Justin Warren is using the Freedom of Information Act to find out who knew what about the botched Robodebt scheme - one of the biggest scandals in recent Australian political history.
Summary
Justin Warren applied to Services Australia under the FOI Act for documents relating to the business case of the notorious Robodebt scheme found to be unlawful by the Federal Court. The documents could show what various ministers including Scott Morrison, Christian Porter and Alan Tudge knew about the scheme, and what went wrong.
The AAT ruled that only one document needed to be released, and Mr Warren is appealing the decision to the Federal Court.
Case Timeline
The Case
The Robodebt scheme, which ran between 2015 and November 2019, used an automated debt recovery system to determine if Centrelink recipients had been ‘overpaid’.
Many people were wrongly accused of owing money. In 2021 the Federal Court approved a $112 million class action settlement for victims of the controversial Robodebt scheme that unlawfully collected money from some of the most financially disadvantaged people in the community.
The program caused severe financial stress and harm to hundreds and thousands of vulnerable people.
In 2017, technology and human rights advocate Justin Warren made a Freedom of Information Act request for early business plans and other documents produced by the Department of Human Services – now known as Services Australia – to justify the rollout of the Robodebt scheme.
These documents could show who knew what – and when – about Robodebt, and how the automated debt recovery program was designed and approved at the most senior levels of the public service and the former Coalition government.
The documents could also reveal what former prime minister Scott Morrison and senior figures in the former government knew when they had responsibility for the program.
When the department refused to release the documents, Mr Warren challenged the decision through the Office of the Australian Information Commissioner, and won. The previous government appealed the decision, and in June 2021 the case went before the Administrative Appeals Tribunal. In December 2022, the AAT upheld secrecy and ruled for only one document to be released. Mr Warren has appealed the AAT's decision in the Federal Court. He is challenging the decision on procedural fairness grounds and on the basis that it wrongly interpreted the Cabinet exemptions under the FOI Act.
Mr Warren is represented by Maurice Blackburn Lawyers in collaboration with Grata Fund.