Julian Hill (Bruce, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

My question is to the Prime Minister. Andrew Johnson from my electorate has profound autism, bipolar disorder, attention deficit disorder and epilepsy. He cannot speak and needs a stomach tube to help him eat. Yet Andrew's mother was asked by Centrelink to prove Andrew's eligibility for the Disability Support Pension, despite him being eligible for many years. Why is the Prime Minister continuing the cruelty of the Abbott government, instead of ensuring that people with disability, like Andrew, who have no capacity to work, will continue to receive the Disability Support Pension?

Ms Burney interjecting—

Tony Smith (Speaker) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

The member for Barton will cease interjecting. The Prime Minister has the call.

Malcolm Turnbull (Wentworth, Liberal Party, Prime Minister) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Paring out the political rhetoric from the honourable member's question, his constituent faces, clearly, a large number of very serious conditions, and his mother clearly has an enormous challenge in caring for him, and we care for her. We care for her. That is why we are rolling out the NDIS across the country.

The matter that he raises is an important one, because I can say that, just as fairness is an absolutely critical, essential element in our economic plan, so too is compassionate love a key part—the key part—of everything we do in terms of caring for those people who are ill or are disabled. I will ask the minister who has the carriage of this portfolio to expand on this answer to your question.

Christian Porter (Pearce, Liberal Party, Minister for Social Services) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I thank the member for his question. I am certainly very happy to get any particular individual details with respect to the person who is the subject matter of your question.

Ms Husar interjecting—

Tony Smith (Speaker) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

The member for Lindsay will cease interjecting.

Christian Porter (Pearce, Liberal Party, Minister for Social Services) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

It is absolutely the case—indeed, it was a process that was started when you were in government—that the assessibility matrix of levels of disability around the Disability Support Pension changed, and, further, under our side of government, there have been more stringent application processes, including consideration of new applications by a Commonwealth appointed government doctor, and looking at all those people in the system under 35 to ensure that those people in the Disability Support Pension system who have a capacity to work—although that might be a modest or limited capacity—are properly assessed for that.

You make the point, based on the information that you have provided here, that this person—

Ms Husar interjecting—

Tony Smith (Speaker) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

The member for Lindsay is warned.

Christian Porter (Pearce, Liberal Party, Minister for Social Services) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

seems to not fit inside those changes, and of course I will have a very good look at that. But I might just add, for the benefit of the House, that the reason that these changes were undertaken—and indeed it was a process, with the nature of the assessments and the disability tables, that was started by members opposite, under your own government—was that on 30 June 2014 the DSP population, which had been growing very steadily at around 7.6 per cent each year, had reached 830,000 individuals. When you take out children and other non-working-age people in the Australian population, that represents a rate of one in 20 working-age Australians being on the disability support pension. That is why more stringent processes were put in place. But I would be very pleased to look at this particular individual case to see where that fits into these processes.