Aged Care and the Pension Clawback

John Howard Lie #1

Interviewer: “Well, if the Budget’s in such good shape why persist with things like the pension claw back . . .”
John Howard: “No, no . . . because Glenn there is no clawback. And what happened with those things is that they were paid in advance and we’re not taking them back, we’re just avoiding paying them twice . . .”
John Howard, interview with Glenn Milne, Sunday Sunrise, 4 March 2001

John Howard Lie #2

“There has been no clawback, there has been no deduction and there has been no deceit”.
John Howard, Parliament, 5 March 2001

The Truth:

“The indexation adjustments to pensions and adult allowance rates for 20 March 2001 will have the additional issue of clawback . . . Two per cent of the existing rate will be deducted from the normal CPI adjustment . . .”
Department of Family and Community Services, internal briefing paper, quoted in Parliament, 5 March 2001