Mathias Cormann (WA, Liberal Party, Vice-President of the Executive Council) Share this | Hansard source

What the government can guarantee is that we will continue to ensure that, if people fail to come to an arrangement to settle their debts, the government has a responsibility to taxpayers to recover the money, as said by Tanya Plibersek. Of course, we know that Mr Shorten supported the automation of this process and we know that Chris Bowen also supported that principle. I guess we're hearing the Labor Party essentially suggesting that, when payments are made to people in excess of what they should have been, the government should just walk away and leave it.