Mark Dreyfus (Isaacs, Australian Labor Party, Cabinet Secretary) Share this | Hansard source

I can assure the member for Ryan that there's been a huge amount of work done by the Attorney-General's Department, by the expert panel headed by former justice of the High Court Patrick Keane, with affected departments. Obviously, one of those departments is the immigration part of the Department of Home Affairs, another is the Department of Social Services and yet another is Services Australia. There's obviously a tremendous interaction between the way in which the current tier 1 and tier 2 in the social security division of the current AAT interact with Services Australia. It's accepted by the government that there's a need for reform of processes at Services Australia. I would suggest to the House that the improvements that I've outlined in my previous answer to the member for Ryan—about very substantial changes being made to what is currently referred to as tier 1—will, if these amendments are accepted, continue to be a first stage or tier 1 of review. They will be very substantially improved. The second tier of review, that will continue to be available, will also operate with improved processes.

The new tribunal, the Administrative Review Tribunal, is going to be empowered, as I've made clear, to give directions—which, relevantly to the member for Ryan's question, will be directions to Services Australia—to participate, in a way which doesn't always occur now, and, further, to participate in ways that the tribunal regards as relevant and appropriate. So it won't be just left up to Services Australia to decide how it's going to participate. The tribunal will have a far more hands-on power of direction, but equally there will be alternative dispute resolution and single-party case conferencing that can all take place at the first review.

We are genuinely hoping, I can say in answer to the member for Ryan, for very substantial improvements in the review of social services decisions across the board. We are hoping that these changes at the administrative review level will in turn lead to improved decision-making across government, and that includes improved decision-making at Services Australia.

Question agreed to.

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