Warren Snowdon (Lingiari, Australian Labor Party, Minister for Defence Science and Personnel) Share this | Hansard source

I am not sure if there is a misunderstanding by the opposition, but there has been no attempt to manipulate the figures nor to misreport. I am not sure why you would get to that position. The 120 days quoted in the 2014 portfolio budget statement is a benchmark KPI for processing claims under the Military Rehabilitation and Compensation Act. The portfolio budget statement lists key performance targets for programs. It was not a misreporting of statistics. It is appropriate that there should be KPIs and it is appropriate we should try to meet the KPIs. I can only think that the opposition are saying leave them out—if the average is 155 days or 158 days, or whatever it is, make the KPI that. That is not appropriate. It is really inappropriate to change a benchmark target that is not being met.

We fully acknowledge that the average processing time for MRCA initial liability claims for the 12 months ending March 2013 was 155 days. There has been no fudging of figures, none. I am not sure why you would think there has been. What is in it for us to fudge the figures? It is a transparent process. Why fudge it? The performance against the individual targets is reported each year in DVA's annual report. There is no attempt to hide the figures; just read them and make comparisons. Of course we can do better and that is what we want to do.

The Joint Standing Committee on Foreign Affairs, Defence and Trade has been conducting an inquiry into the care of Australian Defence Force personnel wounded and injured in operations. The department recently reported to the committee that the times taken to process MRCA liability claims for 2011-12 was 158 days on average. MRCA claims received have increased by an average in excess of nine per cent per annum over the last five years. As you would expect from a prudent government, in response to this increase in claims the government have provided $1.7 million over four years to improve MRCA processing times. It is important that we do it. It is not in it for us to try to extend these times. We want to make sure that we meet these benchmarks where we possibly can. These KPIs are quite important to us. There should be targets which we try to achieve. That is why we are making this additional $1.7 million available.

DVA is further addressing the time taken to process claims under MRCA through a number of ways. Firstly, by applying streamlining processes, providing further training and guidance for staff, redistributing claims across locations, prioritising cases, redeveloping ICT tools and improving access to information from the Department of Defence.

There is absolutely nothing in it for us to try and obfuscate or disguise or otherwise hide what we are achieving in terms of these timelines. It would be incorrect to think that somehow or other we would deliberately go around a process to distort or misreport the figures when we are quite open to public scrutiny here—and we accept that scrutiny, and we accept the desire and need for us to do better. I want to thank the department for the diligent way they have gone about trying to achieve these targets. I know that they are applying their best endeavours to getting the best possible outcome for all of those people putting in claims. If we can improve the time to settle those claims, we will. It is our intention, and anyone who believes that we would do otherwise does not understand the way we do our work.

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