Vatarescu v Commonwealth of Australia for the Agency of Centrelink [2009] FCA 1539

FEDERAL COURT OF AUSTRALIA

Vatarescu v Commonwealth of Australia for the Agency of Centrelink [2009] FCA 1539

ANDREI VATARESCU v THE COMMONWEALTH OF AUSTRALIA FOR THE AGENCY OF CENTRELINK

ACD 45 of 2009

STONE J

14 DECEMBER 2009

CANBERRA

IN THE FEDERAL COURT OF AUSTRALIA

AUSTRALIAN CAPITAL TERRITORY DISTRICT REGISTRY

General Division ACD 45 of 2009

BETWEEN: ANDREI VATARESCU

Applicant

AND: THE COMMONWEALTH OF AUSTRALIA FOR THE AGENCY OF CENTRELINK

Respondent

JUDGE: STONE J

DATE OF ORDER: 14 DECEMBER 2009

WHERE MADE: CANBERRA

THE COURT ORDERS THAT:

1. The application for leave to appeal be dismissed. 2. The applicant pay the respondent's costs of the application.

Note: Settlement and entry of orders is dealt with in Order 36 of the Federal Court Rules. The text of entered orders can be located using eSearch on the Court's website.

IN THE FEDERAL COURT OF AUSTRALIA

AUSTRALIAN CAPITAL TERRITORY DISTRICT REGISTRY

General Division ACD 45 of 2009

BETWEEN: ANDREI VATARESCU

Applicant

AND: THE COMMONWEALTH OF AUSTRALIA FOR THE AGENCY OF CENTRELINK

Respondent

JUDGE: STONE J

DATE: 14 DECEMBER 2009

PLACE: CANBERRA

REASONS FOR JUDGMENT 1 This is an application for leave to appeal from the summary dismissal of an application by a Federal Magistrate; Vatarescu v Commonwealth of Australia for the Agency of Centrelink [2009] FMCA 1041. The proceeding before his Honour concerned a dispute between Mr Vatarescu and the respondent, Centrelink, as to his qualifications for the grant of the Newstart allowance. The relevant statutory provisions are accurately summarised in the submissions of the respondent, made in writing before the Federal Magistrate, and to which my attention has been drawn. 2 Under the Social Security Act 1991 (Cth), at the relevant time, applicants qualified for the Newstart allowance if they were unemployed, satisfied the activity test and entered into and complied with a Newstart activity agreement. Persons satisfy the activity test if they are actively seeking and willing to undertake paid work and comply with the terms of a Newstart activity agreement. If a person failed to comply with the terms of the Newstart activity agreement, they could not be taken to satisfy the activity test. 3 As discussed at the hearing before me this morning, the guidelines for the grant of the Newstart allowance are laid down under the Social Security Act but, as is clear, both from their title as "guidelines" and from the wording of the guidelines themselves, they give the Minister, and through the Minister the delegate of the Minister, considerable discretion as to how they are to be implemented. 4 It would appear that the applicant is a highly qualified man. His qualifications are as a physicist and, perhaps with good reason, he regarded the requirements of the activity agreement presented to him as incompatible with his qualifications. In his view the agreement did not assist him to obtain work and did not improve his prospects of obtaining work in the future. He strongly asserts that it is a waste of public resources to require him to pursue activities he regards as futile. He goes so far as to refer to it as "fraud" although as his Honour pointed out at [7], his use of the term fraud should be understood in its more generic sense rather than in its technical legal sense. 5 The application in the Federal Magistrates Court was initially filed on 9 April 2009. That application was clearly inadequate. It referred to the applicant's request to be compensated for loss of entitlements and stated, as grounds of the application: In a remarkable example of twisted logic, the Centrelink decision does not disprove the incompetence and ignorance demonstrated by the job network service provider, but blames the customer for the shortcomings and failures resulting from the non-implementation of the Job Network legislation and its guidelines.