James Stevens (Sturt, Liberal Party, Shadow Assistant Minister for Government Waste Reduction) Share this | Hansard source

I thank the member for Bradfield for bringing this motion to the chamber and for the opportunity to talk about digital government and government efficiency. I think we all want taxpayer funding that goes into service delivery to be going directly to the coalface at every opportunity. Whilst we recognise there's a cost in administering programs, every dollar that is spent in these different departments—a percentage of it—is hopefully being maximised in terms of the purpose of those departments. In the case of Services Australia, we clearly want to see the budget of that department being used as directly as possible towards Australians that deserve and need the support that it provides. So taking any opportunity to improve and increase the efficiency of government and get the cost of administering programs down will mean that the savings can be put into direct support to Australians.

What the member for Bradfield is importantly highlighting here is that there are huge opportunities for government to create more significant efficiencies around digitisation, through embracing automation and artificial intelligence, and around ways to ensure that Australians who are waiting for decisions from government, particularly for decisions from Services Australia, are provided with support from government that they're appropriately and duly entitled to. When there are long waitlists and long backlogs for processing people's applications and claims, it brings about hardship on people, and, if they're duly entitled to something, the quicker the decision is made, the better. It's important because we're talking about very vulnerable people who are in limbo while they're waiting for these decisions to be made, and, if the decision is ultimately made that they're deserving of support, they have suffered beyond question because of these delays. It's a very straightforward concept, to embrace ways to reduce backlogs and reduce waiting times.

As the member for Bradfield pointed out, we now hear that projects around automation have been cut in Services Australia. These are projects that could lead to a dramatic reduction in the wait times for people to have claims and other issues assessed by the department. We know that last year the Prime Minister made a point about the opportunities through Microsoft and Copilot—their AI tool and capability—which is extremely exciting. Obviously we've all got a degree of apprehension and nervousness about artificial intelligence, but it's got enormous possibility. We want to gently engage its potential benefits and do it in a sensible and measured way, and we thought that the commitment the Prime Minister had announced last year with Microsoft may well have been a sensible way of doing that, but now we find that Services Australia won't be participating in that. I think that's very disappointing.

Investigating the application of AI to speed up some of the processes that are currently causing these backlogs and delays would be transformative for the human beings that are impacted by these delays. We have to be looking at ways in which we can make government more efficient, and the most important government efficiency for the average Australian is quick decision-making. That quick decision-making means that, when someone believes they've got a particular entitlement and they're applying for something from the government, the government gives them a decision on that as quickly as possible. That's the missed opportunity, with Services Australia turning their back on automation projects and artificial intelligence projects and not looking at ways in which decisions that are currently being delayed can be made more quickly.

We believe that this is going to be a growing part of government—a growing opportunity for government—and something that is going to deliver real and tangible outcomes and benefits to Australian citizens, because their interactions with government will be quicker, and that means they'll get decisions. And, hopefully, in the majority of cases, those decisions are to the benefit of the person seeking that decision to be made. While they're waiting for a decision and suffering through backlogs and delays, in many cases they're not getting the support that they deserve. This needs to change, and that's why I strongly urge the chamber to support this important motion that the member for Bradfield has brought to the chamber.

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