The Abbott government is facing concern from its own ranks that slashing paid parental leave and stripping "terrorist" dual nationals of their citizenship could lead to human rights restrictions that are not justified.
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The government faces a difficult task passing its paid parental leave bill through Parliament after Labor, the Greens and some Senate crossbenchers vowed to oppose it.
The citizenship proposal is also under growing pressure after the Commonwealth Ombudsman, top legal experts and media outlets described it as ill-considered or an overreach.
The parental leave changes would prevent mothers of newborns collecting maternity leave from both their employer and a modest government scheme, a practice the government has called "double dipping".
It is expected to affect about 80,000 parents, mostly women, and save the Commonwealth nearly $1 billion over four years.
The plan was examined by a 10-member joint parliamentary committee led by Liberal elder Philip Ruddock and including government MP David Gillespie and senators Matthew Canavan, Dean Smith and Ken Wyatt.
Their report said the bill may limit rights to equality, non-discrimination and social security.
It said women would be disproportionately affected by the bill and questioned whether this was "justifiable".
New parents could lose more than $11,000 if cuts to the scheme go ahead and lower-paid women would be worst affected, analysis by the University of Sydney has found.
The committee said while budget constraints could justify such a policy, the government had failed to properly explain why the cuts were needed and where the savings would be directed.
Social Services Minister Scott Morrison said the measure would ensure the scheme was a "safety net for those families who do not have access to generous public sector or corporate schemes".
He said the government scheme had not increased the time parents took off work to care for their new baby beyond 18 weeks and "for single parent families there has been a reduction in the amount of time taken".
The committee also found issue with the government's proposal to revoke the citizenship of Australians deemed to have been involved in terrorism, particularly how it might apply to children.
Under the law, children aged under 10 are not criminally responsible for an offence. However, the committee found there was nothing in the bill to stop an older child having their citizenship revoked.
The government has argued that in some cases the protection of national security "outweighs the best interests of the child", but the committee said this "misapprehends" the government's obligations.
More broadly, it said the policy limited human rights such as freedom of movement "but did not sufficiently justify that limitation". The report found if someone convicted of a terrorism offence had their citizenship stripped, this effectively amounted to "double punishment".
The committee called on Immigration Minister Peter Dutton to explain "why existing laws and powers are insufficient to protect national security".
Mr Dutton said the government would consider the report and respond where appropriate.
