Category: Services Australia

January 12, 2024

Services Australia embarks on massive networking reset

Services Australia will replace the network that connects its workforce for the first time in more than a decade in response to the growth in cloud-based tools and the WFH shift triggered by the pandemic. The upgrade, dubbed the Telecommunications Services Programme, is one of the first major transformations at the agency since the seven-year,…

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December 12, 2023

Millions spent on dud welfare calculator despite local option

A “viable” local alternative to the failed Pegasystems platform that was intended to replace a 40-year-old mainframe rules engine used to calculate welfare payments was discovered by Services Australia almost a year before the $191 million project was finally scrapped, documents reveal. The proof of concept, conducted by the agency two years into the Entitlement…

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December 12, 2023

myGov reformer David Hazlehurst to lead Services Australia

Public sector stalwart David Hazlehurst, who set up the Digital Transformation Office as interim CEO in 2015 and steered the team of bureaucrats that reviewed the myGov platform plast year, has been appointed to lead Services Australia. Mr Hazlehurst will join the government’s largest service delivery agency in early January, having spent the last 10…

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November 13, 2023

After Robodebt: Govt pledges new regime for automated decisions

Automated decision-making will come under greater scrutiny in the wake of Robodebt, with the federal government pledging to new oversight arrangements for automation in service delivery while it contemplates the creation of a new audit body. The government has also launched a review of data-matching programs between the Australian Taxation Office (ATO) and Services Australia,…

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September 13, 2023

NACC referral for Stuart Robert and lobby-linked tech procurements

Alleged procurement conflicts of interest between former government services and NDIS minister Stuart Robert and a consulting firm co-owned by a “longtime friend, business partner and political fundraiser” have been referred to the National Anti-Corruption Commission by a parliamentary committee. The Joint Committee of Public Accounts and Audit recommended that the recently established National Anti-Corruption…

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August 13, 2023

Services Aust shuts down questions on its use of spyware

Services Australia has declined to tell Parliament what data it is collecting with controversial Israeli spyware and confirmed it has never been knocked back from a warrant to deploy it, including 16 in the last year. The agency also said it does not track how many times it has used the technologies from controversial Israeli…

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July 31, 2023

Push for procurement rethink after ‘criminal’ GovERP outlay

Independent senator David Pocock says the federal government should not be afraid to cut its losses when multi-million dollar technology projects go awry and open the opportunity up to local competitors, rather than double down with multinationals. The ACT senator called for the rethink of assumptions behind procurement after the price tag for the federal…

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July 26, 2023

Shorten vows to break vendor stranglehold on govt services

Services minister Bill Shorten wants a new approach to his agencies’ policy design and implementation through a more capable public service that takes fewer leads from tech vendors and consultants. In the wake of the Robodebt Royal Commission and a series of tech wrecks across government, Mr Shorten on Tuesday laid out the new approach…

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July 25, 2023

Shorten puts failed $191m welfare calculator out of its misery

The federal government has abandoned a long running upgrade to the system used to calculate welfare recipients’ eligibility and payments after pouring $191 million into the tech project over the last four years. As revealed by InnovationAus.com, the project had been on pause since last year after not only hitting technical barriers, but also being…

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July 19, 2023

The staggering cost of GovERP revealed, with no end in sight

Budget funding for the federal government’s common enterprise resource planning system known as GovERP has been laid bare for the first time, as the overhaul enters its fifth year with little to show. Secrecy has surrounded the cost of the project that will replace several existing SAP enterprise resource planning (ERP) systems in use at five…

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July 12, 2023

Public sector technology is failing the public interest

In the preface to the Report of the Royal Commission into the Robodebt Scheme, Royal Commissioner Catherine Holmes reflects on how she was startled at the ‘myriad’ of ways the scheme failed the public interest. A fundamental failure was institutional – the Australian Public Service (APS) did not live up to its formal responsibilities or…

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July 3, 2023

On the ‘back burner’: Govt still to reveal myGov plan

The Albanese government has placed myGov on the “back burner” by not formulating a long-term plan that responds to the findings of the independent audit, according to shadow minister for government services Paul Fletcher. In January, a panel led by former CSIRO chair David Thodey asked for a response by July 1 to its 10…

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June 28, 2023

Services Aus to re-examine lobbying scandal

Government Services minister Bill Shorten has ordered his agency to investigate its exposure to a lobbying scandal that allegedly sought to funnel kickbacks to former minister Stuart Robert for helping tech companies win government contracts. Former Services Australia official Damien West was further embroiled in the scandal on Wednesday with the publication of allegations he…

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June 23, 2023

Centrelink payments engine rebuild paused as budget runs dry

A multi-million-dollar project to replace the legacy Centrelink system used to calculate and pay welfare recipients has been paused due to a lack of government funding, with the agency in charge now running the two systems side-by-side indefinitely. Services Australia has also been revealed to have significantly underestimated the number of business rules in the…

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March 30, 2023

Govt brings digital Medicare cards to myGov

Australians now have the option of adding a digital Medicare card with anti-fraud features to the myGov app, as the federal government continues works to integrate the card into Service NSW’s app. Government services minister Bill Shorten revealed the digital Medicare card on Thursday, which he said would offer greater ease of access for users…

