Susan Templeman (Macquarie, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Hansard source

AN () (): I commend the words of the member for Bean because it is quite extraordinary, and still hard to fathom, that for a very long period of time we sat on those opposition benches questioning the government and the Prime Minister—the then prime minister, the member for Cook. He knew things that he was not disclosing to the parliament. He knew things his own ministers didn't know. The very premise of this parliament, the premise that this is a place where governments can be held to account, particularly, as the member for Bean indicates, during question time, was really treated with contempt.

That is the core of this legislation, the Ministers of State Amendment Bill 2022, and the efforts that we are making to ensure that cannot happen again, that this parliament cannot be treated like fools and can't be held in contempt because of a prime minister failing to disclose actions and decisions that he's made. He failed to disclose that he was, in fact, the minister for many, many things, not just his prime ministerial role. That is the core of this piece of legislation and why it is so important to have on the record the processes that have led to this point.

This bill is about restoring the Australian people's confidence in our federal system of government and part of rebuilding the integrity in public sector institutions, in the processes that we have and in the officials. It's also a key to ensuring that there is a capacity to hold a government and a prime minister to account. The bill will implement reforms to provide for greater transparency and accountability in the administration of this parliament, in the ministries and in the Commonwealth. It implements the first of the six recommendations from the Bell inquiry, so it isn't the only thing that we will be doing. It follows the steps that we've taken already so that we finally have, in this country, a National Anti-Corruption Commission. This is as important as that National Anti-Corruption Commission legislation.

I want to walk through how we got to this point because this is historic—we have never been at this point before—and why it was so important that we censured the member for Cook on this matter. The Prime Minister has spoken about this issue, and I thank him for his leadership. But we should all be deeply saddened that a censure of a former prime minister was necessary. It is a real shame for all of us that this institution had to take that step because, had we not taken that step, we would have been saying: 'That's okay. Maybe it wasn't the best thing to do,' but we'd shrug our shoulders and he'd get away with it. It isn't something that can be overlooked. It is too dangerous a precedent to be setting by overlooking that sort of behaviour. That's why we are committed to addressing the loopholes that allowed that abuse of power to occur. I think the Australian people are absolutely entitled to know who is appointed to administer departments of this country because they make such profound decisions that have impacts on everybody's lives. I hope the Australian people recognise that that is the basis of our desire and determination to clean up this system so that what happened can't be repeated.

Let's just remind ourselves what actually happened, and we learnt some of this because of the Solicitor-General's advice. The advice from the Solicitor General was published in August last year, and that advice found that between March 2020 and May 2021 the member Cook was appointed by the Governor-General to administer five departments of state: Health; Finance; Industry, Science, Energy and Resources; Treasury and Home Affairs. This wasn't made public. It was only revealed through reports in the media. As a former journalist I have great regard for the role the media plays in revealing things, but, seriously, this is not something that should have been left to media to find out. It is something that should have been disclosed freely to the parliament. The Solicitor-General found that the principles of responsible government were fundamentally undermined by the actions of the former government. He went on to say:

… it is impossible for the parliament to hold ministers to account for the administration of departments if it does not know which ministers are responsible for which departments.

That's just a fundamental principle.

We learnt more through the Bell report. The Bell report, for me, was really, really key to understanding and allowing me to get to the real core and gravity of this. The Bell report found that the appointments were unnecessary. If either the then Minister for Health and Aged Care or the then Minister for Finance had become incapacitated and it was desired to have a senior minister exercise the health minister's expansive human biosecurity emergency powers or the finance minister's significant financial authorities, the member for Cook could have been:

… authorised to act as Minister for Health or Minister for Finance in a matter of minutes.

It could have happened in a matter of minutes, so the excuse that we were in a pandemic and things were difficult was just a fallacy. Here we have the recognition that, had someone become incapacitated—another minister—that could have been resolved in a matter of minutes.

The other appointments, including to Treasury and Home Affairs, the Bell report found are in a different category to the Health and Finance appointments. The Bell report said these appointments had 'little if any connection to the pandemic'. It went on to say:

Rather, Mr Morrison was appointed to administer these departments to give himself the capacity to exercise particular statutory powers.

We learnt all this thanks to the Bell report, and I commend the work of the Hon. Virginia Bell AC who did this work. She noted that the member for Cook also instructed the Department of the Prime Minister and Cabinet to prepare a brief for his appointment to administer the Department of Agriculture, Water and the Environment. Apparently, he decided not to proceed with that appointment.

