Child Support and Family Assistance Legislation Amendment (Ending Financial Abuse in the Child Support Scheme No. 1) Bill 2026

Ms PLIBERSEK (Sydney—Minister for Social Services) (09:50): I move: That the bill be now read a second time. Our government is committed to supporting families and children. We have consistently demonstrated that commitment through reforms and investments since we were elected in 2022.

We've expanded the Paid Parental Leave Scheme to 26 weeks and added superannuation. A family having a child today will receive almost $30,000 in paid parental leave, more than double what it was when we came back to government. We've given parents more flexibility in how they take their paid parental leave and set aside four weeks for dads, sending a clear signal that caring responsibilities should be shared by both parents.

For sole parents, we've increased access to Parenting Payment (Single), which previously ended when children turned eight and now extends to the age of 14. When we were elected in 2022, an eligible sole parent with a dependent child aged eight to 14 could receive $651.50 per fortnight in income support through JobSeeker. Now, the same parent can receive $1,087.20 per fortnight through Parenting Payment (Single).

This change has benefited around 200,000 sole parents since September 2023. We've cut the cost of child care for more than one million families, introduced a three-day childcare guarantee for all families who need it, and we're working to build a universal early childhood education and care system to improve affordability and access even further. We've invested $4.4 billion to respond to family, domestic and sexual violence, including more funding for workers in frontline services, with the next phase of work on the National Plan to End Violence against Women and Children on the way.

And, in the most recent budget, we increased funding for community services for vulnerable families and children by $171.7 million, a 12 per cent increase in that important work. Consistent with this commitment, at the 2025 election, Labor promised to close loopholes that enable financial abuse in Commonwealth systems, including in the child support system. Child support exists to ensure children don't suffer financially when their parents separate.

Around one million Australian children depend on it. Children in single-parent households, which are mostly headed by women, face a significantly higher risk of poverty. Child support paid in full and on time helps those families meet essential costs such as food, housing, education, health care and participation in community activities.

It plays a vital role in reducing poverty and financial hardship for families and children. The government understands that child support is not merely an administrative process. It's essential to the economic security and stability of separated families.

It makes a real difference to children every day. But, right now, there are too many loopholes in the system. Some parents use the system to harass their former partners, to obtain personal information about them or to create debts for them.

Some parents hide their income to get out of paying what they should. And far too many parents just don't pay at all. The backlog of unpaid child support is over $2 billion.

There are 200 individual child support debts of over $150,000. One parent's debt to their children is more than $2 million. Currently, our system allows this to happen.

In the 2026-27 budget, the government announced an additional $182.6 million to be invested into the child support system to make it safer and more effective and to help more children get the support that they are owed. Our reforms will improve every part of the system: from weaponisation risks in system processes, to the accuracy of assessments, to enforcing compliance.

We designed this package by listening to people with direct experience of the system. All of us in this place receive representations from constituents about child support. The letters are often harrowing.

I have collected the issues that have been raised with me in correspondence, and this package reflects my commitment to improving the system for those people who have taken the time to write. We've also listened to advocates. I'd like to particularly acknowledge Terese Edwards, the CEO of Single Mother Families Australia, who's in the gallery today.

Terese has fought for decades for progress on these issues, and I want to thank her for her contribution. These reforms are a tribute to her advocacy. And, of course, our reforms are informed by the findings of the Commonwealth Ombudsman and the recommendations arising from reviews of Australia's family law system.

This bill is the first of two to implement the child support reforms we've announced. It does three things: It fixes process that can be weaponised against former partners. It creates new protections for child support recipients against family payment debts caused by former partners.

And it expands access to the Australian child support scheme for children overseas with one parent in Australia. The bill has three schedules. Schedule 1 gives Services Australia discretionary powers to reduce harmful interactions in the child support system.

The changes will allow Services Australia to prioritise the safety of parents by refusing certain applications for new child support assessments, as well as change of assessment applications, where these applications would cause harm. Currently, no matter how much evidence Services Australia has that a person is using the system to harass the other parent, they have no option but to progress applications and involve a parent who may be harmed as a result.

How harm will be determined will be based on the family law framework and decisions to refuse an application will be reviewable. Additionally, Services Australia will have the power to dismiss objections that have little or no prospects of success or would not materially impact the child support case. This change will protect parents from being dragged into unnecessary review processes that may have been initiated with the intention to harass them.

To illustrate the change, let's consider a fictional couple. We'll call them Lucy and Daniel. Lucy has sole care of her two children and has previously suffered violence at the hands of her former partner, Daniel.

