SUBJECT: Robodebt Royal Commission

BILL SHORTEN, MINISTER FOR GOVERNMENT SERVICES: Good morning, everybody. I'm here in the Pullman Hotel in Brisbane. On the morning of the opening of the Robodebt Royal Commission, which starts in half an hour. The Robodebt Royal Commission will be chaired by her honour Justice Catherine Holmes. It's to investigate and look into all of the matters surrounding the Robodebt scandal. I'm here today with two incredibly strong women who would give anything not to have to be here today. They're going to talk briefly about their stories in a moment. 

Kath Madgwick whose son took his own life, and it was during the time when he was being chased by the then government for debts they alleged that he owed them. 

I've also got Jennifer Miller here, her son Rhys, who also took his own life and also was in dispute with the government about a debt that they were chasing. 

Before we hear from these two very strong ladies, I just want to make this point. The Robodebt Royal Commission is about finding out why Australia's greatest failure of public administration and social security occurred. Robodebt went from about July 2015 to November 2019. It was overseen by successive Morrison government ministers. It was a scheme which was said it was targeted at getting Centrelink cheats to pay what they owed. The truth of the matter is the scheme was unlawful. It didn't have legal justification. It reversed the onus of proof. It said that once a machine, an algorithm, a faulty algorithm had asserted that a debt was owed, then the onus was reversed and the citizen had to prove why the government was wrong.

These were David and Goliath struggles, but for four and a half years, successive individuals, advocates, strong family members. The Labor opposition and others said the scheme was out of control. It was only with the advent of a class action and court cases that eventually the Morrison government was forced to cancel the scheme. But four and a half years, despite the warnings, despite the hardship, despite the trauma, the Robodebt scheme was relentlessly implemented by the Morrison Government. So this Royal Commission is to find out how could there have been such a massive failure of public administration? How could the Government of Australia unlawfully raise debts against nearly 400,000 of her fellow Australian citizens, alleging $1.7 billion was owed to the Commonwealth? The scheme was unlawful. The warning signs were ignored. Trauma occurred. We hope the Royal Commission will get to the bottom of why this happened and make sure it can never happen again. Why successive Morrison government ministers and Turnbull ministers ignored the warning signs. Why senior public servants didn't do the proper checking to see if the scheme was lawful. Anyway that's all before us. This Royal Commission is the final chapter in a very sorry story of public maladministration. 

Now, I'd like to just briefly hand over to Kath and to Jennifer to tell you why they think this Royal Commission is so important.

JENNIFER MILLER: Morning, everyone. I'm really pleased to be here today and to support the Royal Commission that is now taking place. I lost Rhys, five and a half years ago, and I've fought for him every step of the way. He had a massive debt of $28,000, so he was falsely accused. It was just too much for him to bear and he took his life on the 26th of January 2017. I have fought hard ever since to keep this out in the media and to get answers. I've never had the courtesy of getting any answers from Centrelink, MPs, state, whatever. I'm just fobbed off. I've been lied to. Rhys has been ridiculed by some of the LNP members and I have been waiting so very long for this Royal Commission to take place. So I'm so grateful and particularly to the Labor Party. Bill Shorten has been a massive supporter and I'm so glad that he invited us here today so that people can see that families have been affected in a very big way. So thank you very much.

KATH MADGWICK: Good morning, everyone. My son received an estimation of debt by a machine and that put him into a place. He had recently been bullied and homeless and lost his job and had no income whatsoever, so he was applying for Centrelink when he received his debt. It was enough for him to become emotionally intoxicated and he then, two and a half hours later, he went and took his own life. This Royal Commission, as Jennifer says, I am so grateful to Bill Shorten and the Labor Party for honouring their commitment to do this. We can't get our sons back, but we do need to have transparency about what happened here. It was wrong and should never have occurred and a machine shouldn't be dealing with vulnerable people, you know. So I guess. Yeah. Thank you. Thanks for the Royal Commission.

SHORTEN: Any questions?

JOURNALIST: I guess given we know who created the program. What is an outcome that you would like to see? You talk about, we want to know who was responsible. Essentially, we know that it was the government of the day. So what is the practical outcome you would like to see come from the Royal Commission?

SHORTEN: How can a government create a scheme which is unlawful? We've never had a satisfactory explanation. No one's owned up and said, “we were the architects of a scheme”. When a government raises a debt against a citizen, the government's using its very, very significant powers. When you have such disproportionate power dealing with your citizens, there is an obligation on the government, a duty of care, I would submit, for the government to get its facts right because it is very much Goliath versus David. When the government says to an individual, you've done the wrong thing, and as it turns out, the government didn't have the lawful authority to do what it was doing. We haven't found out who created the scheme, but furthermore, a series of matters when people would speak up and fight back. 

There was a big error rate in the scheme that didn't set off any warning bells. Then what happened. Or if it did, we weren't told about it. Then what happened is a number of people who were wrongly accused by the Robodebt scheme and by the Government then took their matters to the Administrative Appeals Tribunal. It's like a court where you deal with the administrative law matters. A number of times, 70 times at least. The Administrative Appeals Tribunal said to the government, you're making mistakes here. That was ignored. Legal experts said that there was a problem with the scheme. The Victorian Legal Aid Commission ran a case all the way to the Victorian Court saying this was the Federal Court in Victoria saying this was illegal. 

It took a class action which I approached Gordon Legal to run on behalf of recipients for the government to finally concede. So the question is when the government breaks the law, when it's being told that it's breaking the law, why does it for four and a half years just think it's more important than the law and the rights of citizens? We've never got to that. We do need to understand the full cost of the scheme. And by that I mean that people cost not just the dollar cost. We also need to make sure it can never happen again. That's why this Royal Commission is important.

