Energy Minister Encourages Remote Community Residents to Work From Home Despite Most Not Having Jobs or Internet

ALICE SPRINGS – Federal Energy Minister Chris Bowen has encouraged Australians to consider working from home during the fuel crisis in what community leaders have described as the most out-of-touch suggestion since someone asked why mob don’t just buy an EV.

Diesel prices in remote Northern Territory and Western Australian communities have hit $4 a litre. In some WA desert towns a kilogram of instant coffee now costs more than $100. Meanwhile the Remote Area Allowance – a federal subsidy for people living in remote Australia – hasn’t been increased in over 25 years.

“The subsidy helps but fuel prices will quickly erode those savings” a representative from the Central Land Council said. “We’re talking about communities already on the poverty line making a choice between power and food.”

A senior public servant from the Department of Regional Everything said the government was “acutely aware of cost of living pressures in remote Australia” and had recently formed a working group to examine the feasibility of a future taskforce.

“Obviously we’re looking at this very closely” the spokesperson said. “And by closely we mean from Canberra.”

Community leaders have called for an immediate increase to the Remote Area Allowance noting that its last adjustment was in 2001. They also questioned how a community with limited phone reception and no office was expected to implement the Minister’s work-from-home advice.

At press time a man in Djarindjin was reportedly trying to join a Zoom call from a tractor.

Forty-degree heat. No power. No water… but at least the subsidy’s been thoroughly examined.