5 years ago
PEOPLE WAIT AGES FOR AGE PENSION
ED HUSIC MP
The Morrison Government forgot Australians are ageing - and so it didn’t prepare for so many age pension applications.
That’s the shabby excuse it’s providing to explain why thousands of older Australians have been forced to wait months to get their age pension processed.
Following wave after wave of staff cuts and contracting out, the Government admitted in Estimates last week it didn’t have enough people to process age pension claims:
“there is ... a back-up of demand of all people who would have in the normal course of events been able to lodge in July, they’re all kicked over to lodge in January.
“So we get a spike of people and this will happen every two years, we’ll now have to adjust our models about how we plan and staff for the work- load ... (because it is) not quite working for age pension when we get that six-month delay.”
“So we get a spike of people and this will happen every two years, we’ll now have to adjust our models about how we plan and staff for the work- load ... (because it is) not quite working for age pension when we get that six-month delay.”
Human Services Department Secretary Renee Leon
Senate Estimates 25 October 2018
The Morrison Government owes older Australians a massive apology for this stuff up - and for the way its job cuts in the Department of Human Services have hurt Australians.
Any defence by the Government that they were caught unaware by the spike in age pension applications is a lame joke.
Remember: they have an ABS, a Census, various intergenerational reports and funded themselves to better predict demographic movements.
The Government is also aware of what times of the year are highest for workload.
Because of this stuff up, over 5,000 older Australians are waiting longer than the 49 day age pension processing standard the government set for itself.
An Abbott-Turnbull-Morrison government obsession with job cuts and outsourcing has helped create this mess.
A Shorten Labor Government will invest in 1200 new jobs at Centrelink to build a stronger capability in the agency to better help Australians in need.