Govt told to fix Centrelink wait times

The Senate has called on the federal government to address frustrating wait times for people trying to call Centrelink.

The joint Greens and Labor motion agreed to in the Senate on Wednesday calls on the government to address service delivery failures at Centrelink, following a 19 per cent rise in complaints between 2013/14 and 2014/15.

"There are endless accounts of recipients trying to report changes in their circumstances just to hit a busy dial tone or hours of wait time," Greens senator Rachel Siewert said in a statement.