I would charge the public servants AND the politicians involved. I suspect the politicians are too slippery and will get away. However the public servants at the top and bottom wont be so lucky.

While it may not be fair to the servants, it will concentrate their minds on the tasks they do. They will ensure that everything after that is legal and properly implemented. No more "I was only following orders". What was it the British navy says about admirals, you only have to shoot one occasionally to keep the rest in line.

regards
dkit

You don't need an inquiry to bring the "public service into disrepute"; they do that for themselves. Politicians are the ones who should be brought to book for not controlling the public service.

We should have been looking into the public service's crimes against humanity in the Covid debacle by now.

"Is the Albanese government up for it?". That should be 'what is the Albanese government up to'; but, we know by now that, right from their election, the Albanese government has been hell-bent on highlighting the failings of the previous government instead getting on with their own job. The Robodebt fiasco at least revealed 400,000 crooks who were getting public money they weren't entitled to; the Socialists will probably give it back to them, plus extra.

Now. Will there be an inquiry into Covid mismanagement and bastardry: the biggest totalitarian episode in our history, which has Albanese Socialist state premiers' fingerprints all over it?

I believe it will have no choice, as it has made so much political capital out of the issue.

This piece of political bastardry has absolutely underlined the IMMEDIATE need for an irrevocable bill of rights for Australian citizens. And needs to be addressed yesterday!
Alan B.

You don't need an inquiry to bring the "public service into disrepute"; they do that for themselves. Politicians are the ones who should be brought to book for not controlling the public service.
ttbn,
I think the Public Service Unions are more responsible than anyone for that mess. They're the ones protecting the incompetent by not letting them be moved sideways or down !

It's a good point, where were the central agencies like PM&C and Treasury, while DSS and DHS were victimising the peasants? Except, we all know the answer - they too were just brown-nosing the government.

Under Albanese, the Public Service will be just as obsequious as ever. Instead of punishing the peasants directly, Albanese will do it indirectly, by enforcing massive levels of immigration. That just happens to be, exactly what PM&C and Treasury want

I recall very vividly when a bureaucrat was involved in a domestic situation in which a firearm was discharged into the air. Because the local community wanted that person gone, the only way to get that person out was a promotion to somewhere else. Under Public Service conditions or rules or legislation or whatever, this person could not be demoted or stood down.
This is a critically serious flaw in that system ! This is why we hear of so much incompetence or corruption or misappropriation because we can not rid ourselves of such people & decent people can't get into the service because of nepotism & political party affiliatioin.

And pretty typical of this author I'm afraid.

No mention of the architect of the evil and immoral persecution of those of the most vulnerable of our community by this most overtly Christian Prime Minister we have had in recent times.

This was him at the Royal Commission where they really weren't prepared to go with his usual bluff and bluster.

http://twitter.com/TonyHWindsor/status/1634713306077470723?s=20

And this was him on the 7:30 report.

http://twitter.com/EVERALDATLARGE/status/1635911625088843778?s=20

Would not concede what had happen was immoral for the life of him.

What a pathetic faux Christian he is.

And the fact that this author did not go there is telling.

I heard that the original plans for Robodebt were set up by Shorten and Plibersek based on the same principle for determining whether businesses have paid tax.

The problem was not with the idea, but with the bureaucrats that implemented it. 1000s of welfare cheats were caught, but the mindless civil servants treated everyone as though they were guilty. If it had been better run it wouldn't have been a problem.

Seems very simple to me.
Did those who briefed the programmers understand what they wanted done ?
Did the programmers follow their instructions ?
Did the requesting public servants check the trial runs ?
The politians have nothing to do with it, they are TOO STUPID to understand it anyway.
We must take the lesson of the politicians allowing the power stations
to be destroyed before replacement generation was installed and running
and undestand that politicians are REALLY STUPID !

Dear Bazz,

Why are you even offering an opinion when you have such an anaemic view of what happened?

Of the over 400,000 people given debt notices only 18% were ultimately found to be accurate.

Public servants who raised concerns were sacked.

Ministerial advisors ended up copying and pasting comment for the Ombudsman's report.

Here is Robert's trying to say that as a lowly Minister he just did as he was told which is rubbish.
http://twitter.com/strangerous10/status/1631161062006595585?s=20

And here he is claiming he had a "massive personal misgiving" about the figures he was given but "That's what we do."
http://twitter.com/strangerous10/status/1631108109057011712?s=20

This is Tudge's advisor who later worked for Porter and now works for Dutton.
http://twitter.com/strangerous10/status/1630699726172721153?s=20

Lots of 'I can't recalls' and taking no responsibility.

"Tudge’s former COS Andrew Asten identified a flaw in the system, whereby a recipient’s vulnerability factor was missed when creating their Debt. The recipient later committed suicide."
http://twitter.com/strangerous10/status/1630359590931165184?s=20

What a venal and morally bereft political class they are and you are here defending them and claiming it was all the public servant's fault.

You are defending the indefensible.