Services Australia lands $630m for myGov

Services Australia is set to receive $580 million over four years to maintain and continue developing myGov, after several years of dealing with “opportunistic funding bursts”.

The one-stop shop had been living off $134.5 million of “sustainment” funding granted in last year’s federal budget, with no certainty beyond the end of this financial year.

That effectively mirrored funding it had received in the previous two years, although at the time myGov was destined for a cut that would have left the service “under-funded”.

A review of myGov previously warned that “opportunistic funding bursts, without ongoing funding certainty, provide an unsustainable basis for developing myGov as a critical element of national service delivery infrastructure.”

That all changes with the 2024-5 federal budget, with over half a billion dollars - $580.3 million - to be sunk into myGov over four years, equating to about $145 million a year.

The agency also has some certainty beyond that as well, with budget papers indicating that myGov is in line to receive “$139.6 million per year ongoing”.

The $580.3 million is to be used “to sustain the myGov platform and ensure the continued development of its capability, including continuing an independent advisory board to provide guidance and advice to government on potential myGov enhancements until 2027-28”.

In addition, there will be an extra $50 million over four years - and $5.2 million a year after that - “for enhancements to the myGov platform to continue to respond to the findings of the critical national infrastructure myGov user audit and advice from the independent advisory board”.

Specifically, the budget papers call out “enhancements to the myGov support tool, strengthening myGov fraud detection capabilities, improving the myGov inbox and other communication tools and supporting users to better secure their myGov accounts” as programs of work that are all set to receive funding.