Kath Madgwick, mum of 22-year-old Robodebt victim calls for justice for dead son
Kath Madgwick thought her son had left the house to calm down after receiving a letter from Centrelink. Tragically, that wasn’t the case.
WARNING: Confronting
When Jarrad Madgwick left the Albury-Wodonga home he shared with his mum on May 30, 2019, his mother Kath Madgwick thought her son had gone somewhere to calm down.
Two days later, she discovered her son, 22, had taken his own life.
At the time Jarrad was unemployed and suffering from mental health problems. He had been frantically seeking employment, while attempting to apply for Centrelink.
After days of taxing phone calls, Jarrad received a $2000 debt letter. The next day he was dead.
“What I realise now is that he catastrophised and he was angry,” she tells news.com.au.
“I thought he was walking to go to settle down but he got himself in such an emotional state that he thought his life was ruined.”
On Tuesday, the community services worker drove two-and-a-half hours from Glenwood, Queensland to Brisbane where she attended the initial hearing into the Royal Commission into the Robodebt Scheme.
She sat in the first row of the commission, alongside former Opposition Leader and the current Minister for Government Services and Minister for the National Disability Insurance Scheme, Bill Shorten, and Jennifer Miller.
On Australia Day 2017, the Queensland woman lost her son Rhys Cauzzo, 27, to suicide after he was wrongly issued two debts totalling $28,000.
Taking place more than three years after her son’s death, Ms Madgwick hopes the result will offer her a bit of closure and hold its instigators accountable.
“There’s nothing that could ever bring Jarrad back but if they can stop it from happening to somebody else and people are held accountable for doing something illegal – then I’ll feel like there’s been a bit of justice,” she says.
With a deadline set for April 18, 2023, the Royal Commission will investigate the unlawful program which saw Centrelink issue automated debt notices to welfare recipients based on income averaging, and not actual income figures. These were also sent without further investigation from compliance officers, as was previously practised.
The Coalition-led scheme ran from 2015 to 2019 and saw a total of $751 million wrongly collected from 381,000 people.
A class-action lawsuit settled by Gordon Legal in 2021 also led to more than $1.8 billion in compensation being paid to victims.
Ms Madgwick says there’s another hidden cost behind Robodebt’s legacy.
“They chased my son for $2000 and I was (so distraught) that I wasn’t able to work and had to rely on welfare for 12 months,” she says.
“That cost the government a hell of a lot more than $2000.”
#Robodebt Royal Commission starts next Tuesday. For years I said it was illegal while the Libs denied any wrongdoing.
— Bill Shorten (@billshortenmp) September 21, 2022
It’s time victims got answers and justice, and we will make sure it never happens again: https://t.co/mo4JAX0Vlepic.twitter.com/89Qt4wNVvQ
Making her open address on Tuesday, former Queensland Supreme Court chief justice Catherine Homes (who will be leading the commission) said the $30 million probe will look to hold people in senior positions accountable.
This could include senior members of the previous Coalition government.
“A good deal is known about how the Robodebt scheme operated, but not much has been revealed about why, about what advice or consultation or reasoning or response to criticism was occurring behind the scenes at any stage,” the commissioner said.
“But the focus — appropriately and in accordance with the terms of reference — will be on those in senior positions who had or should have had oversight of it.”
While Ms Madgwick will be one of the many public voices who will make submissions to the Royal Commission, she remains baffled, angry and grieving over what happened to her son when he was at his most “vulnerable”.
“There needs to be human contact (versus an automated letter). They said they sent him an estimation and there was no contact after that,” she says.
“Even if Jarrad owed the money, they still did it at the wrong time when he had no income.
“If Jarrad did owe the money, I’m not against him paying it back, I’m against the way they did it.”
She admits, however, that retelling Jarrad’s story leaves her “overwhelmed”.
“I got into a little bit of a state. I thought ‘here we go again, I’ve got to live through this again’,” said Ms Madgwick, speaking about her first attempts at writing her submission.
“All of this brings up so many memories.
“I hope Jarrad is proud of me and knows what I have done and put myself through in honour of him and how much I love him.”
The first block of public hearings for the Robodebt Royal Commission will commence from October 31 until November 11. Public submissions will be accepted until February 3, 2023.
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