Peta Murphy (Dunkley, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

My question is to the Minister for Government Services. Can the minister inform the House on why he still plans to close the Mornington Centrelink shopfront in March 2021 when the site received over 31,000 contacts in the 2019-20 financial year?

Stuart Robert (Fadden, Liberal Party, Minister for the National Disability Insurance Scheme) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I thank the member for her question. As the House would know, Services Australia runs an extraordinarily diverse property portfolio—in fact, 728,000 square metres across 402 commercial properties. Services Australia runs 325 customer-facing sites. It's a large portfolio. That portfolio used to be larger. In fact, it used to be larger by 256 sites, which were those that Labor cut from 2009 to 2013. In 2009, 61 sites were cut. In the 2011-12 budget, 67 sites were cut. So I say to the member: your tactics committee has given you the hospital pass from hell when you walk in here and talk to us about sites when the colleagues of yours over there closed 256—

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

The member for Dunkley on a point of order?

Peta Murphy (Dunkley, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

My point of order is on relevance. The question was very direct: can the minister inform the House on why he plans to close the Mornington Centrelink shop in March 2021 given the number of contacts?

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

I just say to both the member and the minister that the minister is entitled to give context, but I judge that he's done that, and the question was very specific.

Stuart Robert (Fadden, Liberal Party, Minister for the National Disability Insurance Scheme) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Thank you, Mr Speaker. The Mornington service centre has been extended, and the extent of the lease is up to the date the member had. Clearly, as we move forward towards that date, we have conversations with our leaseholders, as we do. It's important to also understand that, in terms of leaseholders, we have 354 individual landlords that the department engages with across our 402 commercial sites, and we continue to engage with them as necessary. But, in terms of service delivery, it's important that the member understand that the service delivery to her constituents will continue. For example, it's important that the member understand that yesterday Services Australia answered 147,000 calls, and on the social services and welfare line those calls had an average speed of answer of 67 seconds. I'd say to the member that in 2013 the average speed of answer across social services and welfare under those opposite was 90 minutes. Australians waited for 90 minutes. Yesterday they waited 67 seconds. That's the difference. I'd say to the House that, unfortunately, this financial year 47 Australians haven't been able to get through to the call centre, compared to when the member for Sydney was there. It was 40 million calls that were not answered in the 12 months the member for Sydney was there. So I'd say to those opposite that, if we're going to have a discussion about service delivery standards, we will stand up every day and compare our 67 seconds to 90 minutes. We'll compare our 47 Australians who couldn't get through on our lines to 40 million. We'll compare 256 closures over there— (Time expired)