Ben Morton (Tangney, Liberal Party) Share this | Hansard source

The Criminal Code Amendment (Impersonating a Commonwealth Body) Bill 2017 will amend the Criminal Code Act 1995 to safeguard the Australian public from misrepresentation and false statements purportedly made on behalf of Commonwealth bodies. The government strongly condemns the impersonation of Commonwealth bodies and is committed to strengthening public confidence in all communications that come from them. Recognising the importance of this issue, this bill introduces new criminal offences and an injunction power to prevent people from impersonating a Commonwealth body. It is essential to a well-functioning democracy that the public have trust in the legitimacy of statements made by government bodies. That trust will be eroded if individuals are, with impunity, able to represent themselves as communicating on behalf of government bodies without any authorisation. Accordingly, this bill further safeguards the proper functioning of our system of government by introducing new offences for criminalised conduct where a person falsely represents themselves to be acting on behalf of, or with the authority of, a Commonwealth body. For the purposes of the new offences, a Commonwealth body could be a Commonwealth entity, a Commonwealth company, or any service, benefit, program or facility provided by or on behalf of the Commonwealth. These offences will capture false representations in relation to a broad range of government bodies and services, from the Australian Taxation Office through to Centrelink and, indeed, Medicare.

This bill seeks to address a possible gap in our criminal law, which means that impersonating a Commonwealth entity, company or service may not be appropriately criminalised. It is already a criminal offence to impersonate a Commonwealth official. It is less clear whether the current offences cover a person pretending to be, or acting on behalf of, a Commonwealth body, which is why the government has taken action. This bill introduces offences to ensure that the punishment reflects the person's state of mind in making the false representation. The primary offence covers circumstances where a person is reckless as to whether their conduct will result in, or will be reasonably capable of resulting in, a false representation. This conduct will be punishable by up to two years imprisonment. The amendments also create a new aggravated offence where a person holds out that they represent a Commonwealth body or service with the intent to obtain a gain, cause a loss or influence the exercise of a public duty. These penalties are commensurate with offences for impersonating a Commonwealth official. The bill contains safeguards to ensure that neither of these offences unduly limits freedom of expression.

The Joint Standing Committee on Electoral Matters, of which I am a member, has received reports concerning the impersonation of government entities and the potential for these misrepresentations to mislead voters. This has been well publicised with the 'Mediscare' experience in the last federal election. The committee received a number of submissions on this matter and was able to question those impacted by the 'Mediscare' texts and handouts that were seen at booths and sent on election day last year. Importantly, Noah Carroll, the National Secretary and Campaign Director of the Australian Labor Party, appeared before the Joint Standing Committee on Electoral Matters at public hearings here in Canberra. I will read the text message which we refer to:

Mr Turnbull's plans to privatise Medicare will take us down the road of no return. Time is running out to Save Medicare.

It's not the text message that's the problem; it's the fact that, in the field that would normally show who the sender is, the word 'Medicare' is there instead. That text message purports to come from Medicare itself. There is nothing wrong with the communication of that message, as long as the author, the sender, of that message is known. It was something that the Labor Party absolutely avoided on election day. This text message was sent out at about 11 am in the morning. There was plenty of time on election day for the Labor Party to admit that they were the sender. There was enough speculation in the media for them to confirm it, or to know that there was angst in the community about who the sender of this text message was, but they didn't. They remained silent. It was a strategy on their part to remain silent, to let it go all day while people were voting and to make them think it was a bona fide message from Medicare, when it certainly was not. We're supposed to believe this was all an accident by Labor. A spokesman for Queensland Labor said, after it was eventually confirmed that it was sent by Queensland Labor, that the message was not intended to indicate that it was a message from Medicare; rather, it was to identify the subject of the text. I think that's using absolute weasel words after the fact to say that it was not intended to indicate that it was a message from Medicare but, rather, to identify the subject of the text.

I've worked on campaigns and I have some admiration for all people who work on campaigns—people who work on Liberal Party campaigns and people who work on Labor Party campaigns. I can assure you that, when you send something to the printers, you check it; you double-check it; you proof it. When you send a text message, you test it. You send it to a small group of people. You make sure that the text message comes across exactly how you want it to come across. There was no doubt in this case that the Labor Party of Queensland wanted the field that would normally describe who the sender was to instead show 'Medicare', not because it was designed to be the subject of the text but because they wanted it to look like that, to fool voters into thinking it actually was from Medicare.

I've got greater confidence in the ability of the people that work for Queensland Labor. I think they're smart people; I think they've been too smart by half on this. There was no accident. It was an absolutely rolled-gold deception that they absolutely knew they were getting into. The fact that not even on election day itself could they admit that they were behind it actually proves the point that they were more happy in making sure that voters got this message thinking it was from Medicare, and after the election, when it didn't matter, they'd confess and say that it was from them. It scared people. It was inappropriate, and they should absolutely know better. It's a real shame in this House that Labor Party members opposite can't just admit that their campaigners pushed the envelope way too far and say: 'They pushed it way too far. We would never do it again.' But, no, instead they come into this House and defend it. They defend that action as completely appropriate. Mr Carroll said he thought there'd be no confusion at all, when he gave evidence to JSCEM. They wanted confusion; they wanted to hide the fact that they were the sender of the text message. As the member for Fairfax said, Labor has an attitude of 'whatever it takes', and we saw that alive and well in this incident.

This bill also enlivens the injunction provisions in the Regulatory Powers (Standard Provisions) Act 2014. This will provide persons whose interests have been, or would be, affected by the false representation the opportunity to prevent such conduct by a court-issued injunction. The bill will enable affected persons to apply to the relevant court for an injunction to prevent conduct in contravention of the new offences in the Criminal Code. The purpose of this power is to enable affected persons to act swiftly, if needs be, to prevent conduct amounting to false representation of a Commonwealth agency. These amendments are critical to protecting Commonwealth bodies from criminal misrepresentation and to ensuring that the public has confidence in all communications that come from the Commonwealth government. Australian voters decide the future of our country. It is appropriate that we as parliamentarians give voters the tools to make informed decisions in an informed manner on polling day.

In conclusion, it is the government that is committed to ensuring that voters know who is communicating with them to influence their vote. These changes update the Commonwealth's authorisation regime for the 21st century. The bill increases transparency and accountability without imposing an undue burden on communication with voters. It removes that loophole that the Queensland Labor Party campaigners found and exploited—something that they got away with under the current law, something that they should admit crossed the boundaries of what is right in a campaign. And this law will stop them in future taking such deceptive action to use the good name of Commonwealth organisations, and the people who work for them, to advance their political interests, to advance their political campaign, to con mums and dads and elderly people into thinking that they're getting a message from a Commonwealth agency, when instead it was a tricky message from some tricky campaigners working for the tricky Labor Party in Brisbane. This bill also safeguards public trust in the legitimacy of statements made by Australian government bodies.

This government is committed to safeguarding the proper functioning of Australia's democracy and ensuring that Australians have trust in the validity of communications from government bodies. This bill will strengthen public confidence in all such communications and ensure that those who deceive the Australian public are ultimately captured by the law.

The parliament has been well served by the work of the Joint Standing Committee on Electoral Matters, which regularly examines aspects of our electoral system and the issues that arise from the conduct of national elections. I commend the Joint Standing Committee on Electoral Matters under the chairmanship of Senator Linda Reynolds for its work to date in identifying the need to reform the authorisation regime and the Criminal Code. I commend this bill to the House.

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