Today marks two years since the publication of the final report from the Royal Commission into the Robodebt Scheme, which scrutinised the many ways in which Australians were let down by the Government’s use of unlawful methods to “recover” Centrelink debts. More than half a million Australians were affected by this egregious policy failure, with a number of people losing their lives as a result of the financial devastation that was inflicted.
“Robodebt was a crude and cruel mechanism, neither fair nor legal, and it made people feel like criminals,” wrote Commissioner Catherine Holmes in the almost 1000-page report. Yet, two years after the findings were made public, we are still waiting on the Government to commit to meaningful legislative reform.
“While the unlawful Robodebt scheme was a Liberal-era policy failure, the Labor Government has now been in power for three years. Anthony Albanese has previously called the Liberal Party’s failures in this regard a “gross betrayal” of Australian citizens, but a full term in power failing to enact legislative reform also makes this Government culpable of failing to protect its constituency,” says Economic Justice Australia (EJA) CEO Kate Allingham.
“Without legislative reform, Robodebt does not live in the past. People are still suffering as a result of gross inadequacies in the social security system, which the Robodebt Royal Commission Report recommendations laid out a roadmap to fix.”
Instead, in the absence of any Government having yet proven they take these lessons seriously, people who receive social security payments continue to be let down in ways that do long-lasting damage to their financial and emotional security. Just in March this year, it was revealed that an estimated 10,000 people may have had their social security payments wrongly reduced or cancelled as the result of the potentially defective administration of the employment services compliance system.
Separately, a test case was heard in the Federal Court this year regarding a debt that was raised against a person using the unlawful practice of income apportionment, which potentially affected more than two million Australians.
“It seems to have gotten to the point where, instead of having had meaningful reform off the back of Robodebt, Government Departments now have a process to follow whenever these failures occur. We do not need a clean-up checklist, we need reform that ensures people do not get harmed to begin with,” says Ms Allingham.
“Continuing to shirk legislative reform, even as consecutive failures reinforce its necessity, amounts to the Government treating the sizable portion of the population who receive social security payments with contempt.
“The anniversary of the final report from the Royal Commission is a good time for the Government to reflect on its priorities, and whether they want to stay true to the outrage they had when they were in opposition. We certainly haven’t forgotten, and we urge the Government to prove they are worthy of the public’s trust, by making overdue legislative reform a priority of this Parliament.”
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Media contact: Kirsty Sier | 0435 075 085 | kirsty@ejaustralia.org.au