have been stung by the government's reforms to the Parenting Payment system - forcing some mothers to move interstate to a bid to squeeze more value out of their payments. The changes were designed to save $685 million over four years, announced as part of last year's budget but for mothers like Jitana Lyall, 34, the cutbacks meant relocating her family from Melbourne to New South Wales. The community services worker, who worked in an English migrant centre in Melbourne, moved her children, Leon, 9, and Sienna, 8, to Batemans Bay on the NSW south coast in an attempt to reduce the family's living expenses. She now lives in a share house with two other mums and three other children in a similar situation. I couldn't get any full-time work, so the only option was to quit my job and move rural. I knew someone up here and they said accommodation was fairly cheap, and that maybe it would be possible to survive on Newstart," said Ms Lyall. The problem is I had to quit a job that I liked because I was put on Newstart. That extra little bit of money being on the Parenting Payment would have meant that I would have kept that job. I had to quit and move to an area of low employment. From January 1, 2013, single parents were no longer eligible for Parenting Payment when their youngest child turned eight, compared with 16 under the previous arrangement. This group was transitioned to Newstart, for which the maximum fortnightly payment was almost $150 less and imposes higher reductions for income. The changes have come as the rate of lone parent child poverty jumped 15 per cent since 2001, according to the recent Household, Income and Labour Dynamics in Australia (HILDA) Survey. Around one in four children living with a single parent are subjected to poverty, compared with just one in 13 children in two-parent homes. And the areas hardest hit are almost exclusively electorates controlled by Labor, including marginal seats in Fowler, Richmond and Dobell in New South Wales and the vacated Lalor electorate in Melbourne. The data, released this week by the Department of Education, Employment and Workplace Relations, provides political motivation for the Labor Government to consider reversing the cuts in a bit to sandbag Labor seats. A spokesperson for the Department of Education, Employment and Workplace Relations confirmed that the Government is still reviewing support payments for single parents. The Government has heard the concerns of the community on the impact of this change on single parent income support recipients and is considering options to balance the financial support available to single parents with incentives and support to gain employment. The new data shows the effect of policy changes made under the Gillard Government, which came into effect this year. Eleven of the 13 electorates which had the greatest reductions in Single Parenting Payment recipients and 10 of the 12 electorates which had the greatest increases in Newstart recipients - are Labor seats. Kathy Lee, 54, from Queenstown near Port Adelaide, was a founder of the national Single Parents Action Group, formed late last year in response to the changes. The reduction in payments has squeezed the weekly budget of her and her 15-year-old,vision-impaired son even tighter. I have to spend $500 to $600 every 12 months on glasses for him, but I haven't done that this year. I just do not have the money," Ms Lee said. Last year then Human Services Minister Kim Carr ordered Centrelink to contact all partnered and single parenting payment recipients who would be affected by the change to help transition them to the most favourable arrangements. This week the Department of Education, Employment and Workplace Relations confirmed that they had contacted 76,479 by either letter or phone, even though the Department's own figures showed only 73,174 parents were affected by the change. The Coalition has adopted a position focused on getting single parents back into work. "We are committed to managing the existing employment service networks to recognise the unique circumstances of single parent jobseekers and provide them with the help they need to make the transition to the workforce as quickly as possible," said Sussan Ley, shadow minister for employment participation. The Greens believe Labor's commitment to reviewing single parents payments is hollow. "Since his return Mr Rudd has made some vague comments about helping those single parents affected in January, but there has been no concrete commitment," said Western Australian Senator Rachel Siewert. Labor strongly opposed (the Coalition's) Welfare to Work (reforms) back in 2005, but took those cuts even further in January, all for the sake of a now-defunct budget surplus. Ms Lee agrees that single parents like her need specific policies that factor in how single parent jobseekers are different to other groups. "We've got to look for x amount of jobs per week, we've got to go to job network agencies, we've got to go to Centrelink appointments which does not take into account our children," she said. I'm lucky because my son's a teenager. Someone with little ones at school? Nine o'clock appointments? You can't get to them. Ms Lyall believes the Newstart payment simply cannot adequately support parents. It's the inappropriate payment for single parents. It doesn't take into account those extra parenting barriers," she said. Data for the December 2012 quarter showed there were 316,306 Single Parenting Payment and 574,500 Newstart recipients. March 2013 data revealed the effect of the recent changes, with 253,746 Single Parenting Payment recipients and 646,414 Newstart recipients. According to 2011 ABS Census data, there are approximately 600,000 one parent families with dependent children in Australia.