Chief technology officer Charles McHardie, a former Commodore in the Royal Australian Navy, has been acting in the CIO role since the departure of the department’s long-time CIO Gary Sterrenberg in January this year to work on a PhD following his launch of a billion-dollar welfare payments infrastructure transformation, WPIT. DHS’ other top level executives under secretary Renée Leon remain unchanged: Catherine Rule on Programme Design, Rebecca Cross on Integrity and Information, Amanda Cattermole on Health and Aged Care as well as chief executive of Medicare, Barry Jackson on Service Delivery Operations and chief executive of Centrelink, and John Murphy on Payments Reform.