The
Sydney Morning Herald,
4 June 2022:
Labor
wants to end the “digital workhouse” approach to people trying to
get government payments, with new minister Bill Shorten planning to
turn using myGov from an often-frustrating experience into a seamless
one.
Shorten
is taking briefings on his new government services portfolio but
wants to get moving immediately on a user service audit of myGov, the
online entry portal into services such as Centrelink, Medicare and
the Australian Taxation Office.
His
ultimate aim is to make it “a much more seamless exercise” that
doesn’t force people to spend hours of their own time applying for
payments or updating details, the new minister said in an exclusive
interview.
“They’ve
created digital workhouses, basically. You know, workhouses were a
19th century place where the kind-hearted burghers of Victorian
England and Australia said, ‘Well, if we’ve got to pay you for
three meals a day, you can go and work in a workhouse,’” he said.
“And
I think that we’ve used, in some cases, digital technology to
create two classes of Australians.
“We
haven’t privatised the service. We just privatise your time. You
spend hours on it. I’m amazed there’s not more rage out
there.”…..
Services
Australia is effectively the delivery shop for a huge range of other
portfolio areas, administering payments for everything from childcare
subsidies and Medicare rebates to disaster relief and paid parental
leave, along with the more traditional welfare payments such as
pensions and JobSeeker…..
However,
it has come under pressure in recent years for increasingly forcing
people online to make those claims, with nearly 30 Centrelink or
Services Australia shopfronts closing around the country, leaving 318
dedicated outlets. Shorten has previously said people seeking support
and services must have the option to speak with real people, not
merely be pushed onto a website or sit in an automated phone queue.
Another
top priority for Shorten in his new role is launching a royal
commission into robodebt as soon as possible…...
As
new Minister for the National Disability Insurance Scheme Bill
Shorten is looking to reform those elements of the scheme which are
shortchanging people with disabilities
Brisbane
Times, 3
June 2022:
Labor
has vowed to crack down on providers overcharging for services
claimed on the National Disability Insurance Scheme and to clear the
backlog of thousands of legal appeals for funding, while delivering
COVID-19 booster shots to people with disabilities.
NDIS
Minister Bill Shorten said he was disturbed by the "twin pricing
system" for services to people with disabilities and says
restoring trust between scheme participants and senior bureaucrats
was vital.
The
National Disability Insurance Agency has come under fire for cutting
the funding packages of disabled people as it faces rising costs.
Shorten said it was an obscenity that there were 5000 appeals on NDIS
packages before the Administrative Appeals Tribunal…..
"Under
the last regime, we're spending more money on the process of fighting
people for amounts which are less than the amount we're spending in
the fight. How did we end up in that parallel universe?"
The
number of appeals on NDIA decisions that make it to the AAT has more
than doubled over the past year and legal costs are running at tens
of millions of dollars.
The
NDIS will cost almost $36 billion in 2022-23 and costs are forecast
to keep increasing.
Shorten
acknowledged the need to tackle the pricing of services charged to
NDIS packages, saying it seemed to be a "black box" where
providers come up with fees but "you don't know the magic of how
they're coming to it".
"I'm
disturbed at the twin-rate system or the dual system where if you
don't have a package, you pay X dollars, if you do have an NDIS
package, you get charged X plus $100. The scheme can't
cross-subsidise everyone else," he said.
Making
sure people with disabilities - both NDIS participants and those on
disability support pensions - have quick access to their third and
fourth COVID boosters is also a priority for the new minister…..
Shorten's
longer-term goals include working with the states to improve support
in schools, community mental health services, housing and bed block
in hospitals as a way of tamping down NDIS costs.
But
he said he was wary of any approach to the rising NDIS costs that
suggested people with disabilities were the problem.
"I
think there's been a level of incompetence and wastage. I think
there's a breakdown in trust," Shorten said.
