House debates

Monday, 2 December 2019

Questions without Notice

Prime Minister

2:31 pm

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

Two of those referrals from the shadow Attorney-General were about the sitting Attorney-General, one with respect to the former Attorney-General, George Brandis, and in fact one with respect to myself. And on 24 February 2015 the shadow Attorney-General referred the then Attorney-General, George Brandis, to the AFP with an accusation of corruption and unlawful conduct. In a proper sense, and in the real world not that long ago, if you referred a standing Attorney-General to the AFP and absolutely nothing came of it, you would have a question to answer. And what came of that referral? Absolutely nothing—just as it did from the other seven referrals.

In fact, the obsession that you had for George Brandis—you were like the Wile E. Coyote of referral, and making the George Brandises of the world look like roadrunners is the easiest thing to do. But he was looking over his shoulder at you, going 'Beep beep'! There were 24 calls for George Brandis's resignation—and then again, and then again. The letter that the shadow Attorney-General sent referring George Brandis to the AFP for corruption was so lame that it couldn't even name the offence that was said to have been committed. At least when I got referred to the AFP for bribery you were able to nominate the offence that you said was committed. But what came of that? Absolutely nothing—a serial offender in terms of vexatious complaints that waste the time of the AFP when the AFP could be using their time looking into things like drug dealing, terrorism or child sex offences. What a joke.

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