privacy laws and centrelink?

[davidc4430]

http://www.abc.net.au/news/2017-02-27/dhs-warns-to-disclose-centrelink-recipients-history/8307958

funny whenever someone wants some info regarding a family member from centrelink you hit a brick wall.

that info is protected by privacy laws mate.

seems the department/govt can bypass the law when it suits

[davidc4430]

Centrelink clients affected by debt recovery advised personal information no longer safe

http://www.abc.net.au/news/2017-03-01/centrelink-clients-advised-personal-information-no-longer-safe...

i think we all should be concerned, how often do we fill out forms under the understanding the information supplied is protected from being released by law?

now we discover the govt in order to discredit someone has released some of that information.

why will anyone want to supply information knowing the 'law' no longer protects them?

[lyndal1838]

If they want money from the Government they will supply whatever information the Government requests, privacy concerns or not.

They have you over a barrel, unfortuately.

[tezza2844]

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@lyndal1838 wrote:

If they want money from the Government they will supply whatever information the Government requests, privacy concerns or not.

They have you over a barrel, unfortuately.

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And if you challenge or question their decision or ruling, they will feed all your personal details to the media to try and silence you.

[lyndal1838]

If you go public with questions and accusations you can probably expect something like that to happen.

There are avenues for challenging rulings and decisions without dragging it into the public domain.

[davidc4430]

makes ya wonder why this govt is unpopular doesnt it.

make trouble for us and we will reveal embarrasing private information about you to the media.

how long before PM Turnbull utters the words "I'll make australia GREAT AGAIN!"

and anyone printing stuff he disagrees with will be 'fake news' broadcasters.

heard him on radio this morning, just once i'd love an interviewer to say 'ok obvioulsly you wont answer the question so 'click' your gone'

no more avoiding answering questions by any pollies, now that would be a nice change.

[lyndal1838]

How many times do we find that there is another side to a story?   If someone wants to bad mouth a government department I believe the department has a right to defend theselves if there is another side to the story.

Or are you advocating that a person can make up any garbage that they like to get what they want from any government agency with no ramifications?   That is an open invitation to rort the system and part of the reason that our social security budget is out of control.

[davidc4430]

no, i'm not advocating the right of anyone making up garbage and get away with it.

the govt, and whatever department have every right to disprove anything in a way that does not make it personal.

once they start using a persons private information as a way to silence the argument we are in big trouble.

centerlink deals with huge numbers of people, if someone makes a complaint the department must investigate. if the complaint is found to be groundless then send that information to the complainant. if the person goes to the media the depatment has the right to respond with information that the complaint was investigated and found to be wrong. but not to release the information or history of the person to the media.

if the media broadcasts false facts as being true then its the media who should be in trouble.

what centerlink did in this case was unprofessional and will have i believe repercussions. to have avoided the privacy laws to punish a person is just not ok.

do we just tear up privacy laws now? where will that lead us to?

[davidc4430]

Linda Burney urges AFP to investigate Centrelink recipient's information release

http://www.abc.net.au/news/2017-03-02/burney-urges-afp-to-investigate-centrelink-information-release...

i think if the privacy laws were any good in the first place someones in trouble.

[*tippy*toes*]

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@davidc4430 wrote:

makes ya wonder why this govt is unpopular doesnt it.

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Every government is unpopular isn't it? It doesn't matter who's in, they're just a bunch of lying, cheating pollies, who are only in it for their own personal gain.