Jordon Steele-John (WA, Australian Greens) Share this | Hansard source

So it is not capable of further review. That is the source, I would put to you, and also to the broader Senate and anybody else watching this debate, of some of the significant concerns the community have around the powers granted to the government under this legislation, to the minister of the day, in the case of the transitional arrangements, and to the minister and disability ministers, in relation to the category A determinations. The concern is that politicians do not have the expertise, or the lived experience, often, to be able to determine what is a needed and necessary support for a disabled person, because our needs are unique and determined by a combination of our impairments, the environment in which we live or the environment in which we may seek to live, or our medical or psychological experiences and conditions.

The government offers to the Senate a substitution pathway. An amendment that it proposes creates a level of flexibility for supports that are prohibited under their legislation but that nevertheless may, in an individual circumstance, be considered appropriate or needed; yet, as we have just seen in the exchange, while you may apply and while you may be guided in that application by a certain series of criteria set out in the legislation, the agency of the day and the government of the day are empowered, by even the amendment the government offers as a solution to some of these concerns, to develop and define additional rules in order to create additional criteria and barriers. When the CEO rules or makes a determination, remember: it won't be the CEO; it will be a delegate of the CEO; it will be a planner.

If anybody out there is listening and watching and thinking, 'Oh, well, at least the CEO will know what they're doing,' remember: it will be a delegate of the CEO; they're a planner; they're under KPIs; they're under pressure; they're human beings. We have all experienced the challenges of making sure that those people, who are under pressure, read the documents that are put before them in relation to determining our support needs and giving us a changed series of funding or supports. If that person considering that application for that otherwise prohibited support, which is not listed because it hasn't been captured, gets that wrong, then there is no recourse—there's not a review process.

This, I would submit to the Senate, is a basic absence of procedural justice. This is basic stuff. A citizen who is a taxpayer, contributing to public programs, and a recipient of the supports of those public programs, should have the right, if they feel like a government bureaucrat has got it wrong, to request a review and to, ultimately, if they so wish, take it to appeal. We've heard, in that exchange, that that is not an avenue granted under this legislation. I find that alarming, and so does the disability community, and that's why we're seeing an increasing number of disability organisations come forward and say, 'Whoa, hang on'—