Over a 13-month period, Daniel repeatedly tells Services Australia that Lucy's income has changed and submits multiple change of assessment applications and objections seeking to alter the child support assessment. Each time, Services Australia reviews the evidence and concludes that Lucy's income has not, in fact, changed. Despite providing little evidence to support his claims, every time Daniel lodges an application or objection, Lucy must engage with Services Australia and provide evidence to confirm her income details.

This creates a significant administrative burden for Lucy and can be used to harass, exhaust or wear down her resolve to claim the child support she is entitled to. As a result of this bill, if Daniel lodges a further change of assessment application or objection, Services Australia can refuse the application or dismiss the objection. This bill also removes the mandatory requirements to exchange documents provided during the change of assessment and objection processes.

When one parent lodges a change of assessment application, both parents must submit detailed personal information so that application can be assessed. Currently, there is a legal requirement mandating that entire copies of documents provided in this process are exchanged with the other parent. This can include a parent's contact details, details about their employment and even financial records showing where they have used their bank cards—details of where they shop, for example.

This means sensitive and personal information is shared, which deters some parents from seeking a change and, at worst, can create a physical safety risk. Between 30 and 40 per cent of the approximately 14,000 parents who seek a change of assessment each year withdraw from the process before it is completed, in part because of the legal requirement that all documents be shared.

The current requirements will be replaced with a safer information exchange model that provides Services Australia with discretion over how to exchange relevant information, including by redacting documents or by providing written or verbal summaries of information. The intention is to share only the information that is relevant to the merits of the case, ensuring the other parent is afforded the opportunity to respond to that relevant information, not trawl through irrelevant documents.

As an example of this change, consider Tom and Linda. Tom and Linda are separated and have a history of family and domestic violence. Tom and Linda have a child support case where Tom is the payer.

Linda believes that Tom is understating his income and his child support assessment does not reflect his true financial capacity. However, Linda is hesitant to apply for a change of assessment. She knows that if she asks Services Australia to investigate Tom's income she will have to provide information about her income as well.

She is worried that personal information, such as her current employer, may be disclosed to Tom and put her safety at risk. Linda decides not to proceed as the risk to her and her child's safety is too high. As a result, Linda and her child may not be receiving the level of child support they are owed.

Following the changes, if Linda decides to proceed with a change of assessment, Services Australia will not be required share information with Tom that is not relevant and may increase her risk of harm, such as her home and work address and her bank statements that show where she shops. Schedule 2 of this Bill strengthens protections for parents who currently collect child support privately.

There is a link between child support and Family Tax Benefit, or FTB. This link exists to ensure that where a parent is able to receive child support from their former partner for the benefit of their child and it is safe to do so, they seek that child support, and government income support is adjusted to account for this income. This link can be weaponised.

When a paying parent does not submit tax returns for an extended period, their child support liability must be based on provisional income. If that parent then submits multiple years of tax returns, their child support liability may be retrospectively recalculated. This often results in the parent owing more child support than they actually paid.

In these cases, the receiving parent's FTB entitlement may then also be retrospectively reassessed, resulting in a FTB debt for the receiving parent, through no fault of their own. In these circumstances, parents in agency collect are already protected in that FTB entitlement is based on the child support actually paid, so there can be no FTB debt. As any additional child support is paid, FTB will be adjusted accordingly.

For parents in private arrangements, the government has no visibility of when that additional child support is paid to the receiving parent. The FTB debt against the receiving parent remains whether or not the paying parent actually pays the additional child support they owe. This means a receiving parent in private arrangements may be punished by having an FTB debt raised, with no extra child support provided.

The government's reforms make changes to address this problem. The government is creating new processes that ensure parents entering the system are given more information about the advantages and risks of choosing private arrangements or agency collect, including the protections that are available against FTB debts if they choose agency collect. The additional change made in this schedule of the bill, says that those parents who are owed money can choose to pursue the extra child support debt from the paying parent themselves.

For parents who continue to choose private arrangements, this bill pauses collection of FTB debts for three months after those debts are raised, giving parents the opportunity to consider their options and take appropriate action to pursue the extra child support from the paying parent themselves, or they could apply for an exemption or special circumstances debt waiver, which would extinguish the family tax benefit debt.

Or they could choose to move to agency collect and ask to have outstanding child support recovered by the government. This would cause the FTB debt to be reassessed against the child support arrears that have been received, assumed to be zero, which would also extinguish the FTB debt. For parents in this situation who opt to move from private arrangements to agency collect, we are reversing the assumption: we currently assume the extra child support has been paid.

