18 February 2017
Green Left Weekly
The federal government announced changes to Centrelink’s controversial automated debt recovery system on February 14.
The changes include no longer demanding immediate payment from people who dispute a debt; allowing people to use bank statements, instead of hard-to-obtain payslips, to prove their income; making it easier to contact Centrelink; and allowing people to by-pass the MyGov portal to review their debt.
But unions, community groups, Labor, the Greens and GetUp! have all warned the changes do not address fundamental flaws with the system.
The debt recovery system has faced complaints it is wrongly issuing debts and forcing recipients to prove their innocence through a complicated, unfair and at times broken system.
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