Michael Sukkar (Deakin, Liberal Party, Shadow Minister for Social Services) Share this | Hansard source

The coalition will be supporting the passage of the Social Security Legislation Amendment (Technical Changes) Bill 2025. The bill will simply amend the Social Security Act to maintain current arrangements for youth disability support pension payment rates. As many members in this House may know, there are different rates of DSP for recipients under 21, depending on their individual circumstances, including their family situation. This includes a rate for a single dependant living at home and a higher independent rate. This bill makes technical changes to provide for the intended different rates of payment for DSP youth recipients based on those circumstances, including their particular family situation.

The bill corrects a drafting error from many years ago that unintentionally affected a small cohort of DSP recipients under 21. And the bill ensures that youth recipients continue to receive rates based on their circumstances and family situation, maintaining higher payments for those who are independent or living away from home, which is the intended aspect of the rules. We understand from the government and have been assured that without this correction some recipients in full-time study or apprenticeships would receive lower payments. That is obviously an unacceptable situation, as it discourages education, which obviously contradicts common sense and of course contradicts our disability strategy at a national level.

We understand that the bill also validates past rate decisions and preserves the intended DSP payment structure, which is an understanding of not only this government but previous governments as well. On that basis, we will be supporting this very sensible and non-controversial bill.

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