Copyright theage
The scheme, by which the Department of Human Services used “income averaging” obtained from Australian Taxation Office data to automate, impose and garnishee fictitious debts from welfare recipients between 2016 and 2020, is back in the news thanks to the SBS documentary The People vs Robodebt. Journalist Rick Morton’s book Mean Streak: A moral vacuum, a dodgy debt generator and a multi-billion-dollar government shakedown is also on the shortlist for this week’s Prime Minister’s Literary Award. The harrowing evidence attempts to address what Michael Cordell, the producer of the documentary, described as a failure of the scandal to fully capture the public imagination. “Perhaps there’s an empathy deficit for people on welfare,” he said. While the quest for justice remains unfinished and the scheme’s architects and executors are still to be held to account, robo-debt is a zombie scandal. It won’t go away. Last year, more than 1200 complaints forced the new National Anti-Corruption Commission to reverse course and investigate the six names kept secret in Justice Catherine Holmes’ royal commission report. Morrison was the social services minister who started the scheme, declaring himself “the new welfare cop on the beat” in 2015. Carriage for robo-debt was taken over with unconcealed vigour by Christian Porter, Alan Tudge and finally the keystone cop on the beat, Stuart Robert, who was pushed to close it down while Morrison was his party leader and prime minister. In 2020, Morrison offered an apology in conditional language – “I would apologise for any hurt or harm in the way that the government has dealt with that issue” – but it wasn’t until 2023 that the federal government passed a formal apology. After a royal commission, numerous other inquiries and legal cases, the government has offered a record $1.8 billion settlement, which may yet grow as more evidence surfaces in inquiries by the National Anti-Corruption Commission and the Australian Public Service Commission.
