Treasurer Jim Chalmers hits back at Sussan Ley after she demanded Anthony Albanese apologise over COVID-19 payment delay

Treasurer Jim Chalmers has hit back at the Coalition after it demanded an apology be made to workers over the “far too slow” reinstatement of COVID-19 leave payments.

Deputy Liberal leader Sussan Ley demanded on Saturday Prime Minister Anthony Albanese say sorry to casual workers over the “flip flopping” of the pandemic support.

Mr Albanese bowed to intense pressure this week from state and territory leaders, unions and the Australian Medical Association to extend the Pandemic Leave Disaster Payment to September 30 after an urgent meeting of National Cabinet.

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Ms Ley said the Coalition had called for the payments to be restored for a week and hit out at the Prime Minister for his refusal to budge despite an emotional confrontation with a casual female worker who had struggled financially during COVID-isolation.

“To sort of put his hands up and say ‘not my problem’ two weeks in with people who have actually had to do without these payments,” she told the ABC.

“Putting them in this impossible position is unacceptable and Anthony Albanese needs to apologise to every casual worker who suffered stress as a result of this flip-flopping.”

Sunday Agenda host Kieran Gilbert posed the comments made by the Deputy Liberal leader to Mr Chalmers in an interview while he was at the G20 in Bali.

The Treasurer slammed the comments as “obviously ridiculous” and reference it was the Coalition that had set out the June 30 deadline for the pandemic payments.

“I think one of the reasons why that comment is so obviously ridiculous is because it was her government a little eight weeks ago that designed this program at the end of June,” he told Sky News Australia on Sunday.

“I think whether it is this or the comments the other day about the jobs summit, but they should be able to be invited to it, I think it fails at the first credibility hurdle.

“They will whinge and they will complain, we will get on with our work with state and territories led by premier and chief ministers of both political persuasions.”

He stressed it was Ms Ley’s government that had left the incoming Labor Party with a trillion dollars in debt and “restricted” them from doing “the right thing by people”.

“I think that those comments, from whether its Sussan Ley or others, are frankly ridiculous in the context of us trying to do the right thing by people,” Mr Chalmers added.

“But restrained and restricted in lots of ways by the enormous amount of debt our predecessors racked up and handed over to us.”

Mr Albanese also referenced the bill left over by the former government as justification as to why the payments had not been restored during questions after National Cabinet.

Ms Ley said Labor’s blaming of the former government was “just another ridiculous excuse”, arguing the Prime Minister was the one receiving health briefings and responsible for the Commonwealth’s COVID response.

“We’re not sitting at the National Security Committee table. We’re not getting those briefings. He knew, as those payments were concluding, exactly what was the health situation was turning into with new waves of COVID,” she said on Saturday.

The Pandemic Leave Disaster Payment was reinstated on Saturday after state and territory leaders met at a pushed forward National Cabinet.

The $750 payments will be split 50-50 between the Commonwealth and the state and territories which the Prime Minister said was a “fair way going forward”.

Mr Albanese said the decision recognised the “risks that are associated with the more infectious new variants” following a week of pressure on the government from both parties around the country and unions to backflip on its scrapping of the payments.

“I want to make sure that people aren’t left behind,” he said.

COVID-19 isolation requirements across the country have forced thousands of casual workers into isolation without pay as the third wave of the virus continues to spread.

But while the Prime Minister did not flag an end to COVID-19 isolation, he said the payments “can’t continue forever” given the economic constraints on the government.

The payments will be made available through Service Australia from July 20 and scheduled to end September 30 after the third wave peak in August.