ABSTRACT
Overall levels of socio-economic and health disadvantage in regional, rural and remote Australia are consistently higher than those in metropolitan areas, as has been well documented (Alston, 2005; Baxter et al., 2011; Vinson and Rawsthorne, 2015). In an earlier chapter, some of the key indicators of disadvantage in regional, rural and remote locations were discussed. In this chapter, rather than providing further demographic information, we will be detailing the patterns of structural disadvantage described and discussed by the social workers we interviewed. The reason for this is to reflect the ways in which social workers in practice in regional, rural and remote Australia report their experiences and assessments of disadvantage, their responses, and their analysis. It is the intersection of social work practice and the issues, client groups and communities social workers are engaged with that is the focus of our exploration in this chapter. We also wanted to reflect the narratives of workers as they describe the individuals, families, groups and communities who miss out, and the workers’ suggestions for a better support system. Those we interviewed described a broad context of disadvantage, the impact of particular issues and the ways in which structural disadvantage reproduced itself in regional, rural and remote communities to systematically exclude people. Discussion in this chapter both supports existing research in this area (Alston, 2005; Cheers and Taylor, 2005; Green and Gregory, 2004; Hunter, 2007; McGann et al., 2012) and also tracks the experiences of workers as they engage in the dilemmas and challenges of working with structural disadvantage outside an urban context. Anderson (2009) explored the resolve and resilience of mental health workers in the context of climate change and drought in rural communities. She argues that workers engaged constantly within a broad spectrum of practice, from individual support and counselling, to the impacts of government policy and funding changes, to international discourses on climate change. Work at an individual level was experienced as directly connected with structural and environmental issues. We found a similar set of narratives amongst the social workers we interviewed as they worked creatively with those at the margins in regional, rural and remote communities across large-scale structural challenges and their very localised impacts.