The scale of it is staggering. When asked to explain this, the Bell report noted it is difficult to reconcile the member for Cook's choice not to inform his ministers of the appointments 'out of his wish not to be thought to be second-guessing them, with his belief that the appointments had been notified in the Commonwealth Gazette'. We've got two opposing thoughts here: 'I didn't want to alarm them and think they didn't have my confidence,' but 'Oh, I thought they were going to be noted in the Gazette and gazetted.' That sort of language has given no-one any confidence that there was a desire for transparency and disclosure. If people haven't read the Bell report, I would encourage them to do so because it makes very clear what processes were involved and why we should be so concerned about what happened and why there is a need for this legislation.

One of the concluding statements in the Bell report is:

Given that the Parliament was not informed of any of the appointments, it was unable to hold Mr Morrison—

The member for Cook—

to account in his capacity as minister administering any of these five departments.

It reflects on the Solicitor-General's advice and conclusion, which was:

… the principles of responsible government were "fundamentally undermined" because Mr Morrison was not "responsible" to the Parliament, and through the Parliament to the electors …

That's really what this is about. It's not about us and the parliament; it is about the responsibility we have to the people who have put us here, and that is to be transparent, to disclose things and to ensure that we are meeting their expectations around integrity.

It was surprising to know that there was an additional part to this story that was only very recently revealed. That was when we discovered that the member for Cook's secret appointments extended beyond himself. Documents released under freedom of information revealed that the approach of the previous coalition government, when it came to giving the Prime Minister, himself, additional portfolios, extended to other ministers, and multiple assistant ministers were appointed to multiple departments.

The former member for Tangney was appointed to administer the home affairs department, and the member for Capricornia was appointed to administer the Department of Prime Minister and Cabinet. While these appointments were gazetted, the member for Cook specifically asked that there be no swearing-in ceremony, no public event held to show what was happening, no changes to the official ministry lists. That is a total breakdown in the trust upon which our democracy depends.

It probably is best reflected on by a member of that previous government, the member for McPherson, the former Minister for Home Affairs, who was responsible for portfolios that then had appointments made to other ministers. She said:

Given what we've heard, it's not surprising that I wasn't told about it.

It's not okay to behave in the way the former Prime Minister and others have in relation to keeping information secret.

She went on to say:

At no time in those discussions did Ben Morton—

The member for Tangney—

raise with me the fact he had been appointed to administer that and been effectively appointed to administer parts of the home affairs department.

She said: 'It's extraordinary. It's very disappointing, if this information is coming to light now.' She goes on to say, 'Who knows what the reasoning was behind any of that. There was no reason to keep that hidden.'

They are the words, direct quotes, from the member for McPherson, who, like all of us, has been treated like a fool by the former Prime Minister, the now member for Cook. It is a shameful page in the history of that government. There were multiple things for that government to be ashamed of, but this one, in particular, went to the core of what this place is about. It went to the heart of what we are here to do. This legislation will go a long way to ensuring we don't see a repeat of it.

The bill requires the Official Secretary to the Governor-General to publish a notifiable instrument registered on the Federal Register of Legislation as soon as reasonably practicable—not months later or only when FOI documents are revealed or only when someone tells it to a journalist for a book that's going to be published. It will say that the Governor-General has chosen, summoned and sworn an executive councillor to the Federal Executive Council, appointed an officer to administer a department of state or directed a minister of state to hold an office. It will also require any notification when those positions change.

The notifiable instrument will include the name of the person, the department of state, where that's appropriate, and the date on which they were sworn, appointed or directed. Where an appointment has been revoked, it will include the name of the person, the name of the former office and the date that such membership, appointment or direction was revoked. The notifiable instrument may also comprise a copy of an instrument issued by the Governor-General, ensuring there are no loopholes and no ways to get around it; there is no way of sneakily putting it through.

This bill delivers on the Albanese Labor government's promise to restore trust and integrity to federal politics. The centrepiece of this promise has been our legislation for a powerful, transparent and independent National Anti-Corruption Commission, and the provisions in this bill add to that. They go some way to ensuring greater integrity and transparency, and we will continue to look for ways to make sure the people of Australia know that we are accountable and that governments are held to account.

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