An assistant ombudsman said she felt like a failure after being unable to convince her boss to raise questions about the lawfulness and accuracy of the robo-debt scheme in 2017.
, withheld key documents flagging the likely unlawfulness of the scheme from an independent watchdog investigating the program, the royal commission has been told.
Ms Macleod was shown multiple documents, including emails and attachments sourced from Human Services, raising significant legal doubt the scheme, that she had never seen before. Ms Macleod said the Ombudsman’s office was often known as the “mosquito” among public servants because “we are annoying.” “Myself and my team we could not convince the acting ombudsman to use that sort of language that there was an issue,” Ms Mcleod said.
“Beyond that, you’re also talking about a cohort of people accessing the welfare system don’t have the means to take it to the Administrative Appeals Tribunal or to the Federal Court,” she said.Earlier Deloitte partner Elea Wurth—tasked by the commission with producing a technical study of robo-debt—said a review found artificial intelligence was not present in the program.
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