Anthony Albanese has accused Opposition Leader Peter Dutton of not having a "hint of empathy" or acceptance anything wrong happened in his response to the scathing final report of the robodebt royal commission.
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In the wake of the report into the automated, data-matching debt policy - which was unlawfully ramped up, maintained and ended during the Coalition's term - Mr Dutton apologised to robodebt victims and warned the Prime Minister and minister Bill Shorten to dial down what he called the "glee" he saw in the government's response.
He also called Mr Shorten a "political animal" and cautioned against a trial by media.
The almost 1000-page report from Commissioner Catherine Holmes was publicly released on Friday, apart from a sealed section which contains 20 referrals to four different authorities for possible civil and criminal actions.
Mr Dutton had earlier slammed the Albanese government for politicising the matter and cautioned against "glee" when engaging on the report in which eight former Coalition ministers were criticised, including former prime minister Scott Morrison.
"When the problems were brought to the attention of the government at the time, the program was stopped," he said.
"I'm sorry to those people that have been adversely affected. I truly am."
Commissioner Holmes was critical in her report that the scheme was, in fact, not shut down immediately.
Mr Albanese said the Opposition Leader was missing the point.
"I would have thought given that Peter Dutton sat in the cabinet for all of that time, sat in the Parliament for all of that time, and since, and defended this system, that the royal commission could have seen some recognition from Peter Dutton that this isn't about politics. It's about people," he told reporters in Perth.
"There could have been a hint of empathy from Peter Dutton, but there was none. None.
"A refusal to even say that anything wrong happened here, in spite of the very clear evidence in a report that is almost 1000 pages long. That documents the human impact of taking humans out of Human Services."
Commissioner Holmes marked Mr Morrison for "misleading" cabinet over the legality of the scheme while he was social services minister. He was also found to have "failed to meet his ministerial responsibility" by rushing through the proposal.
Mr Morrison has released a statement rejecting the "unsubstantiated" allegations, saying the commission had fundamentally misunderstood government processes.
"I just caution the glee of the Prime Minister and Bill Shorten at the moment," Mr Dutton told reporters in Brisbane.
"Bill Shorten ... they sought to politicise the issue from day one and we know a lot about Bill Shorten ... he is a political animal and has used every opportunity to milk out whatever political advantage there is to the Labor party out of this particular issue and the Prime Minister is doing the same."
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There was a great human cost as a result of the scheme. From 2016 to 2019, the robodebt scheme raised more than half a million inaccurate Centrelink debts through a method of "income averaging". Some welfare recipients who were hounded for false debts committed suicide. Federal Court Justice Bernard Murphy described Robodebt as "a massive failure of public administration".
As well as Mr Morrison, Commissioner Holmes was scathing of the then ministers who oversaw the program, including Stuart Robert, Alan Tudge and Christian Porter. Marise Payne was criticised for her lack of memory or records about the scheme. Senior public servants, such as former human services secretary Kathryn Campbell, were also slammed for their roles. Sweeping changes to the public service are among 57 royal commission recommendations.
Mr Tudge and Mr Robert have rejected the findings against them in public statements.
Mr Dutton labelled the report a serious issue and said his party would consider all 57 recommendations.
"Mr Morrison's provided a response, refuting the allegations that were made and if there's a legal process that follows, I don't know," Mr Dutton said.
Asked if Mr Morrison should resign, he said: "I will point to the statement of Scott and others have made."