First published in the Sydney Morning Herald

A little while ago Rachel Willika's washing machine broke down. That was followed quickly by the refrigerator. Rachel and her two daughters worked out that if they split their various bills between them they could save up and buy the new washing machine the family needed. They would worry about the fridge later.

Then came the real problem.

Rachel Willika is a Jawoyn woman who lives in the tiny community of Eva Valley in the Northern Territory.

Because of this Rachel's money is not her own to spend; her welfare payments have been quarantined by the Federal Government as part of the radical intervention into the lives of the Territory's Aborigines.

When Rachel's daughter asked Centrelink if she could spend her money on a new washing machine the welfare agency first said yes, but then changed its mind.

What Rachel told her friend Claire Smith - a member of Women for Wik, an organisation monitoring the intervention - earlier this week was a statement of the obvious. "We can't wash clothes now. All our clothes, kids' clothes, are piled up ... The kids can't go to school because the clothes are not washed," Rachel said.

"Everything's stopped now. How would you feel? They are the main things you need to run a house properly."

Welfare quarantining applies to all indigenous people living in one of a list of remote communities and towns across the Territory. It means at least half of their government payments are managed on their behalf by Centrelink.

Rent, medical expenses and utility bills are paid and a set amount of money is held at the local store for people to use only on food and non-alcoholic drinks.

Regardless of whether the person is suspected of child neglect or has asked for help with managing their money, their payments are spent for them.

People's normal right of appeal to the Social Security Appeals Tribunal has also been abolished because, the Howard government argued, the situation was so dire there was no time for the process.

The Rudd Government is continuing with this part of the Territory intervention and will also go ahead with plans to give child protection officers the power to recommend withholding government payments from all parents suspected of child neglect or abuse.

The idea is that children should not have to suffer lack of food or a trip to the doctor or worry about the electricity being cut off because their parents have mismanaged their money.

Welfare quarantining outside the Territory is starting in Western Australia's Kimberley region and Queensland's Cape York. In those areas it will proceed on a case-by-case basis and only after parents have been warned.

People can also volunteer for the system, as they have been able to anywhere in Australia for some time.

The argument for the near-blanket application of the policy in the Northern Territory is that taking people's money away from them saves them from "humbugging", where family members feel unable to say no to requests for money from relatives who might want to use it for drugs or alcohol.

But lawyers who have visited the Territory to monitor the intervention have seen many problems with the one-size-fits-all approach. People who do not live in one of the communities listed for welfare quarantining have been signed up by Centrelink because they happened to be visiting one day.

In some cases they should not be part of the system at all; in others, people have been given a food account at a shop that is not in their home town. Because the shops are not linked they cannot access their food money in another location.

Some who worked out what was happening were able to get Centrelink to reverse their decisions. Others were helped by visiting lawyers.

But what about the rest?

Information about welfare can be baffling for people with a good education let alone those without those skills.

The National Welfare Rights Network and the National Association of Community Legal Centres have submitted a proposal to the Attorney-General's Department asking that officers be sent to communities to make sure people's rights are explained to them and protected.

In the meantime families like those of Rachel Willika find themselves caught up in the latest government strategy to tackle indigenous disadvantage.

Saving for a new appliance might seem novel to many people in this era of easy credit, but that's the way the Willikas wanted to do it. Until Centrelink, at the government's behest, decided otherwise.