Christian Porter (Pearce, Liberal Party, Attorney-General) Share this | Hansard source

I've listened to what you've said, and there is nothing that suggests corruption by the AFP in terms of a differential treatment of criminality that is asserted by one organisation over another. There is just simply nothing that supports that very, very serious statement.

Of course, this is not new to the House. Members will recall that in July when, admittedly, serious allegations were first raised, the government referred them to the Australian Commission for Law Enforcement Integrity under section 18 of the Law Enforcement Integrity Commissioner Act. The commissioner accepted that referral and the commission is engaging in an appropriately comprehensive investigation of the allegations. As I said when the member for Clark first sought to establish a joint parliamentary committee into allegations surrounding Crown, the Australian Commission for Law Enforcement Integrity is the most appropriate body to consider those allegations. The government's position remains unchanged as to the appropriateness of ACLEI to investigate the allegations. We do not support the creation of a royal commission to conduct what would be a simultaneous investigation into Crown Casino, when the current investigation has adequate powers and resourcing.

I might note also that there would be three investigations simultaneously being conducted into these matters. First, as I noted, is the investigation by ACLEI, which is the specialist agency responsible for the investigation of corruption issues in the Australian government law enforcement agencies, including the Department of Home Affairs and any other law enforcement agency. That investigation is underway. ACLEI works very closely with state and territory counterparts. So, obviously, it has been working cooperatively with the Victorian Commission for Gambling and Liquor Regulation's investigation into Crown—which is the second contemporaneous investigation. Also, the New South Wales state government has launched its own investigation, chaired by the Hon. Patricia Bergin SC—and ACLEI is, again, in discussion with that inquiry. So there are three inquiries, with the full breadth of jurisdiction and powers required.

ACLEI is highly experienced in these types of investigations. In fact, it is better resourced to quickly and effectively commence an investigation into allegations of corruption than any other single body or envisaged body in the Commonwealth. I might note for the member for Clark's benefit that ACLEI's investigative powers are essentially the same as a royal commission's, including the power to compel evidence. I might also note that it also has covert powers, such as controlled operations powers, as well as the power of arrest. So, if ACLEI obtains admissible evidence of any criminal offence in the course of its investigation into this matter, it must, by compulsion, give that evidence to the relevant police or prosecutorial authority, including state or territory authorities.

I might take a brief moment before closing to clarify a number of seriously inaccurate comments that have been made, particularly by the Australia Institute, on this matter and the ACLEI investigation, which, as I noted, was requested by the government in July of this year. The Australia Institute has made a number of factually inaccurate assertions with respect to ACLEI, its powers and its capacity to investigate. I can inform the House that those assertions from the Australia Institute were so inaccurate that the Integrity Commissioner felt the need to take the unusual step of writing to the Australia Institute directly to correct those statements. In fact, my office has spoken with the Commissioner for the Law Enforcement Integrity Commissioner and he considered it appropriate that I table the letter. I will seek to do that now.

I won't go through that letter in full here. But I will mention two of the points that the commissioner, quite properly, raises in response to claims that have been made by the Australia Institute. In the first point, he noted: 'The Australia Institute claim that ACLEI does not have the full investigative powers of the royal commission.' That is simply wrong. Secondly, the commissioner notes in his correspondence to the Australia Institute: 'ACLEI's powers are, in some respects, greater than that of a royal commission.' The Australia Institute also claimed ACLEI's definition of corrupt conduct is, in the words of the Australia Institute:

More limited than the definitions of the state-based anti-corruption commissions.

Again, this is simply inaccurate. Corrupt conduct is defined, for the purposes of this investigation, in section 6 of the Law Enforcement Integrity Commissioner Act as being: 'conduct that involves, or that is engaged in for the purpose of, an abuse of office; or perverting the course of justice; or conduct that, having regard to the duties and powers of the staff member as a staff member of the agency, involves, or is engaged in for the purpose of, corruption of any other kind'. As the Integrity Commissioner notes in his letter to the Australia Institute, it's clearly the case that those words 'corruption of any other kind' is an incredibly broad definition that would well and truly take into its scope any of the matters that have been alleged in this Crown investigation.

There is a full list of other factually inaccurate comments that have made in that correspondence that I've tabled. I won't seek to go through them all here. We decline to support the suspension of standing orders and the substantive motion, on the basis that it is not meritorious in the context of there being an ACLEI investigation, a Victorian investigation and a New South Wales investigation—all of them with the appropriate jurisdiction, all of them with the appropriate powers. I think it evidences the fact that this is not a meritorious proposition from the member for Clark when, at the end of the proposition, he resorts to what is a very nasty and quite wrong slur on the AFP.

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