Social Security and Other Legislation Amendment (Technical Changes No. 2) Bill 2026
Mrs McINTOSH (Lindsay) (12:03): I rise to speak on the Social Security and Other Legislation Amendment (Technical Changes No. 2) Bill 2026. The bill comprises nine schedules to make minor and technical amendments across social services, child support and family assistance legislation to ensure the legislation reflects the administrative practices being undertaken for the delivery of payments.
Schedule 1 of the bill amends the A New Tax System (Family Assistance) Act 1999 to allow the automation of applications for advanced payments so people can apply for a payment online, as well as over the phone or in person. More than 2.7 million advance payments were processed in the past financial year, an essential lifeline for people who find themselves in a difficult situation, with urgent bills to pay, like electricity and gas bills, repairs to homes or replacing essential items like fridges, unexpected medical costs, or buying work supplies like boots or tools for a new job.
These changes will allow requests for advance payments to be made online so people can apply for them when they need them and in a way that best suits their needs. The changes in this schedule will also support people by introducing more flexibility around their social security repayment amounts. If people find they are in a position to make their repayments quicker, they'll be able to do so.
Equally, if they need more time to repay the debt, that can be approved too. Schedule 2 of the bill will amend the Administrative Review Tribunal Act and the family assistance act to allow the secretary to alter certain social services decisions undergoing a review at the Administrative Review Tribunal to ensure decisions reflect the most up-to-date information available.
It is hoped that this will expedite some decisions that end up in the ART and ensure both the ART and Services Australia have the most up-to-date information when considering appeals of decisions. Schedule 3 will amend the family assistance acts to ensure the agency can use pre-issue income data from the ATO to complete reconciliations of a person's entitlement to family tax benefit.
Pre-issue income data is the income a person has on file with the ATO. Essentially, it uses what has been reported by your employer as your income to date to determine what your income is. This information can also be used to determine a person's entitlement to FTB or the single-income family supplement and apply end-of-year notification requirements to recipients who are not required to lodge a tax return.
The use of a person's pre-issue income data will help Services Australia make more accurate payment decisions and should lead to fewer debts being created. Most importantly, these changes do not take away a person's right to seek a review of any decision or appeal that decision, should they disagree with it. Flowing on from that, schedule 4 of the bill will amend the family assistance act to allow the pre-issue income data to be used for childcare subsidy reconciliations and to ensure a person's entitlement is updated when their income changes.
Again, this will help ensure a person's payment is accurate and large debts aren't created. While stakeholders support the use of pre-issue income data at a general level, Economic Justice Australia and Single Mother Families Australia have raised some concerns about the long-term use of pre-issue income data where it differs from a person's final assessment amount.
I would strongly encourage the Minister for Social Services and her department to carefully consider this point, because it is important that we have correct assessments. A person's final assessment amount should be used as soon as possible to make a determination on their payment entitlement. Schedule 5 of the bill will amend the child support act to also allow a person's pre-issue income data to be used for child support assessments.
This change is particularly important. Single Mother Families Australia, Relationships Australia and even the Commonwealth Ombudsman are supportive of these changes, because getting child support payments right really matters. Relationships Australia have said that the use of pre-issue income data will help address the weaponisation of the child support system by thwarting a payer's attempts to delay assessment of their tax obligations by ensuring that we have more current and accurate child support assessments.
Just last week, I highlighted that outstanding child support debts have hit record high levels, with more than $2 billion now owed to children across the country. These are children that are now missing out. I'm personally appalled that, under the Albanese Labor government, child support debt has skyrocketed.
That's $2 billion that should be in the pockets of parents and carers to raise children. We are in a cost-of-living crisis where we know families are struggling to keep a roof over their heads and to put food on the table. When I hear about parents who are doing the wrong thing—going on overseas holidays, buying new cars and boats, and failing to lodge their tax returns, so their payments don't add up—it makes me really angry, and every single person in this place should be angry.
Around 230,000 parents owe a debt, with the average debt sitting at over $8,600. Astoundingly, the highest debt owed is $2 million. Ten parents have debts of more than a million dollars, and another 190 parents owe more than $150,000 in child support payments.
Of the 230,000 parents that owe a debt, only 33,000 have wage-garnishing orders in place to recover the debt from their pay. That's just 14 per cent of parents with a debt. Worse, there are only just over 4,000 departure prohibition orders in place to stop parents travelling overseas if they owe a debt—under two per cent of parents.
Child support payments are not optional. Parents have a moral and legal obligation to pay child support. This money is to help raise, feed and clothe children.
It has nothing to do with an ex-partner. It is always about putting children and their welfare first. The Albanese Labor government needs to be using every power it can to start collecting these debts because it is unacceptable that kids are going without.
Schedule 6 of the bill will amend the family assistance act to enable merit reviews of decisions to use tax refunds to offset family assistance debts like the family tax benefit. Schedule 7 of the bill will amend the Paid Parental Leave Act to ensure that a person's paid parental leave superannuation contribution reflects the settings of the scheme. This will ensure that if a person's paid parental leave amount is later changed, the superannuation contribution is based on the actual entitlement.
Schedule 8 will make minor amendments to the Social Security Act to confirm in the legislation that a restriction on requesting urgent payments is triggered once a person has been paid their 10th urgent payment rather than when their next request is rejected. Schedule 9 of the bill will fix minor cross-referencing errors in the legislation between this bill and the last technical bill in 2025.
As I said at the outset, this bill is technical in nature, and the coalition will support the passage of this legislation through the parliament. Debate adjourned.