Shayne Neumann (Blair, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Hansard source

I speak in support of the Social Security Amendment (Australian Government Disaster Recovery Payment) Bill 2023. Few bills of this parliament affect my electorate more than this one. During my lifetime, we've had four major floods in my electorate, including a flood in 1974 that was eight feet over my parents' house. While I've been the federal MP for Blair, we've had three major floods—in 2011, 2013 and 2022—not to mention the many bushfires that affect my regional and rural electorate in South-East Queensland, so I'm very pleased to speak on this bill.

The bill makes important amendments to the Social Security Act 1991 to introduce additional objective qualification criteria for the Australian government disaster recovery payment, which will support quicker decision-making under payment arrangements. The bill amends that piece of legislation to provide greater certainty in supporting automation processes and to ensure the timely payment of claims for the Australian government disaster recovery payment in the 2023-24 high-risk weather season and beyond. That's absolutely critical. The disaster recovery payment is a one-off payment to eligible people who are adversely affected by a major disaster.

The act sets out the circumstances in which a person qualifies for the payment. To qualify for the disaster recovery payment, an applicant must be adversely affected by a major disaster and be at least 16 years of age or receive a social security payment. The act provides alternative qualification criteria for the payment, which include a person who is an Australian resident, is a holder of certain visas as determined by the minister or is receiving a social security payment. Certain Australian citizens who are not Australian residents are covered. I do recall that, in 2011, New Zealanders qualified for this payment in my electorate, and there are many New Zealanders in South-East Queensland, let me tell you! Automatic assessment of claims for the payment based on objective criteria are expected to be processed in a matter of minutes or days instead of the weeks required to assess claims manually. Timely payment, when people are being so affected, is so critical. The amendments proposed by the bill provide objective criteria on which to assess payments and to ensure the timely processing and delivery of those payments. The purpose of the bill is to amend section 1061K to insert new qualification criteria to make the payments available to someone if they've spent a certain amount of time in Australia before a major disaster.

The weather in the coming year 2023-24 is likely to be characterised by severe weather events. A delivery of faster payments to those eligible is a critical element in our disaster preparedness response, so this bill requires urgent consideration, and I'm so pleased we're going ahead with it. It's really critical that communities are also very resilient in terms of preparation—everything from flood levees to making sure that there are controlled burns in regional areas, as well as making sure that we have the proper necessary release of water from places like Wivenhoe and Somerset dams. Local councils need to be prepared as well. For example, they need to have appropriate evacuation or community hubs, as has been said on many occasions in many reports.

Disasters will happen in our country. With climate change, weather conditions are becoming more extreme, and disasters will happen more frequently. There will be more extreme events, and that's the experience that we'll have in my home state of Queensland, where cyclones in the north impact South-East Queensland as well. This is a reality we can't ignore. We need to take action on climate change, and we need to be prepared as much as we possibly can. That's why this government is doing everything we can in terms of the disaster ready fund. I'm pleased we had projects done and paid for, and projects committed to in my electorate, such as the Dingyarra Street flood mitigation project in Toogoolawah. I thank the Somerset Regional Council for that. There are also other projects supporting private sector managed retreat of at-risk settlements around Ipswich and elsewhere in South-East Queensland. That will be a project which will trial a managed retreat system as well.

These things are important. The legislation before this Chamber is absolutely critical. The recovery payment, for the information of people, consists of $1,000 per eligible adult and $400 per eligible child, and it is delivered by Services Australia. It really is about the purchase of essential items like food for a family, replacing damaged household items, clothing, school items or even toys for children who've lost their cherished possessions. It's designed to fund whatever is needed in the immediate aftermath of a major disaster, and to help families to recover. I can't describe how important these payments are to those who have been flooded and who've lost everything.

The use of automation will allow someone to enter their information to claim a payment, and a computer will check that information within limitations or business rules. If the information provided doesn't meet a business rule, then the claims can be assessed manually. I can't stress how important that is, because, in many cases, people are not technologically savvy, they are not digitally aware, they've lost their mobile phone, computers or laptops, so it is important things are dealt with manually as well. Not meeting the business rules doesn't mean someone is not eligible or doesn't qualify for the payment. Everyone's circumstances are unique. Every flood is different, and every person who is flood affected has different circumstances. If someone doesn't meet the streamlined automation rules, their situation can be considered in a manual way, against discretionary criteria.

This bill is really, really important, and that's why we're committed to improving the way we can deliver this essential assistance. The automation was originally introduced for the disaster recovery payment back in January 2022, and while it has been used to deliver payments after the Queensland and New South Wales floods, an assessment of the business rules identified risks in the application of discretionary decision-making criteria. When these issues were identified, the automation of recovery payments was paused. It's important for this automation to be reactivated before the commencement, as I say, of the high-risk weather season.

Services Australia advised that without automation, the processing time of recovery payments after significant events could blow out to five weeks or more. That's totally unacceptable. It will have a terrible impact on people. This is contrasted with the potential for automated processing times to be reduced to 20 minutes or less. Last financial year, Services Australia processed 1.6 million disaster recovery claims in a population of 26½ million. It goes to show how important this particular bill is for Australians.

These disasters take an enormous toll on people. It affects them physically, emotionally, psychologically and financially. Communities have been destroyed, homes and lives lost—and I've seen that on so many occasions in my electorate. This government will support people, and it's important that governments do so in the aftermath of disasters, to ensure the recovery of these communities. The disaster recovery payment offers a helping hand to people straight after a disaster. The bill requires urgent attention because the government support is absolutely critical and has to be effective. Six or eight weeks is far too long for most families to wait. These measures will get the disaster recovery payment to people who need it most and do it quickly. I commend the bill to the House.

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