Oversight Legislation Amendment (Robodebt Royal Commission Response and Other Measures) Bill 2024

The majority voted against an amendment introduced by the Australian Greens, which means it failed. This amendment would have added the text below to the usual second reading motion, which is "that the bill be read a second time" (parliamentary jargon for agreeing with the main idea of the bill).

Amendment text

At the end of the motion, add ", but the Senate:

(a) notes that:

(i) Robodebt was the worst failure of public administration in Australian history, raising an estimated $1.73 billion of illegitimate debts from over 430,000 vulnerable Australians,

(ii) there is widespread community outrage due to a lack of accountability and insufficient findings from completed investigations; and

(iii) the Robodebt scheme flourished because of a political and media culture that stigmatises income support recipients, and failures in public sector leadership and culture in key departments; and

(b) calls on the Albanese Government to:

(i) implement all 57 recommendations of the Robodebt Royal Commission in full to ensure that Robodebt can never happen again,

(ii) immediately release the confidential additional chapter of the Robodebt Royal Commission report,

(iii) provide the Parliament with an update regarding the status of any civil or criminal referrals made in connection with Robodebt,

(iv) reinstate the six-year limitation on debt recovery as a matter of urgency,

(v) abolish the punitive Work for the Dole and the Targeted Compliance Framework, that have propagated a culture of punishing income support recipients; and

(vi) ensure that the lessons for public sector leadership, management, culture and policy are learned by incorporating study of this failed chapter across public sector leadership education and development training".