When the 2026/27 State Budget was handed down in May, it delivered several cost-of-living measures intended to help Western Australians manage rising financial pressures. While those initiatives provided some immediate relief, they largely reflected an approach we’ve seen before: short-term support for a long-term problem.

Three months later, we’re not seeing the pressure ease. In many cases, it’s getting worse. More people are struggling to meet basic living costs, and frontline services continue to report growing demand.

Temporary payments and targeted assistance can help people get through a difficult period, but they won’t stop the trend we’re seeing. Until longer-term action addresses the structural factors driving financial hardship, more Western Australians will continue to fall behind.

At the Financial Wellbeing Collective, we see this reality every day through the people and communities we work alongside. The numbers tell a story that short-term relief alone cannot.

Who’s asking for help?

Most of the people we support are still on low incomes or Centrelink payments — that hasn’t changed. But we’re also seeing a growing number of people who wouldn’t fit that picture: double-income households, people with steady jobs who never thought they’d need to call a service like ours. At the same time, overall demand keeps climbing: compared with three years ago (FY22/23), our Emergency Relief and Food Access Service (ERFAS) call volumes have increased by 35%. For a growing number of Western Australians, the cost of living isn’t a crisis moment anymore. It’s just where they live now.

Perth’s rental vacancy rate remains tight at 2.2% as of July 2026, down from 2.4% a year earlier and still below the 2.5-3.5% range considered a balanced rental market. When there’s nowhere to move to and very little room to negotiate, the maths on a household budget stop working, and it doesn’t stay contained to housing. It shows up in health, in family stress, and in every other part of a person’s life.

Where the gap still sits

The services people turn to when they have nowhere else to turn, including ERFAS, the Hardship Utility Grant Scheme (HUGS) and financial counselling, didn’t receive additional funding in this budget, even as demand continued to grow.

ERFAS assessments jumped 36% on the previous financial year to 19,099. HUGS assessments rose 17% to 15,564. Both are now at their highest levels since FY20/21.

These aren’t the signs of a temporary cost-of-living squeeze. They’re evidence of a sustained trend that has been building for years. Continuing to rely on short-term relief measures and funding decisions made one budget at a time won’t reverse it. What’s needed is long-term investment that matches the scale and persistence of the challenge.

What we know actually works

Early intervention isn’t a theory for us; it’s what programs like Energy Ahead and Financial Coaching are built on. 12 partners across WA, working together so someone can be referred seamlessly to the right support instead of bouncing between services. That’s the model and it’s what should be scaled.

A comprehensive strategy is still the answer

Short-term relief measures are necessary but without a long-term plan, we will be having this same conversation after next year’s budget, and the year after that. Australia needs a comprehensive cost-of-living strategy built around four pillars:

• Support people earlier, before debt spirals or housing is lost. Extend the rent relief program, offer financial literacy workshops, boost funding for financial counselling, and invest in financial coaching programs that help people build lasting money skills.
• Integrate financial counselling with housing, health and family and domestic violence services. Financial stress rarely arrives alone. When support is embedded in the services people are already accessing, they get help at the moment they need it most.
• Use shared data to identify and act on risk sooner. Stronger collaboration between community organisations and government can surface early warning signs and drive more innovative, targeted responses to the root causes of hardship.
• Provide long-term, sustainable funding for frontline services. Piecemeal funding cycles make it impossible to plan, retain staff, or scale what works. Sustainable investment is the foundation everything else is built on.

The evidence backs this up

This isn’t just what we’re seeing on the ground. A major national report released this year, funded by the Ecstra Foundation and led by RMIT researchers, found that financial wellbeing is shaped far more by people’s circumstances and life events than by individual choices or money habits. It also found that one-off support fades quickly – real change needs sustained, reinforced investment, not a single intervention. The report’s own call is for a coordinated, long-term national financial wellbeing strategy. That’s precisely the shift WA needs too, and the models already exist here to build it.

The window isn’t closed

The budget didn’t go far enough, but that doesn’t mean the conversation is over. The evidence is there. The need is only getting more urgent. And the models that work are already running in WA communities right now.

We’re ready to help build something that reaches people before they hit crisis point, not after.

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