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House of Assembly - Fifty-Third Parliament, Second Session (53-2)
2016-07-06 Daily Xml
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Grievance Debate

State Government Concessions

Dr McFETRIDGE (Morphett) (15:09): The rebate and concession schemes in this state have been a debacle for many, many years now. What we were presented with yesterday was the absolute tip of the iceberg when it comes to the depth of despair that this Department for Communities and Social Inclusion is in. Today, we heard about Westminsterial responsibility. This minister has to accept ministerial responsibility. This minister, though, is the trifecta of the debacle which started in 2009 with the now Premier. What did the 2009 Auditor-General's Report say?

Over a number of years—

so 2009 was not the first time—

Audit review of the administration of concessions payments has highlighted areas where controls could be improved.

The audit for 2008-09 indicated there remain a number of controls which require improvement.

DFC—

as it was then (the department for families and communities)—

responded that these concerns will be addressed through the implementation of a new database system [CASIS].

We know what happened to CASIS. It started at under $600,000 under the Premier. It was trashed under the current minister at $7.4 million. That was in 2009, so this problem is not new. Let's see what the Auditor-General said in 2012:

Over recent years—

so, again, over recent years—

Audit has commented on the Department's inability to comprehensively reconcile concession payments with client details maintained on the Department's databases.

The Auditor-General then goes on to talk about CASIS and what a debacle, what a mess, CASIS was. For those who do not know, CASIS is the Concessions and Seniors Information Service. We started with CART, which we think is an absolute donkey cart, in this case, which is the Concessions and Rebate Tracking service. We know that failed. The Premier introduced CASIS and that has failed. Now we have COLIN and we have COLC. None of those is working well. Let's continue with what the Auditor-General said in 2009, 2012 and 2014.

Let's see what the Auditor-General said in 2014. The Auditor-General said that CASIS had been introduced. It was supposed to be going to solve the problems with an anticipated introduction fee of $600,000, then it was $3.72 million. It was not working. The Auditor-General identified the problems back in 2014, but the minister comes in here and says that this is something she has been working on and working with the Auditor-General on. It is not the Auditor-General's problem: it is the minister's problem.

You cannot pay 4,350 dead people and say that it is the Auditor-General's problem. If you cannot count the bodies, if you do not know where the bodies are, you should not be in that place. If you are going to hand out $2.81 million when your department has no record at all of the client, what are you doing? It is the minister's responsibility. The public servants can give them this information, but it is the minister's responsibility to check on the information. You cannot hand out $11.79 million to people across South Australia who are not eligible, when they have not even put an application in or when Centrelink has not approved their application. You cannot excuse $1 million when your records do not match the energy supplier's records. You cannot keep going like this.

Not only has the Auditor-General warned about this in 2009—seven years ago—but the media were warning about this three years ago. In the media, the headline in InDaily was, 'Taxpayers face "looming catastrophe" on concessions'. Who was the reporter then? The Minister for Investment and Trade's chief of staff Kevin Naughton. So, Kevin Naughton was an in-depth investigator here and the headline was 'Taxpayers face "looming catastrophe" on concessions'.

The Minister for Water is implicated in this too because SA Water have been giving out concessions. They do not know how many or who to and they do not seem to care. The Premier is the architect of this failed system. He was there right from the word go, with one in five people receiving ineligible concessions back in 2013. Even last year, there was the headline, in InDaily again, on the $7 million for the CASIS system that failed.

This is a system that has been under pressure for a long time. We have had the Premier fail with his IT system. We then had former minister Piccolo come in and pick up the pieces, and now we have the trifecta with the current minister, who is completely out of her depth. This should not be allowed to go on. You cannot stand in here and not take responsibility for the outcomes of this. You have been warned time and time again.

The SPEAKER: No, I have never been warned, member for Morphett.

Mr Marshall: I find that hard to believe, sir—that you have never been warned.

The SPEAKER: About that. The member for Florey.

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