JOURNALIST: Do you think there are more people out there that may have taken their own life as a result of this scheme?

SHORTEN: Well, the mothers here certainly would have that view. When someone takes their own life, there can be a range of reasons. But one thing is for sure, when you've got fragile people or people pushed to the edge, the government shouldn't be doing unlawful things to these people at the same time.

JOURNALIST: Sorry, Minister, just before you go, is the government planning to change its decision to end the fuel excise and reinstate it?

SHORTEN: Not that I'm aware of, no.

JOURNALIST: Mr. Shorten, the Labor Government's been accused of basically this is a form of payback for Pink Batts. How do you respond to that?

SHORTEN: I wish that the previous government hadn't broken the law for four and a half years. This Royal Commission has not been called because someone doesn't like someone. This Royal Commission has been called because nearly 400,000 Australians had unlawful debts raised against them by their own government. This Royal Commission has been called because there was great trauma and stigma. When the Government of Australia says you owe us money, you prove to us you don't owe money. This is the people who use the safety net. They're vulnerable as already, they might be people with disability, they could be students from the country living in the city, people who might not be able to get a job because the government's issuing a debt order against them. If the former government didn't want the Robodebt Royal Commission, then they shouldn't have had Robodebt. There was Robodebt and now this will be Robojustice.

JOURNALIST: What does it say about the former government's acknowledgement of what went wrong with Robodebt that accusations like that come up against your government?

SHORTEN: Well, I'm sure that there are former coalition ministers who are going to have sleepless nights, but I just hope that they have the sleepless nights if they have them, because they realise that they were managing and overseeing an illegal, unlawful scheme, a massive breach of public administration. I hope that they're just not having sleepless nights because they're worried they may get caught.

JOURNALIST: And you use the word unlawful. Why don't you use the word illegal?

SHORTEN: It was illegal. Let's be very clear here. The ability of the Commonwealth of a government to raise debts against citizens is a very awesome power, which citizens give to their government. But we expect that power to be used tempered by rules and guidelines and the law. And what we see here is the government had a series of budgets and in my opinion, they just wanted to magic up numbers so they could prove that they were economic overlords and very clever budget masters. But what they did is they magicked up the numbers and then they retrofitted a scheme and they went after what the people they saw as the vulnerable. 

See, I think the Morrison government wanted to shame the poor. I think they view that people on the safety net are less equal than other people and thank goodness there's a change of government. We view all Australians as equal and that means equal under the law. The problem is that when you're on Centrelink under the Morrison Government you weren't equal under the law, you were a second class citizen, you were treated as if you were in some sort of digital workhouse like they used to have in the 19th century. In the real sense, the real workhouses. And you were treated as guilty until proven innocent. Some questions for the others?

JOURNALIST: Yeah. I think you both acknowledge your sons faced some challenges in life. But how much responsibility do you think should be carried by the Robodebt scheme for for the deaths of your sons?

MILLER: Look, I for me personally, I was very, very close to my son. We used to talk all the time. He did have mental health problems. Centrelink were aware of that, but he also was working in any casual capacity that he could. He wasn't lazy. Yes, he had his issues, but he was totally loved by just so many people. People that he worked for, worked with, totally respected. And honestly, when he received this debt it was LNP may as well had him on the edge of a cliff and just tipped him over. And really that's what it's about. And I've worked for five and a half years, like I've said, contacting some of the ministers; Alan Tudge, Christian Porter, Catherine Campbell. Well, that's quite a few. And, you know, I've never had a reply. Never had a reply.

MADGWICK: I admit that Jarrad yes, he was having a tough time. He'd just split up with his girlfriend. I'm not saying that he wasn't down at the time. He was, but everything was normal. Day before we were at the beach. He was with his dog. You know that. That estimation. Jared had a $5,000 loan. No income. Didn't think he was getting paid. And I'm sorry, but that pushed him into a point. My son didn't agree with suicide, thought it was selfish, so he thought he could testify. And. And, yes, that was the reason.

JOURNALIST: Would an apology be enough? I mean, there's been class action. Money aside, is an apology from the government former government enough?

MADGWICK: No, it wasn't. And Scott Morrison didn't really apologise did he? He said he would apologise. No, it's not. We need to know who's responsible for this. So. And people need to be held accountable. I'm sorry. You know, you can't just do something illegal. I mean, if I go and steal your car, you're going to have me for unlawful use of a vehicle. You can't say I didn't know. I'm sorry. That's not good enough. No, we need to know who who done this. And they should not be in government.

MILLER: We need to have the accountability. And we also need to have changes made so that this doesn't happen again to other families. You know, that's why I went to the media in the first place, to say please don't take your life over a false debt, a government debt, which even then I wasn't totally aware of how the process was, but once I saw the information that I saw, I knew that there was a problem and I knew that this had to be stopped. So we need the accountability. We need the answers, and we need change. Yes, I do not believe that the LNP in any way or form would ever officially apologise. They've been given every opportunity and they haven't done so. So to me, they're dead and buried. I don't like them. I don't want to deal with them again. We're progressing forward now and we're struggling, but we do it and we hope that this is going to give us the answers.

MADGWICK: And I had a letter just sorry, I had a letter. Well, Jarrad, I got into his Facebook. He had a letter from a girl in Tasmania that was long and and describe how she felt being in that situation herself and that she thought about taking her life. But after seeing me, she wouldn't do that to her mother. So if it saved one person by our standing up here, as tough as it is, then it's worth every every minute of it.

SHORTEN: Are there any final questions? All right. Well, thank you very much. Thank you for handling the matter sensitively. And I just want to thank these mums who the world has dealt them cards no parent would ever want but they're doing the very best they can.