Prerna Mehta took a 20 per cent pay cut to help prevent job losses at her firm, but she was made redundant anyway.
In the heart of Perth’s financial district, West Australians are returning to office buildings after months of quarantine.Prerna Mehta worked as a consultant for a professional services firm but lost her job two weeks ago.
“It’s a bit of a rollercoaster. I’m definitely not someone who wants to slow down at the moment, so I’m actively looking for a new job."Suzanne Worner runs Upbeat Events, an events company that works with local councils to create major street festivals in Perth.“No one is going to commission a 50,000-person street festival for some time. Essentially, our office has been derelict since the day we said 'put down your pens', and it's been a quiet place ever since,” she says.
“I remember it was Friday the 13th of March and it really just hit us that these events can’t go ahead. We basically said to our staff just to stop. A lot of them are artists and we had to tell them 'we won’t have the money to pay for you. This just isn’t going to happen'.” Social support organisations are now warning of a second unemployment wave due to the planned repeal of JobKeeper in September and more businesses realising they can’t survive long-term.
WACOSS says it is concerned that stigma associated with unemployment is preventing people from asking for help.“A lot of them are young families in those new housing development areas. A pile of them are getting JobKeeper now, but they’re using all of that to pay off the mortgage, and they’re having to go to charities to get food relief just to get by,” Mr Twomey says.
Australia Latest News, Australia Headlines
Similar News:You can also read news stories similar to this one that we have collected from other news sources.
WA caps international arrivals to limit COVID-19 cases
Read more »
Queensland joins WA in push for international flight cap amid Melbourne virus spikeState premiers have lobbied the Morrison government to reduce international flights coming into Australia as Melbourne grapples with a coronavirus spike.
Read more »
Community in mourning as investigators land in WA to examine chopper crashAs investigators touched down in Western Australia's Kimberley region, more details have been revealed about what may have caused a helicopter crash that killed a well-known tourism operator and a young girl. 9News
Read more »
WA wants cap on international flights to reduce COVID-19 riskWA Premier Mark McGowan asks Prime Minister Scott Morrison to cap the number of international flights into Perth Airport to slow arrival numbers and reduce the risk of coronavirus in Western Australia.
Read more »
WA wants cap on international flights to reduce COVID-19 riskWA Premier Mark McGowan asks Prime Minister Scott Morrison to cap the number of international flights into Perth Airport to slow arrival numbers and reduce the risk of coronavirus in Western Australia.
Read more »
Students in China heed their government's warnings against studying in Australia – less than half plan to come backA new survey shows that Chinese university students were already rethinking plans to study in Australia before the coronavirus pandemic hit.
Read more »