Stuart Robert (Fadden, Liberal Party, Minister for the National Disability Insurance Scheme) Share this | Hansard source

We have heard Labor's hyperbole and it's now time to hear the facts. Income averaging has been a longstanding practice of successive governments, going back decades, to support the raising of social welfare debts. It is important to remember this is a practice implemented and used by the Labor Party when in government.

Ms Plibersek interjecting—

I am coming for you, Member for Sydney; you just wait! It's also a practice that is accepted as appropriate and lawful for the AAT in numerous cases, as recently as 2019, and when the previous Labor government used those methods. Indeed, from 2007-08, when Labor came to power, a program was called—amongst many things—the 'pay-as-you-go debt scheme'. Labor in government started to put together a range of collection methods using income averaging. In the 2008-09 budget, Wayne Swan's first budget, Labor included the following paragraph:

The Government will increase the number of assessments of people receiving payments through Centrelink, where data-matching with the Australian Taxation Office suggests the need for such a review. The reviews will seek to identify people who have failed to declare, or may have under-declared, income or assets to Centrelink. This measure will reduce overpayments and will lead to the recovery of amounts already incorrectly paid.

… … …

The measure will provide net savings of $589.2 million …

The 2008-09 budget paper goes on to say:

The Government will increase the number of assessments of people receiving payments through Centrelink, where data-matching with the Australian Taxation Office suggests the need for such a review.

I've had the department go back and check the debts raised in two years, on a random sample of 500 per year, firstly in 2009 and then in 2011, when the member for Sydney was the human services minister. In 2009, 16.8 per cent of all debts—and debts in that year were about 22,000—were wholly or partly raised through income averaging. That's 16.8 per cent of debts in 2009, of approximately 20,000 debts, that were insufficiently raised. In 2011, when the member for Sydney was the human services minister, some 25,000 debts were raised, and, based on a random sample of 500 checks, the number of debts raised wholly or partly through income averaging had increased to 24.4 per cent.

We have accepted that income averaging is insufficient to raise a debt, but the point is that this is a longstanding practice and it was sped up and increased by Labor from 2007-08. The member for Sydney presided over 24.4 per cent of debts being raised wholly or partly through income averaging, which goes to explain the press release that the member for Sydney sent out on 29 June 2011. It reads:

A new data matching initiative between Centrelink and the Australian Taxation Office is expected to claw back millions of dollars from welfare recipients who have debts with the Australian Government.

Why would you need a data-matching initiative with the ATO? The ATO doesn't produce fortnight-by-fortnight data, which is required for welfare; it produces annualised data. Why would the member for Sydney put out a press release in 2011? Because 24.4 per cent of the debts taken from the sample of debts that that member raised during that year were wholly or partly from income averaging.

Ms Ryan interjecting—

The member for Lalor calls out 'wrong'. These are facts, Member for Lalor. You can yell from the back bleachers all you like, but the bottom line is that the use of income averaging at large scales began in 2007-08 and grew to 16 per cent in 2009 and to 24.4 per cent in 2011. Then the member for Maribyrnong, out here waving his hands and taking hyperbole to a whole new level, in this press release says:

… the tax garnishee process had been carried out manually once a year for the past 15 years and involved a significant amount time … The automation of this process will free up resources …

The Labor Party began the automation of debts using income averaging—fact. That's where it began. The minister at the time was the member for Sydney, and her own press release from 2011 shows that income averaging is not only a longstanding practice and process; it is something that the Labor Party began.

On 15 June 2010, the then Minister for Financial Services, Superannuation and Corporate Law, the member for McMahon, stated:

It is important that the Government explores different means of debt recovery to ensure that those who have received more money than they are entitled to repay their debt.

Now we know what the different means were. It was income averaging, wasn't it, Labor Party. The Labor Party, all pure and light, is saying, 'Oh, no, income averaging only started under the coalition.' No, it didn't. It's only the coalition that has called out to say income averaging is not sufficient. That begs the question, Member for Sydney: when 24 per cent of the debts raised—

Opposition members interjecting—

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