Daniel Hart was in the middle of walking the length of Australia when one day, he took a wrong turn and ended up enduring "the worst night" of his life.

Mr Hart has been walking 4,500 kilometres to Cape York in Far North Queensland to raise awareness of what he says is a need for a universal basic income (UBI).

Since April 2, when he started at Wilsons Promontory in Victoria, he's been clocking up an average of 25 kilometres a day in a $5 pair of sandals, a hat made from a pizza box and a few basic items stuffed into a small backpack.

On most nights, he has chosen to sleep wherever he can lay his head, mostly in football stands or on ovals.

That's until one night recently, when he made a very different choice.

'I really hate going backwards'

On day 53 of his walk, Mr Hart's trail took him onto the coast track which winds through the Royal National Park, 60 kilometres south of Sydney. 

He soon realised he had gone the wrong way.

'I knew I was on the wrong track but I really hate going backwards,' Mr Hart said.

About three hours in, rock-hopping beneath the cliffs, he got to a point where he thought he might have to get his feet wet but "as long as a massive wave didn't come", he thought he would be OK.

But the massive wave did come, he said.

Mr Hart said he was swept out into the water, "smashing into the rocks, rag-dolled and dragged back out".

He eventually came to rest on a rock, having lost all his gear in the sea, including shoes, backpack and phone. 

Mr Hart tried to find his way out, but at sunset decided it was too risky to continue, and sheltered in a cliff-side cave.

After a gruelling night, Mr Hart spent a few hours trying to climb out.

He then captured the attention of people walking nearby and was winched to safety by emergency services. 

Arriving at Sutherland Hospital in Sydney with just the shirt on his back, Mr Hart was physically healthy but had no phone, money, ID or place to spend the night.

But thanks to the help of people following his walk on social media, he was able to get back on his feet again and return to his walk.

Hoping to provide income to all

The goal of Mr Hart's walk is to encourage people to consider a basic income for all Australians.

He described it as regular, unconditional payments of about $500 per week to cover an individual's basic needs.

It is something he believes could be possible by "taxing corporations correctly".

"Right now, they're taxed legally, but not ethically, in my opinion," he said.

He says he hopes by hearing his story, people will seek out more information, find out what it is, and make up their own minds about it.

Mr Hart says he first had the idea for the walk a couple of months after the free AI system ChatGPT emerged.

He said it made him start to seriously fear for people's jobs, including his own.

"That was a bit of a wake-up call for a lot of people," he said.

"I can certainly see that it's going to take my job within the next six to 12 months."

Mr Hart is far from the first person to promote the idea of a basic income.

Professor Geoffrey Hinton, the computer scientist regarded as the "godfather of AI", has said that a benefits reform, like a universal basic income that pays fixed amounts of cash to every adult citizen, might be needed because he was "very worried about AI taking lots of mundane jobs".

But opinions vary, with some saying they believe people will adapt as AI becomes more prevalent, and new jobs will be created.

Mr Hart admitted he might sound crazy and also idealistic.

"A bit of both," he said.

"I think people who sort of understand it know how good it would be for people.

"There is a lot of pushback, though. A lot of people mention the dole, tell me to get a job and call me a communist.

"But it's kind of my job to try and educate people."