A mobile service centre visiting the Bega Valley Shire to offer access to essential government services including Centrelink, Medicare and child support has been busier than ever, according to the mobile service centre manager Andrew Gregory.
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The 20 tonne truck called the Golden Wattle has specialist staff from the Department of Human Services on board to help with a range of services, including lodging Centrelink claims, Medicare registrations, providing access to online services and offering free hearing checks on board.
Mr Gregory said that staff had been kept busy answering a wide range of enquires.
“At Eden there was a lot of people wanting to get registered on the My Gov website. We were able to get them email accounts and set the accounts up for them,” Mr Gregory said.
“We’re getting a lot of questions around the childcare subsidiaries. We are able to talk about the various entitlements and subsidiaries.
“We also had young people coming in to ask about what happens when they finish school and what help they may be able to get for further education,” Mr Gregory said.
“For example we had a young guy in here who is about to start as an apprentice and who will be on low wages and we were able to get a part youth allowance for him. I have to say I was pretty impressed with this guy,” Mr Gregory said.
“We also had enquiries by young people wanting to come off their parents’ Medicare cards.”
The truck was in Pambula on Friday and is at Merimbula on Monday, July 23 from 9am to 3:30pm, located near the Information Centre, Beach Street.
It will be at Bermagui on Tuesday, July 24 from 9am to 4pm, near Dickinson Park, off Lamont Street and at Wallaga Lake, Wednesday, July 25 from 9am to 3:30pm, near the Land Council Building, Umbarra Road.
The truck offers free hearing tests and information about Department of Veterans’ Affairs programs and support services for veterans and their families is also available.
It is eight years since the truck was in the Pambula, Merimbula area although it had visited Eden and Bombala a year ago.
Mr Gregory said that numbers of people accessing information had doubled on this visit and believed they might have exceeded the number of hearing tests on Friday for any one day of the truck’s operation.
There are two Golden Wattle trucks that travel the country visiting rural and remote areas with three crews interchanging between the trucks.
