Kim Beazley (Brand, Australian Labor Party, Leader of the Opposition) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

My question is to the Prime Minister. I refer to the Prime Minister’s refusal yesterday to expand the Cole commission’s terms of reference. Will the Prime Minister now confirm that, if these rorted terms of reference remain in force, the inquiry will have no power to conclude whether the foreign minister did his job in enforcing UN sanctions against Saddam Hussein; no power to conclude whether the foreign minister properly exercised his functions under the Customs (Prohibited Exports) Regulation; no power to conclude whether the Minister for Foreign Affairs, the Minister for Trade or the Prime Minister himself responded competently to the 27 sets of warnings received about this scandal; and no power to determine what the $300 million was used for by Saddam Hussein in military purchases and in the subsidisation of suicide bombers prior to the war? Prime Minister, haven’t you designed a cover-up that would make Richard Nixon proud?

John Howard (Bennelong, Liberal Party, Prime Minister) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

In answer to the first part of the question, the answer is no, I will not confirm that, because the assertions made by the Leader of the Opposition are wrong; therefore the conclusion that the Leader of the Opposition has reached is fatally flawed, as is the whole of the argument that he has advanced on this matter.

If the Leader of the Opposition bothers to listen, I will patiently and quietly take him through the sequence of how this works. If the Leader of the Opposition wants to know, again, how this works, let me tell him. Be he reminded that we had a request from the United Nations and, alone of sovereign governments around the world, the government have established a fully transparent inquiry to get to the bottom of the matter. Not only has the inquiry been invited to find out whether AWB committed any crime; by its own declaration the inquiry has also been empowered to make findings of fact on the conduct of ministers and government officials.

From reading Mr Cole’s statement of 3 February, it is quite plain that, if the Minister for Foreign Affairs has not done his job in relation to this matter, Mr Cole will so find that. It is quite obvious that he will so find it in relation to the Minister for Trade. It is obvious he will find it in relation to me because, if you read the statement he made on 3 February, he said that he would be able to make findings of fact about the knowledge of ministers in respect of the behaviour of AWB and whether those ministers or their departments came into possession of matters that were relevant to the payment of kickbacks or bribes by AWB.

The statement I made last night was, I think, quite deliberately misquoted by the Leader of the Opposition. What I said last night—and I repeat it here today—was that, if I had been told by AWB that it was paying bribes to Saddam Hussein and I did nothing about it, it would be game over. Of course it would. But, interestingly enough, there is no evidence that that happened. Of course I was not told by AWB. Of course the minister was not. None of the ministers were. The reality is that the opposition are flailing around on this issue.

Kim Beazley (Brand, Australian Labor Party, Leader of the Opposition) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Mr Beazley interjecting

David Hawker (Speaker) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Order! The Leader of the Opposition has asked his question.

John Howard (Bennelong, Liberal Party, Prime Minister) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

They have not been able to produce any evidence of wrongdoing by any of my ministers. They have not been able to produce evidence of any wrongdoing by any officers of the Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade. All the member for Griffith has done is to sneer at and denigrate the hardworking people of the Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade.

We alone of governments established a transparent inquiry. It is presided over by an eminent lawyer, somebody who is well regarded in the Australian community. I believe, as most Australians do, that what should happen is that Mr Cole should be allowed to get on with his job and get to the bottom of this matter. The government await that conclusion. The government will continue to cooperate with the inquiry. At the end of the day, this government will be able to look anybody in the eye and say, ‘We alone had the courage and the transparency to establish an inquiry with the powers of a royal commission.’ I believe the government have acted with entire and complete propriety in this whole matter.