Now we will assume that it has not been, and their family tax benefit debt will be recalculated to zero. This bill makes a further change relevant to these cases. If a parent chooses to move from private arrangements to agency collect, the bill will allow them to request that Services Australia collect outstanding child support debts that have been raised in the previous three months, or nine months in exceptional circumstances, even if the debt relates to a period outside this timeframe.

That means that if late lodgement of tax returns causes a new child support debt to be raised that relates to years of underpayments, the government can pursue that child support debt on behalf of the receiving parent. To illustrate these changes, our fictitious couple this time is Alex and Lee. Alex is assessed to pay child support to Lee, and they have managed their child support privately up till now.

Alex has not lodged her tax returns for five years. When Alex lodges her outstanding tax returns, that causes a reassessment of child support for past periods. The reassessment means that Alex should have paid $14,000 more in child support to Lee than she actually did.

This causes Lee's family tax benefit entitlement to also be reassessed and a family tax benefit debt is raised against him. Under the current rules, Services Australia is obliged to commence recovering that family tax benefit debt immediately, regardless of whether Alex has paid the $14,000 to him or not. If Lee asks to move to agency collect, Services Australia can only pursue the portion of the $14,000 that relates to the three months prior to that move.

The changes made by this bill mean that Lee has time to consider his options. If he opts to move to agency collect, the family tax benefit debt is extinguished. If and when Alex pays the $14,000 that's owed, his family tax benefit entitlement will be adjusted accordingly.

And Lee would be able to ask Services Australia to collect the entire $14,000 child support debt from Alex. Even though that debt was accrued over a period of five years, the debt was raised within the three-month window. These changes provide pathways that release parents from FTB debts raised against them through the child support system, while enabling those parents to collect more of the child support debts that are owed to them.

Another reform in this bill is to allow both receiving parents and paying parents to move into agency collect arrangements. Currently, only receiving parents, or both parents together, can make this choice. Around a quarter of child support parents with a family and domestic violence indicator are payers.

We know that direct financial interactions can create opportunities for ongoing control and unwanted contact. Under the current rules, these parents can be left without an effective option to avoid direct engagement with the other parent. Giving all parents the ability to have Services Australia manage payments will reduce those risks and provide an additional layer of protection.

Schedule 3 of this bill will make child support assessments easier to access across international borders, by allowing direct applications to the Australian child-support system from parents in certain overseas jurisdictions. Currently, a parent who resides in a reciprocating overseas jurisdiction cannot apply directly to Services Australia to receive child support, but must apply through their local child-support authority.

This is inconsistent with the legislation for parents in non-reciprocating jurisdictions who can apply directly to Services Australia for a child support assessment where they meet eligibility criteria. This change will reduce difficulties parents face in seeking child support, such as where there are delays in the overseas authority sending the application to Services Australia, or the parent can't identify who their local child-support authority is.

This legislative change will be accompanied by a grant to a non-government organisation to assist some parents overseas where the other parent of their child is an Australian who has refused to support that child. I'll give a fictitious example to illustrate this change. Like other examples, these are not merely hypothetical but reflect a lot of correspondence to me as the minister and to our department.

George travels to a holiday destination overseas. He meets Maria, a local woman. During their time together, Maria falls pregnant.

George returns to Australia and refuses to support the child. Maria and their child live in an economically depressed area and suffer significant hardship. The child has limited access to health or educational opportunities.

A small amount of child support could dramatically change that child's life. Under current arrangements, Maria would need to navigate local systems and is dependent on her own country's processes to address a situation that is the result of the actions of an Australian citizen. Under this change, Maria can apply directly to Services Australia to assess the case.

Normal eligibility and assessment rules will apply. If the application is successful, Services Australia will collect the assessed amount of child support from George and remit it to Maria regularly to support their child. This change sends an important message to Australians in this situation.

For children born overseas to an Australian parent, the government will not protect the Australian parent from their responsibilities to this child. The three schedules of this bill represent the first tranche of our child support reforms. Our reforms will also mandate employer withholding in all suitable circumstances, so that child support is remitted from wages in the same way as pay-as-you-go tax and superannuation, resulting in easier, on-time and in-full payments.

And we'll implement automatic overseas travel bans for paying parents with $10,000 or more in unpaid child support and a history of recent travel. The government is committed to making this system safer and more effective for the children who depend on it. I commend the bill to the House.

Debate adjourned.