Steve Georganas (Adelaide, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

On Friday, Justice Murphy of the Federal Court ruled that the Morrison government's robodebt scheme was flawed, unlawful and a very shameful chapter in Australia's history. This was a disgraceful act by the government, pursuing the poorest of the poor through the welfare system, using the robodebt scheme they came up with, with some algorithm that compared tax returns. They relentlessly pursued these people—illegally and wrongfully, as was said by Justice Murphy—to recover money. They found that the government unlawfully raised $1.76 billion in debt. They settled out of court. They didn't want to be taken into court. If they had gone into court, Minister Roberts and Minister Porter would have had to front up and give evidence. This scheme was wrong and unlawful, and the government should apologise to the millions of people who were caught up in it.

When will the Prime Minister hold someone to account for one of the greatest unlawful schemes that a government has enacted on its people? A few minutes ago in this place, we heard the debate about multimillionaires receiving JobKeeper handouts and the government turning a blind eye, not even wanting to investigate it or to have some of the money recovered, yet in this case they relentlessly pursued the poorest. (Time expired)