Department of Social Services – 2GB with Luke Grant
E&OE
LUKE GRANT:
Kevin Andrews, the Federal Minister for Social Services, has outlined a plan to merge two major departments. The idea is to combine the policy making department of Social Services with the service delivery agency the Department of Human Services, which delivers the services like Centrelink, Medicare, Child Support agency and the disability employment service CRS Australia.
If it comes to fruition the new super-department will employ close to 40,000 people, and be responsible for – well, we’ll find out, but lots of money. To explain why this is being proposed, the minister Kevin Andrews is on the line. And I must say, he made himself available yesterday, and due to other stories we didn’t get to this.
So Kevin, as I say, good afternoon – or Minister, more rightly, happy New Year. And sorry we didn’t get to talk yesterday. I hope you’re well.
KEVIN ANDREWS:
Happy New Year to you too, Luke, and your listeners. And yes, very well.
LUKE GRANT:
Very good to hear. Is this a plan that we’re likely to see enacted at some point? Is it just an idea you’re throwing around? How serious are you about creating a super-agency, if you will?
KEVIN ANDREWS:
Well we’re looking at options in terms of what’s the most efficient way of actually delivering government. The Department of Human Services is really the evolution through amalgamation of a series of other agencies that you mentioned. Medicare, Centrelink, the child support agency, Commonwealth Rehabilitation Service here in Australia. And once upon a time, not so many years ago, they were all separate agencies. And now they’ve been brought under the umbrella of the Department of Human Services.
The question is whether or not there is room for, and it would be efficient to actually merge human services with social services, given that they’re basically in the same space in terms of the delivery of social services to Australians. Things from Aged Care through to pensions, right through to Medicare and virtually every other service the Commonwealth is involved with.
LUKE GRANT:
And I assume part of this is, as you undertook before government, to look at the way we conduct ourselves as a government, as a government business if you will, and try and find the most economic and efficient way of doing things.
KEVIN ANDREWS:
That’s true. I mean the size of government has just burgeoned, particularly over the last decade or so. And we came to office saying that we wanted to cut that back. We wanted government to obviously provide in my area of social services a proper safety net, but it also has to be sustainable and therefore efficient.
LUKE GRANT:
What about the size of that super department? It would be, wouldn’t it, something like 40,000 people? That’s huge.
KEVIN ANDREWS:
There’s about 33 I think, thousand people employed by Human Services. And when you think that every Medicare office, every Centrelink office et cetera across Australia can understand why there’s so many people employed and that’s appropriate to deliver those services at local levels. I mean, we’ve got a few thousand more people employed by the Department of Social Services which is largely the policy side of the equation.
So yes it is a large number of people, it’s – overall the two departments are responsible for about one third of Commonwealth expenditure. So we’re talking about billions of dollars each year.
LUKE GRANT:
Absolutely. What about the unions and those that might oppose an idea like this? Are they at least half interested in the idea or are you going to have trouble dealing with them?
KEVIN ANDREWS:
Look, as I said this is just an option we’re exploring at the moment Luke. And it’s not so much – this is not about looking for redundancies or job reduction. It’s really the back office functions. If there’s a case to be made out for it it’ll be being able to combine IT systems and things like that, which cost millions if not billions of dollars over a period of time. And if we can do that more efficiently then obviously we’re able to drive the taxpayers’ money further than we can at the present time. So they’re the sort of factors that we’ll be looking at in terms of just exploring this.
LUKE GRANT:
Mmm. I read a report earlier today to my listeners in relation to – and being a Victorian MP as well as being a Federal Minister, what’s your take on the statement made by the boss of Holden in relation to the whole notion that it wouldn’t have mattered what a federal government of any colour had proposed, the conversation was already happening about the car maker’s future in Australia. It seems to me that those on the other side, the ALP members, went off a little too early and probably owe the Government an apology, don’t they?
KEVIN ANDREWS:
Look I think it’s become increasingly clear since that decision was first announced by the general – the major office of Holden, General Motors in Detroit, that really nothing was going to change it. My observation of this is if you look at the big car manufacturers, they essentially look at which location around the world can they produce their cars the most efficiently. And in this case they’ve decided that they can no longer produce the cars in Australia. We’ve had the previous closure by Ford, we had Mitsubishi before that.
They’re making decisions based on where they can get the best result in terms of the efficiency of their operations, and obviously the profit for their shareholders as well. And I think unfortunately, and it’s regrettable, that Holden decided that they could no longer sustain the operation here in Australia.
LUKE GRANT:
But Joe Hockey’s right, isn’t he? I mean I really think today – the story in The Aus is a beauty, where he basically says we’ve got to reject aid for lazy companies. We’ve got to make sure that the companies get their act in order, that we’re not just giving money so that shareholders get a dividend. And I think lots of people – and, look, you’re caught up in a huge portfolio where there’s massive expenditure. We’re right, aren’t we, as taxpayers to assume that if we’re going to give help to an organisation, be it General Motors, SPC, whoever, they’ve got to have their own house in order before they start coming to the government asking for our money.
KEVIN ANDREWS:
That’s absolutely right Luke, you know, there’s only a limited amount of taxpayers’ money available. There are more calls on that money than we’re able to actually provide, and you can think of a whole range of social areas where people want money expended and that’s quite appropriate. But at the end of the day there’s a finite amount of money. We’ve got – we’ve had deficit after deficit after deficit for the last, what, half dozen years.
We’ve got the biggest Commonwealth debt ever, and if we don’t do something about this it will become unsustainable in the future. And that means that things like social services will be much more difficult to actually provide in the future. If you look at what’s happened in some of the countries in Europe then you can see that future if Government doesn’t get control of the books at this stage.
LUKE GRANT:
Yeah. And just finally, a story I read in The Telegraph a day or two back in relation to the Disability Support Pension and some changes to it by the previous government that apparently only apply if your case is individually assessed by the authorities. Are you happy with the way that that has played out, and are you going to make any changes so that it affects the people it’s targeted to affect?
KEVIN ANDREWS:
Well obviously again this is a question where you’ve got to get the balance right. Yes it’s quite appropriate that we provide a safety net, but at the same time it’s got to be sustainable. So people who are deserving of the Disability Support Pension should get it, but people who are not deserving of it shouldn’t get it. And we’re – I have an inquiry going on at the present time, headed up by Patrick McClure who is the former head of Mission Australia in Sydney, and he’s having a look along with my department and others at the Disability Support Pension and all the welfare payments at the present time. Again to try and get that balance right that yes, the safety net should be there, it should be for the people who are deserving of it and need it, but if people are undeserving of it or they don’t need it or they’re, you know, simply rorting the system, well then they shouldn’t be getting it.
LUKE GRANT:
Alright Minister, good to talk again. All the best for this year, thank you so much.
KEVIN ANDREWS:
You too Luke, thank you. Bye.
LUKE GRANT:
Thank you Kevin, bye-bye. That’s Kevin Andrews.