The United States Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) is a cabinet-level executive branch department of the U.S. federal government created to protect the health of the U.S. people and providing essential human services. Its motto is "Improving the health, safety, and well-being of America". Before the separate federal Department of Education was created in 1979, it was called the Department of Health, Education, and Welfare (HEW).
Medicare is the publicly funded universal health care insurance scheme in Australia operated by the nation's social security agency, Services Australia. The scheme either partially or fully covers the cost of most health care, with services being delivered by state and territory governments or private enterprises. All Australian citizens and permanent residents are eligible to enrol in Medicare, as well as international visitors from 11 countries that have reciprocal agreements for medically necessary treatment.
Abortion in Australia is legal. There are no federal abortion laws, and full decriminalisation of the procedure has been enacted in all jurisdictions. Access to abortion varies between the states and territories: Surgical abortions are readily available on request within the first 22 to 24 weeks of pregnancy in most jurisdictions, and up to 16 weeks in Tasmania. Later-term abortions can be obtained with the approval of two doctors, although the Australian Capital Territory only requires a single physician's approval.
The Centrelink Master Program, or more commonly known as Centrelink, is a Services Australia master program of the Australian Government. It delivers a range of government payments and services for retirees, the unemployed, families, carers, parents, people with disabilities, Indigenous Australians, students, apprentices and people from diverse cultural and linguistic backgrounds, and provides services at times of major change. The majority of Centrelink's services are the disbursement of social security payments.
Lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, and queer (LGBTQ) rights in Australia rank among the highest in the world; having significantly advanced over the latter half of the 20th century and early 21st century. Opinion polls and the Australian Marriage Law Postal Survey indicate widespread popular support for same-sex marriage within the nation. Australia in 2018, in fact was the last of the Five Eyes set of countries - that consisted of namely Canada (2005), New Zealand (2013), United Kingdom (2014) and the United States (2015) to legalize same-sex marriage. A 2013 Pew Research poll found that 79% of Australians agreed that homosexuality should be accepted by society, making it the fifth-most supportive country surveyed in the world. With its long history of LGBTQ activism and annual Gay and Lesbian Mardi Gras festival, Sydney has been named one of the most gay-friendly cities in the world.
The Attorney-General's Department, also known as the Department of the Attorney-General, is the law enforcement and justice department of the Australian Government. The AG’s Department is responsible for the enforcement and compliance of federal law, the administration of justice and the national oversight of industrial relations affairs. The department oversees various sub-agencies including the Australian Security Intelligence Organisation (ASIO), the Australian Federal Police (AFP), the Australian Human Rights Commission (AHRC) and the Director of Public Prosecutions.
The Medical Rural Bonded Scholarship (MRBS) Scheme is an Australian government program designed to address the shortage of doctors in rural areas. As part of the scheme doctors are required to work for 20 hours per week in an area classified as RA2-5 for 9 months of the year over 4-5.5 years, once they have attained Fellowship and commenced their return of service period. Where these doctors work for the rest of the time is up to them, the location they choose to work in is also up to them. although they are restricted to working in areas classified as RA2-5 for their return of service.
Social security, in Australia, refers to a system of social welfare payments provided by Australian Government to eligible Australian citizens, permanent residents, and limited international visitors. These payments are almost always administered by Centrelink, a program of Services Australia. In Australia, most payments are means tested.
The Minister for Government Services is the minister in the Government of Australia responsible for Services Australia. The current minister since 1 June 2022 is the Hon Bill Shorten MP, who also serves as Minister for the National Disability Insurance Scheme.
Ombudsmen in Australia are independent agencies who assist when a dispute arises between individuals and industry bodies or government agencies. Government ombudsman services are free to the public, like many other ombudsman and dispute resolution services, and are a means of resolving disputes outside of the court systems. Australia has an ombudsman assigned for each state; as well as an ombudsman for the Commonwealth of Australia. As laws differ between states just one process, or policy, cannot be used across the Commonwealth. All government bodies are within the jurisdiction of the ombudsman.
National biosecurity in Australia is governed and administered by two federal government departments, the Department of Health and the Department of Agriculture, Fisheries and Forestry. The Biosecurity Act 2015 (C'wealth) and related legislation is administered by the two departments and manages biosecurity risks at the national border. The Act aims to manage biosecurity risks to human health, agriculture, native flora and fauna and the environment. It also covers Australia's international rights and obligations, and lists specific diseases which are contagious and capable of causing severe harm to human health. Each state and territory has additional legislation and protocols to cover biosecurity in their jurisdiction (post-border) including the detection of pests and diseases that have breached the national border.
