Senate Community Affairs Legislation Committee, , 1:16:34 to 1:26:59
Investigation into miscommunications regarding human overrides in the Integrated Assessment Tool and the department's failure to understand the legal framework.
Topics: Health, Integrity, Government IT systems
Speakers: Ms Sonja Stewart, Senator Penny Allman-Payne, Mr Blair Comley, Mr Greg Pugh
Thanks, Chair. My questions relate to the IAT. And the first lot are in relation to some of the documents that had been previously released under FOI in relation to that. So my first question is according to emails that were published under FOI, the Department was regularly indicating to assessors that human override would be preserved. I'm keen to understand more clearly how this miscommunication happened. I know that we've heard in our inquiry hearing that there was a point up until which people were being advised that override would be there. Then it wasn't, but keen to understand now if the department has actually unpacked how that miscommunication came about.
So Sonia Stewart, Deputy Secretary. So the government made its decision in 2024 that there would not be a human override and established the mechanism by which the integrated assessment tool and rules would be used to do classification and prioritization. So that was the key decision that government made at that time. What happened after that was uh departure from the legal grounds on which the system was created, and then the way that the build was done in terms of IT, and then there was a further departure, which uh we acknowledge and apologize for, and it was unfortunate in providing the guidance to assessors that there would be a human override. Um as you have would appreciate, and it's been a subject of um many appearances. This was a very big set of reforms. And um at the end of that process in terms of uh readiness and doing the assurance checks, it became um uh um it became um we became aware that there was a uh that this departure existed particularly in the provision of um legal advice that happened at the end of September right before the uh the new system was due to start on the first of November. Umsequent to that, there was a number of options that were considered around this misalignment, the misalignment between the government decision, the way the system had been built, what assessors had been advised, and options were considered and uh and legal advice provided. Um what happened was that uh we had to give notification to those assessors that an error had been made and the guidelines had to be changed that there would not be a human override. Um sorry, my voice. So that is the way that that um that is the way that that occurred.
Thanks, Ms. Stewart. And that accords with the evidence that was given at our Senate inquiry. I guess my question goes to has the department actually identified um the source of where those departures, as you phrased it, um Occurred. So who in the department was responsible for these miscommunications?
So in these big reforms, there's a number of different teams that work contemporaneously to do bills and do the reforms. And there's a digital delivery, there's policy delivery, there's key connections with assessment organisations around the integrated assessment tool and guidance. And so there was a key departure around the build that was made into the system and the legislation. So we have we have done that. I do also acknowledge that this is the subject of a recommendation from the Ombudsman into his own motion review, which the Department has accepted in terms of doing further work around the root cause analysis. Did you want to add anything further to that?
Could I just ask you to clarify though? So you're saying there was a problem with the build. So has the department done any work to identify the source of the problem of the build? Were they given incorrect instructions? Was it that the people who did the build made errors? Like has the department actually identified precisely where these errors occurred?
I'll ask Mr. Pugh, Senator Orman Payne to go into further detail. Thank you.
Thank you.
Thanks, Senator. So probably just a supplement Ms. Stewart's response. As Ms. Stewart has identified, the development of the legal framework did involve a number of parallel processes. There are a number of different teams. We're all working at the same time to develop the legislative framework, IT system program arrangements and operational policies. And we have accepted it in response to the Ombudsman's report that a common understanding of the legal framework across all teams is essential and we accept responsibility for not meeting that standard. That said, when it comes to the IT build, we've given evidence in this forum and in other inquiries over the last several months around the fact that the system needs a functionality to enable outcomes to be overridden to put people into short-term pathways such as restorative care and end of life and also into residential care. So the way that we've managed the ability for someone to not override an ongoing support at home classification one to eight is to have a very clear and prominent warning sign that says if you override this outcome in relation to this subset of classifications, that is illegal and uh you know we are basically monitoring that approach. So that that is the way that that has come into development and the way that we're managing uh the system in practice.
Can I just add to this? I try to be helpful, Senator.
Just to clarify, I'm still unclear though that the department has identified and can tell the Senate where who was responsible for the error. Like you've told us there was a miscommunication, you've told us the build at human override built into it, but no one has actually said that you've identified where the problem precisely existed. And I'm I'm going to go to page 12 of the Ombudsman's report, where the Ombudsman says, no quote. In our view, the Department did not and may still not understand key components of the legal framework it created, nor did it understand what legal framework it was meant to create. This had serious consequences, including that up and until the introduction of the Act and the rules in October 2025, Department had been incorrectly advising assessment providers and the public that automated IAT outcomes could be changed. This is despite the fact that there was no mechanism in the Act or the rules to change outcomes. I guess my concern is if the Department can't tell the Senate precisely how this error occurred, and given that the Ombudsman is saying they're not convinced that the Department understood what it was meant to be doing, how can we be sure that these errors aren't going to happen again if you can't tell the Senate where the errors actually occurred and who was responsible?
If I may, Senator, thank you for the question. We have done we have done quite a lot of looking back as to where we think the divergence occurred. We believe the divergence occurred as far back as June 2024 in terms of different understandings of whether there would be an override. And so we have looked at you know planning sessions that went into the IT build where there was clearly an understanding by some in the department that there would be an override function. We agree with the Ombudsman that there was not uniform understanding of the legal basis through that period leading up to 1 November 2025. The amount of and I think my colleagues have provided significant evidence to various committees of the Senate related to this that once the checks were done before the launching of the system on the 1st of November 2025, there was clarity both about the legal basis but also clarity across the whole department as to the fact that there would not be an override for that component of the IAT. So we have agreed with the recommendation from the Ombudsman to do a root cause analysis, which we will further investigate the precise reason for the divergence, but as best as we can tell at the moment, the divergence occurred as far back for some teams as June 2024, and then unfortunately but became established kind of wisdom that there would among some teams that there would be an override. It was only when the final checks were done with the law and legislation when the when the just before commencement that this inconsistency was identified, at which point we then advised assessors that the override was not available.
Mr. Comley, is the expectation uh that the findings of the root cause analysis will be made available to the Senate at future estimates hearings?
Yes. Yes, I would I would envisage the root cause analysis would be would be published once we have completed it to make it clear exactly what what was the cause of this um implementation um error?