Robodebt Royal Commission will rebuild trust and allow expanded MyGov progress, Bill Shorten says

It's the first step in his long-term vision to bring a "citizen-centric" focus to government services.

But Mr Shorten said lessons first had to be learned to ensure governments were providing systems that were "fair, accurate, accountable and efficient".

It comes as a briefing paper by Social Services Department officials recommended the fresh Labor government draw its attention to accuracy of payments rather than raising debts from welfare recipients in an effort to restore trust.

In a speech to a government services forum on Tuesday morning, the government services minister discussed his hope to see the federal government's MyGov system be expanded to become a "whole-of-life support" shop for Australians over the next decade.

Pointing to successful examples in Denmark, Estonia and South Korea, Mr Shorten said an enhanced MyGov could provide access to pharmaceutical prescriptions, and offer health check reminders with a built-in booking system for GPs.

Cyber security risks and privacy concerns needed to be worked through, however, before achieving a system of that level, he said.

But the "robodebt" scheme, a government income-matching program that wrongfully issued debts to thousands of Australians, had set back public trust, making service enhancements a challenge.

Mr Shorten described the initiative, which was introduced in 2015 by then-social services minister Scott Morrison, as "deeply-flawed" and "beta-testing" on the country's most vulnerable.

"[Robodebt] is the antithesis of fair, a woefully unlawful experiment on vulnerable people," he said.

"The Royal Commission will help us understand how such a failure of public administration could happen, for the crucial reason of ensuring it will never happen again.

"We should assume that AI and similar new technology will make mistakes, and that we should design services around that assumption."

Labor announced during the election period, if elected, it would hold a Royal Commission into the years-long saga, which resulted in more than a billion dollars being repaid to nearly half a million Australians.

Mr Morrison rejected calls for further inquiries into the matter, responding "the problem has been addressed" and accusing Labor of hypocrisy.

Mr Shorten said on Tuesday it was time to reset the conversation and earn back trust.

"I want us to return to a respectful relationship between the government and the APS, that has the safety to be and truly frank and fearless," he said.