Luke Gosling (Solomon, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Hansard source

When it comes to trust that Australians put in their government and democratic processes, what we've seen after almost a decade of those opposite, with the coalition holding the reins, has been a really swift decline. We've spent almost 10 years watching those opposite avoid transparency measures at all costs. They've flouted the norms and conventions around ministerial responsibilities over and over again. As a result, trust in the parliament and in the public service has nosedived. We've had to watch rort after rort and scandal after scandal unfold for years amongst those who hold the highest office in this nation, and, instead of holding that responsibility in the upmost regard, they've been trashing it. It's a disgrace. We need a proper national integrity commission. It's a shame that the minister has left after what was a pretty lacklustre defence of their sham of a model, but there you go.

What we saw just last week was that those opposite, the federal government of Australia, are so afraid of being held to account that they rolled their own Prime Minister in cabinet over the issue of an anticorruption commission because they were worried that a proper anticorruption commission would investigate what they've been up to—all their rorts and improper behaviour and unethical behaviour. As we know, they've been very, very busy rorting on an industrial scale, and Australians have had enough.

As I've said before in this place, we need to rebuild the ethical infrastructure of our nation, and federal Labor will do that if we get the confidence of the Australian people at the next election, because we need a powerful, independent, transparent anticorruption commission with retrospective powers. Every single non-coalition member in this place is united in supporting it, and we cannot settle for anything less, least of all the embarrassingly weak and secretive model the government is proposing, which experts such as The Centre for Public Integrity, have comprehensively slammed as being 'A sham designed to cover up corruption'.

Australians have the right to know how their hard earned taxes are being spent, and we all know that this is yet another broken promise from the government for broken promises. We all have a role to play in restoring public confidence in our democracy. Only federal Labor will give this assurance to Australians: that not only are their taxpayer dollars being used appropriately but also that decisions are being made in the national interest rather than in narrow, sectional, political interests, as they are with those opposite.

It's good that the member for Wentworth is in the chamber, because I remember watching an episode of Q&Ait must have been some 18 months ago—and the federal government had put him out there to try and defend the pathetic stance of the federal government when it comes to a national integrity commission, and the blame was put onto COVID of course: 'We can't do anything because of COVID! The public service staff couldn't possibly!' But, luckily, Ken Henry and other people were on that panel, as was Tanya Plibersek, the member for Sydney, who stuck holes in that argument pretty quickly. This was on 26 October 2020, but, as the member for Sydney said, the draft legislation was ready in the December before that, in 2019. So those opposite have deliberately wasted time because they simply do not want a proper national integrity commission. But, we need one.

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