The Minister for Government Services has announced a two-year roadmap to supposedly propel e-government. But the plans, part of a larger strategy, are considerably lacking substance.
The Department of Human Service’s customer compliance staff will now be required to seek “additional proof” rather than solely relying on income averaging when determining if there is a debt.
Peter Martin, Crawford School of Public Policy, Australian National University
Newstart increases are projected to get smaller and smaller relative to pension increases. By the end of the century Newstart will be just two fifths of the pension.
ParentsNext has punitive dimensions that threaten people’s human rights. Now a Senate Committee will determine whether it’s helping or harming vulnerable parents and their children.
Debt agreements have become the fastest form of personal insolvency in Australia. But in many cases, there are better options available to manage debt.
By far the most significant projected savings in the government’s omnibus bill is the phasing out of end-of-year supplements for family tax benefit recipients.
State revenue offices are using data matching to identify people who earn income from Airbnb, then sending notices that they may be liable for land tax, even though this remains a legal grey area.
The problems with Centrelink’s data-matching system stem from reconciling datasets held by different agencies. What if we used a blockchain to create a single source of data?