No Jab, No Pay


No Jab No Pay is an Australian policy initiative which withholds three state payments – Child Care Benefit, the Child Care Rebate and, as of 2018, the Family Tax Benefit Part A end of year supplement – for parents of children under 20 years of age who are not fully immunised or on a recognised catch-up schedule, and imposes fines on childcare centres that admit unvaccinated children.
The policies grew out of a grassroots campaign championed by News Limited, in 2013. It was boosted by parent activists representing children who had died of preventable disease, notably the families of Riley Hughes and Dana McCaffery, infants who died of pertussis, leading to a backlash of harassment and trolling from anti-vaccination activists. Far-right politician Pauline Hanson also opposed the policy, though she later walked this back and clarified that she supports vaccination. The campaign was a response to a rise in "conscientious objections", which had reached record levels particularly in the Sunshine Coast area of Queensland, where early attempts to pass legislation were knocked back in 2014. Efforts to circumvent the legislation included the founding of fake religions, of which the best known, the "Church of Conscious Living", was promoted by anti-vaccine group the Australian Vaccination Network, and by anti-vaccination activist Stephanie Messenger.
No Jab No Pay was introduced in 2015, and expanded in July 2018. By July 2016, 148,000 children who had not previously been fully immunised, were meeting the new requirements.
No Jab No Play was introduced at the state level, in New South Wales, Queensland and Victoria in 2017, leading to an immediate though small rise in immunisation rates, with Western Australia, which has some of the lowest vaccination rates in the country, following in December 2018.