Mark Dreyfus (Isaacs, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Attorney General) Share this | Hansard source

I referred to a new corruption scandal. I withdraw that. As stated by the government's Special Minister of State, this is what the law requires:

Electorate Officers … are employed to assist the Senator or Member to carry out duties as a Member of Parliament, and not for party political purposes.

But, as 60 Minutes and the Nine newspapers have revealed with evidence from multiple sources, taxpayer funded electorate officers were employed within the offices of both the Assistant Treasurer and the member for Menzies exclusively for party political purposes. Even worse than that, these factional players were hired at taxpayer expense for the reprehensible activity of branch stacking, and it's clear from the evidence we've seen to date that the Assistant Treasurer was aware of and endorsed this clear abuse of taxpayer resources.

How is it that this Prime Minister, who sends debt collectors after vulnerable and innocent Australians under his illegal robodebt scheme, can continue to support as the Assistant Treasurer a person who has, according to news reports, been caught red-handed misusing public money? As former counsel to the New South Wales Independent Commission Against Corruption Geoffrey Watson SC declared:

I very much doubt that Sukkar can or should remain a minister of the Crown. A minister is a position of real power and thus real trust and you cannot have it in the hands of people who abuse it

This latest scandal has set another clear test for the Prime Minister. Will he follow the standard set by the Leader of the Opposition and act decisively against senior figures in his own party, or will he try to sweep this scandal under the carpet too? Will he clean it up or cover it up? Sadly, but unsurprisingly, the Prime Minister once again has failed this basic test of integrity and responsibility. It's unsurprising because responsibility is something this Prime Minister runs from at every turn. We saw it when the Prime Minister jetted off to Hawaii on a secret holiday while Australia burned. We saw it this week again as he has tried to pretend that aged care wasn't really— (Time expired)

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