Ms Julie Bishop (Curtin, Liberal Party, Deputy Leader of the Opposition) Share this | Hansard source

This issue is about the Treasurer. This is about the Treasurer misusing his position as the Treasurer of this country—using his ministerial office, using his ministerial staff and directing Treasury officials to provide preferential treatment to a friend of the Prime Minister’s, who year after year after year has given the Prime Minister, when he was Leader of the Opposition, a free vehicle—the registration and all the costs involved. This is thousands and thousands of dollars as a gift to the Prime Minister. So this is about the Treasurer using his ministerial position, his ministerial staff and his ministerial office to direct Treasury officials to give preferential treatment to a mate of the Prime Minister’s.

Do you know what is extraordinary? This is exactly what the former Minister for Defence was accused of doing, and the former Minister for Defence resigned because he had used his ministerial office to direct Defence officials to meet with his brother in order to get preferential treatment.

The government tries to use the excuse that ‘Mr Grant did not get any credit from Ford Credit.’ Well, as I recall, the government also pointed out that Mr Fitzgibbon’s, the member for Hunter’s, brother did not get a contract with Defence, apart from the fact that those contracts have not been let yet, and that therefore it is okay. But the member for Hunter still resigned because he knew that it was an abuse of his position—his ministerial office—to direct a senior Defence official to be in his office to meet with officials that no other constituent would be able to access.

I just had a meeting with a whole group of constituents from the member for Mallee’s electorate and they said, ‘We have been in trouble in relation to Treasury matters before. We have needed support in relation to the bank guarantee.’ A number of them told me that they had written to the Treasurer’s office and received no reply. They have sought to get responses from the Treasurer’s office. But, in the case of Mr Grant, all he had to do was telephone the Treasurer and the Treasurer moved heaven and earth, that day, to make sure that Mr Grant’s needs were taken care of.

The patronage, the cronyism, the jobs-for-the-boys, the-looking-after-your-mates is so much a part of the Labor Party’s DNA that they do not even know when they have done something wrong. The member for Hunter was still denying that he had done anything wrong, because he was out blaming the Judases in his midst for his downfall. This is another Labor member with a messiah complex—yet another. They do not even know when they have done something wrong. They are still blaming the Judases for the Messiah’s downfall. This is another example of Labor once more trying to shoot the messenger.

Why is it that in the Senate inquiry last Friday the government senators, clearly on directions from the leadership, intervened to prevent evidence being given in the Senate inquiry? The government senators were trying to suppress evidence to a Senate inquiry by intervening in a most disgraceful way to prevent a Treasury official giving his evidence.

What happened to the openness and accountability and transparency that the Prime Minister promised on coming to office? A Senate inquiry was held not because the government wanted to clear the air but because the coalition, with the support of the Greens, was able to get up a Senate inquiry to answer the questions that the Treasurer and the Prime Minister refused to answer in question time. In fact, in the case of the Treasurer, the answers that he gave at the time were manifestly false and he knew it. So we set up a Senate inquiry, and what does the government do? It directs its senators to run interference against a Treasury official who is called to give evidence. That is disgraceful. That is absolutely disgraceful. The government directed a Treasury official to run interference on Mr Grech so that he could not complete his evidence. What kind of transparency is that and what is the government trying to hide?

If this was just a normal constituent—if Mr Grant was just a run of the mill constituent who made an inquiry and it was just going through the processes—why is the government trying to prevent the Treasury official who knows about this matter giving full evidence? What is the government seeking to hide? Well, you can get a fair idea of what the government was seeking to hide by the emails that were tabled—and I note this—by the government senators. I think it is passing strange that the Treasury officials did not table emails from Treasury but the government senators did. Government senators having tabled these emails certainly does gives the lie to what the Treasurer said in parliament in answer to questions about OzCar. In fact, it shows that on 27 February, after a whole series of efforts by Treasury officials and by the Treasurer’s office, they were prepared to do whatever it took to get Mr Grant preferential treatment. In fact, one of the emails—from Mr Grech, of 27 February, to Andrew Thomas in the Treasurer’s office and copied to the Treasurer’s home fax—goes so far as to say:

Andrew, just to let you know that I have spoken again with John Grant this afternoon to clarify progress.

This is a week of this Treasury official ringing Mr Grant, reporting back to the Treasurer and reporting to the Treasurer’s home fax. The email continues:

Grant said that he had a good meeting with Ford Credit on Thursday—

This is the meeting that the Treasury officials set up for Mr Grant. Do not worry about all the other car dealers across Australia; just one car dealer gets a meeting set up specifically for him with Ford Credit—

and they have told him that while they are generally concentrating on Ford dealerships—

So we know that Ford Credit do not generally deal with people who are not Ford dealers. He goes on to say:

… I know for a fact that they still have a number of non Ford dealers on their books … they were prepared to take him on assuming the numbers add up.

Mr Grech then goes on to talk about Grant’s accountant, who ‘is preparing the financial advice’. But I ask members to listen to this: Mr Grech says:

I told Grant to keep in touch and to let me know if Ford show concerns or resistance.

So if Ford shows ‘concerns or resistance’ to the direction from the Treasurer that Mr Grant is to be looked after, what happens then? Well, as Mr Grech says:

… I will not speak with Ford again on this unless it is absolutely necessary to push it through …

So this Treasury official was under no illusion that he had a direction from the Treasurer to push it through. In other words, Mr Grant was going to get access to money, whatever it took. At a time when Ford Credit was seeking half a billion dollars from the government, the Treasurer directed his office and his Treasury officials to make sure Mr Grant got preferential treatment. With this wording:

… I will not speak with Ford again on this unless it is absolutely necessary to push it through …

these Treasury officials were in absolutely no doubt at all that the Treasurer was directing them to look after the Prime Minister’s mate. The patronage, the cronyism, the-look-after-your-mates is just so much a part of the Labor DNA that they do not even know when they have done the wrong thing.

This just goes to show why the Labor Party is running so much of a distraction on this. The fact is that this matter should have been cleared up in the Senate inquiry on Friday. A Senate inquiry was held so that the Treasury official could give evidence. I remind the House that this was the Treasury official who was sent away during Senate estimates to be hidden from the Senate inquiry. These were Treasury officials who were not able to give evidence during Senate estimates, were they Treasurer? A Treasury official was sent away from Senate estimates so that he would not have to face questioning. A Senate inquiry was set up, with the support of the Greens—not with the support of the government but with the support of the Greens—so that this Treasury official could give his evidence unimpeded, and yet time and time and time again, the Treasury—

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