The National Disability Insurance Scheme (NDIS) is a scheme of the Australian Government that funds reasonable and necessary supports associated with significant and permanent disability for people under 65 years old. The scheme was first introduced in 2013 following the "Make It Real" community campaign and advocacy from disability groups. The scheme is administered by the National Disability Insurance Agency (NDIA) as part of the Department of Social Services and overseen by the NDIS Quality and Safeguards Commission.
Lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, and queer (LGBTQ) people in Australian state of Tasmania have the same legal rights as non-LGBTQ people. Tasmania has a transformative history with respect to the rights of LGBTQ people. Initially dubbed "Bigots' Island" by international media due to intense social and political hostility to LGBTQ rights up until the late 1990s, the state has subsequently been recognised for LGBTQ law reforms that have been described by activists such as Rodney Croome as among the most extensive and noteworthy in the world. Tasmania's criminal penalties for homosexual activity were the harshest in the Western world when they were repealed in 1997. It was the last Australian jurisdiction to decriminalise homosexuality after a United Nations Human Rights Committee ruling, the passage of federal sexual privacy legislation and a High Court challenge to the state's anti-homosexuality laws. Following decriminalisation, social and political attitudes in the state rapidly shifted in favour of LGBTQ rights ahead of national trends with strong anti-LGBTQ discrimination laws passed in 1999, and the first state relationship registration scheme to include same-sex couples introduced in 2003. In 2019, Tasmania passed and implemented the world's most progressive gender-optional birth certificate laws. In July 2023, the Tasmanian government officially included and also added "asexual or asexuality".
The Office of the Assistant Secretary for Planning and Evaluation (ASPE) is the principal advisory group to the United States Secretary of the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) on policy development and provides coordination and support for HHS's strategic and policy planning, planning and development of legislation, program evaluation, data gathering, policy-related research, and regulatory program.
Lynelle Jann Briggs, is a former Australian Public Service Commissioner. She was chief executive of Medicare from 2009 until 2011, when Medicare was integrated into the Department of Human Services.
The Australian Digital Health Agency is the Australian Government statutory agency responsible for My Health Record, Australia's digital prescriptions and health referral system, and other e-health programs under the national digital health strategy. The agency replaces the former National E-Health Transition Authority which ceased on 1 July 2016. The agency is led by its chief executive officer, board, and is subject to directions issued by the minister for health and aged care on the approval of all state and territory health ministers.
My Health Record (MHR) is the national digital health record platform for Australia, and is managed by the Australian Digital Health Agency. It was originally established as the Personally Controlled Electronic Health Record (PCEHR), a shared electronic health summary set up by the Australian government with implementation overseen by the National Electronic Health Transition Authority (NEHTA). The purpose of the MHR is to provide a secure electronic summary of people's medical history which will eventually include information such as current medications, adverse drug reactions, allergies and immunisation history in an easily accessible format. This MHR is stored in a network of connected systems with the ability to improve the sharing of information amongst health care providers to improve patient outcomes no matter where in Australia a patient presents for treatment. PCEHR was an opt-in system with a unique individual healthcare identifier (IHI) being assigned to participants and the option of masking and limiting information available for viewing controlled by the patient or a nominated representative; MHR uses an opt-out system.
The New South Wales Department of Communities and Justice, a department of the Government of New South Wales, is responsible for the delivery of services to some of the most disadvantaged individuals, families and communities; and the administration and development of a just and equitable legal system of courts, tribunals, laws and other mechanisms that further the principles of justice in the state of New South Wales, Australia. It also provides services to children and young people, families, people who are homeless, people with a disability, their families and carers, women, and older people. The department is the lead agency of the Stronger Communities cluster of the New South Wales government.
The Robodebt scheme was an unlawful method of automated debt assessment and recovery implemented under the Liberal-National Coalition governments of Tony Abbott, Malcolm Turnbull, and Scott Morrison, and employed by the Australian government agency Services Australia as part of its Centrelink payment compliance program. Put in place in July 2016 and announced to the public in December of the same year, the scheme aimed to replace the formerly manual system of calculating overpayments and issuing debt notices to welfare recipients with an automated data-matching system that compared Centrelink records with averaged income data from the Australian Taxation Office.
Kerri Gaye Hartland is the Director-General of the Australian Secret Intelligence Service (ASIS). She was formerly an Australian public servant for 30 years, before joining the private sector. She was the first female deputy director-general of Australian Security Intelligence Organisation (ASIO) and took up the position of secretary of the Australian Government Department of Employment, Skills, Small and Family Business in January 2017.
