Extract from ABC News
By political reporter Matthew Doran
Victims of the Federal Government's controversial Robodebt system are welcoming a settlement that includes $112 million in compensation.
Key points:
- The Federal Government made a late settlement before the trial began
- The class action's lead plaintiff, Katherine Prygodicz, said the settlement was a "relief"
- The deal now needs the approval of the Federal Court
A class action trial was due to begin on Monday, but the Commonwealth settled at the last minute.
The total value of the deal is $1.2 billion — $721 million was announced in May when the Federal Government agreed to repay debts it illegally clawed back from 327,000 Australians.
It also agreed to waived $398 million in debts it was still pursuing and coughed up $112 million in compensation.
The class action's lead plaintiff, Katherine Prygodicz, said the settlement was a "relief".
"I can't answer for 400,000 people, I can only speak for myself, and I'm very happy that I don't have a Robodebt and that I don't have to pay money back to the Government," she told the ABC.
"I am glad that it's come to closure, and I'm very happy with the result."
Ms Prygodicz initially received a demand for $4,000, but that was later recalculated to $3,000 after she questioned the debt.
"I'm not sure how they came up with that number and that was what motivated me to look into it a bit a bit more deeply," she said.
"I didn't mind if I had a genuine debt and I needed to pay it back, I just wanted to understand how it was calculated.
"I know to the very best of my ability that I report the things accurately — I'm a maths and science teacher, and worked as a scientist, so I deal with numbers all the time and I couldn't understand why I had a debt."
The answers she got from Centrelink did not help, and the outstanding amount was taken from her tax return.
"I was told that it was based on algorithms that would be too difficult for me to understand," Ms Prygodicz said.
Sydney woman Leonie Campbell was also hit with two debt notices in 2018, for money she was paid almost a decade prior when she was at university.
The first demand arrived the week before her wedding.
She was originally pursued for $14,000 but managed to fight it down to half that.
Ms Campbell is still waiting to be completely reimbursed.
"I had to troll through years and years of bank statements to get all the information they needed, and when I asked them what proof they had on their end, they didn't have to provide me with anything," she said.
Ms Campbell also welcomed the end of the court process and the Commonwealth's decision to settle.
"I think their response shows just how illegal the system was, and the stress that it put a lot of people through," she said.
"I'm pretty lucky, I would have been one of the lucky ones.
"I had a full-time job, but I'm imagining that wasn't the case for a lot of people who had debts raised."
Andrew Grech from Gordon Legal, the firm managing the class action, said there was nothing victims needed to do straight away to get access to any compensation.
The Federal Court is yet to approve the terms of the deal.
"What they need to do is wait for the court to notify them of the next step, that will happen in about three to four weeks' time," he said.
"They just need to wait for the court process to unfold and they'll be notified of the next steps."
He conceded $112 million split between a potential pool of 400,000 people was slim pickings considering the vast amount of money the Commonwealth had been demanding from people.
"Never enough money, but it's the best that can be achieved in all the circumstances," he said.
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