Prime Minister Anthony Albanese has accused predecessor Scott Morrison of showing “no contrition whatsoever” after the former PM was named in a scathing Robodebt report.
Mr Morrison was among those singled out by the royal commission on Friday and accused of misleading cabinet.
However Mr Morrison has rejected any suggestion of wrongdoing, saying the findings were “based upon a fundamental misunderstanding of how government operates”.
As the fallout continued, Mr Albanese said it wasn’t his place to decide what action should be taken against the former prime minister.
“But I do note … that Scott Morrison has also shown no contrition whatsoever for the impact that his actions as minister have had,” he said in Perth.
“And I do note very serious findings of the royal commissioner about his evidence before the royal commission.”
He also hit back at Liberal leader Peter Dutton, who accused Mr Albanese and Government Services Minister Bill Shorten of acting with “glee” and politicising the issue.
No ‘hint of empathy’
“I would have thought, given that Peter Dutton sat in the cabinet for all of that time … and defended this system, that the royal commission could have seen some recognition from Peter Dutton that this isn’t about politics, it’s about people,” Mr Albanese said.
“There could have been a hint of empathy from Peter Dutton, but there was none.”
Education Minister Jason Clare also added his voice to the mounting criticism, say Mr Morrison conscience should bother him for years to come.
“Scott Morrison and all of these ministers and bureaucrats are going to have to live with this on their conscience for the rest of their lives,” Mr Clare told Sky News on Sunday.
“This wasn’t just one or two cases, this was half a million Australians who got a bill that they didn’t owe … taxpayers had to fork out over a billion dollars to fix this mess.”
Federal police and the national anti-corruption watchdog are considering civil and criminal evidence against unnamed individuals in relation to the tarnished debt collection scheme run by the Morrison government.
Dismissed or ignored illegality
The report, tabled in parliament on Friday, found certain former Coalition ministers dismissed or ignored concerns about the legality of the scheme but that has been rejected by those in question.
In accordance with proper process, Mr Albanese said that a sealed section of the royal commission report which related to the referral of individuals to authorities had not been provided to him by Commissioner Catherine Holmes.
Earlier on Saturday, Government Services Minister Bill Shorten said the findings would be “the political tombstone” of those responsible.
“It’s the right of Mr Morrison and his former ministerial colleagues to say they did nothing wrong,” he told Nine’s Today Show.
“But I actually think the facts contradict their narrative.”
Mr Shorten also told the Seven Network the royal commission had revealed “political cowardice, incompetence and venality”.
Dutton ‘truly sorry’
Opposition Leader Peter Dutton’s response was that Mr Shorten had attempted to take advantage of the inquiry from day one.
“He’s a political animal and he’s used every opportunity to milk out whatever political advantage there is to the Labor Party out of this particular issue and the prime minister’s doing the same,” Mr Dutton said.
“I just sound a word of caution about the Prime Minister’s politicisation of this process as well.”
The Liberal leader said the former Coalition government stopped the scheme when problems were brought to its attention and said his party would consider the recommendations.
“I’m sorry to those people that have been adversely affected, I truly am,” Mr Dutton said.
More than 100 ministers, advisers, public servants and contractors gave evidence to the royal commission.
Commissioner Holmes’ outlines a litany of human impacts, including families struggling to make ends meet and young people driven to despair and suicide.
The former government launched its crackdown on “suspected welfare fraud and non-compliance” in mid-2015 in an effort to save billions of dollars.
It issued debt notices to people identified through a process called income averaging, which compared reported incomes with tax office data.
But it ended up delivering $406 million in savings and costing $971 million.
The scheme was ruled unlawful by the Federal Court in 2019, after issues were raised by Victoria Legal Aid.
Madeleine Masterton, who was the litigant in the first robodebt test case, said was not concerned about a lack of an apology but welcomed the commissioner’s call for higher welfare payments.
She said she was gratified to see “the failures laid out clearly and the horror of having targeted people with the least capacity to navigate a complex system”.
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