Friday, July 07, 2023

Rick, Asher et al on the RC Robodebt: Secrecy over sunshine of transparency

 Just as dumbfounding as #Robodebt continuing after a senate inquiry findings (which prompted an ato officer to send that cease and desist email on averaging) no one did 🙄

Cease and Desist Letter



Sometimes there are only a few voices daring to tell the truth - how thoroughly they have been vindicated


Rick covering the RC into Robodebt


Robodebt inquiry hears ATO's threat to 'shut down' scheme



The robo-debt royal commission has found the scheme was sustained by ‘venality, incompetence and cowardice’. By Rick Morton.

Robo-debt royal commission ends in criminal referrals




#RobodebtRC recommendation 13.1 is strongly supported by members... frontline staff warned the bosses that the scheme was crook but a Dept culture of devaluing the expertise of staff on the ground meant those warnings were ignored. #auspol



Lara Tingle: Robodebt royal commission exposes welfare bashing as a meanness at the heart of our politics

First robodebt royal commission scalp confirmed at PwC


PwC partners Terrence Weber and Thai Bowe and PwC director Frank van Hagen “were each of the understanding, or belief, that DHS was aware that PwC was preparing a report that was separate from the presentation to the minister”.

“In contrast, [PwC partner Shane] West gave evidence to the effect that he could not recall DHS ever having knowledge that PwC was preparing the detailed report that it had been drafting.

“However, Mr West later accepted, in submissions to the commission ... it was likely that DHS was aware that PwC was preparing a draft report separate from the presentation, and in a more detailed format. That was a prudent and realistic concession.

Commissioner rejects PwC partner’s oral evidence


Hot potato 🥔  as Dao used to say …at Equifax  The robodebt scheme was passed like a hot potato up the line of Coalition ministers – but who will be held responsible?


Commissioner Catherine Holmes branded the former Coalition government's debt-raising scheme an "extraordinary saga" of "venality, incompetence and cowardice".

"The report paints a picture of how the Robodebt [scheme] ... was put together on an ill-conceived, embryonic idea," Commissioner Holmes wrote.

"It is remarkable how little interest there seems to have been in ensuring the scheme's legality, how rushed its implementation was, how little thought was given to how it would affect welfare recipients and the lengths to which public servants were prepared to go to oblige ministers on a quest for savings."

Robodebt royal commission findings revealed, individuals referred for criminal prosecution


‘It was so shocking’: why robodebt’s dark legacy will linger long after royal commission report


The Robodebt findings have been handed down – what happens next and who was deemed responsible?


‘She failed to act’: Damning findings for robo-debt public servant, Kathryn Campbell, now in new $900k job

When Australian Council of Social Service chief executive Cassandra Goldie gave an interview in January 2017 warning that the scheme was raising inaccurate debts and should be terminated, the report finds Campbell was not interested in these substantive issues but rather the possibility of obtaining a “good line for us to use in the future” in the media.


The Guardian


The ABC


SMH