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March 28, 2023

Single supplier procurements the norm in lobby-linked tech contracts

Government officials approached only one supplier in $472 million worth of technology procurements tainted by a developing lobbying scandal. Many of these were marked as “open tender” despite only one supplier ever being approached, while nearly a dozen failed to justify value for money. The limitations of the procurements were uncovered in a review of…

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March 21, 2023

EY’s GovERP work grows $43m in five months

Ernst & Young will be paid another $7.2 million over the next three months to ramp up work on the federal government’s enterprise resource planning system less than three months after Services Australia enforced a stand down on the overhaul. The cost of the consulting giant’s work as delivery partner will now come in at…

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February 15, 2023

No further tech contractor cuts planned at Services Aus

Services Australia is planning no further cuts to its technology contractor workforce this year after shedding 1245 workers in late 2022 and standing down more over the Christmas and New Year period. In November, reports emerged that 1000 technology contractors would be let go at the services agency following the end of several significant multi-year…

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January 31, 2023

myGov review urges funding certainty for ‘critical’ platform

An independent audit of myGov has urged the federal government to commit long-term ongoing funding of more than $100 million a year to the platform to ensure it becomes the “go to” place for online services. The findings of the much-anticipated audit led by former CSIRO chair David Thodey were announced by Government Services minister…

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January 24, 2023

IBM contracts surge after whole of government deal

Canberra’s largest government agencies have stuck multi-year deals with IBM worth more than $350 million following the arrival of the renegotiated whole-of-government agreement earlier this month. The Department of Defence and the Australian Taxation Office signed contracts with Big Blue just days before the Christmas and New Year’s shutdown, while the Digital Transformation Agency inked…

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December 9, 2022

GovERP faces summer slowdown as SAP build enters new phase

Work on the federal government’s massive enterprise resource planning system overhaul will be drastically cut back over the next two months, as the late-running multi-million-dollar project enters a new build phase. It comes just weeks after consulting giant Ernst & Young, the delivery partner on the Services Australia-run program, saw its principal GovERP contract more…

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December 5, 2022

Delayed myGov app launches sans Medicare card

The federal government’s long-promised myGov app has finally launched, complete with a new digital wallet offering users the ability to prove their identity with a service provider using a QR code. But the smartphone app, which was first flagged in 2019 and has taken the last 18 months to develop, is missing key features currently…

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October 4, 2022

Cyber hub pilot extended as govt considers long-term future

Efforts to centralise federal government networks through a handful of cyber hubs in Canberra’s biggest agencies will continue until the New Year, after the pilot program was extended. The six-month extension, which takes the trial up to the start of January 2023, was enabled by a $30.2 million injection in the 2022 federal budget that…

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September 27, 2022

One week in: David Hazelhurst on the short, sharp myGov audit

A crack team of bureaucrats from across the federal government has been assembled to support what is shaping up to be the most extensive audit of myGov since it was switched on more than a decade ago. Public sector stalwart David Hazelhurst has been brought in from the Department of Agriculture, Fisheries and Forestry (DAFF)…

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September 15, 2022

David Thodey to lead major audit of myGov platform

A panel of experts led by former CSIRO chair David Thodey will undertake a major audit of myGov promised by the federal government in the lead up to the election to deliver reliability and usability improvements for users. Former Human Rights Commissioner Edward Santow, eSafety Commissioner Julie Inman Grant, social epidemiologist Professor Emily Banks, and…

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September 5, 2022

Govt launches revamped myGov, says app still ‘coming soon’

The federal government has launched its revamped myGov platform, as its full attention now turns to delivering a long-promised smartphone app for accessing government services online. Services Australia flicked the switch on the new myGov on Monday, having revealed plans to permanently replace the legacy platform – which was last upgraded in 2017 – last…

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July 6, 2022

Big Blue: ServicesAus $50m private cloud server upgrade

Services Australia will spend $50 million to upgrade its five-year-old private cloud server fleet to IBM Power midrange hardware for use across the agency. The upgrade comes through a three year “hardware and software services” contract reported last week. Services Australia told InnovationAus.com the contract is to “upgrade an existing server fleet to the latest…

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July 1, 2022

Defence, ServicesAus warned over contractor oversight issues

Some of the Public Service’s biggest users of outside contractors are not ensuring the outsourced workers are properly qualified, inducted or discharged, the national audit office has found, putting Commonwealth assets at risk. The Australian National Audit Office (ANAO) has released three reports on the management of contractors by the Department of Defence, Services Australia…

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June 17, 2022

Massive extension to Services Aus data contract hidden for years

Services Australia’s contracts with Canberra Data Centre have now passed $300 million after updates published in recent weeks revealed a massive increase which had not been reported by the agency for years. Services Australia has held a contract with Canberra Data Centres (CDC) for a lease at its Hume data centre near Canberra since 2011….

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May 11, 2022

myGov app ‘on track’ to launch this year

A myGov smartphone app is “on track” to launch at some point this year after private beta testing began last December. It’s been nearly three years since the federal government flagged a need for a single government app to provide access to myGov services, and nearly six months since Deloitte’s $5.5 million contract to develop…

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