Rowan Ramsey (Grey, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

My question is to the Treasurer. I refer the Treasurer to his statement in the House on 4 June when he said that Mr John Grant was treated ‘just like everybody else’.

Mike Kelly (Eden-Monaro, Australian Labor Party, Parliamentary Secretary for Defence Support) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Dr Kelly interjecting

Harry Jenkins (Speaker) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

The Parliamentary Secretary for Defence Support will leave the chamber for one hour under standing order 94(a).

The member for Eden-Monaro then left the chamber.

Rowan Ramsey (Grey, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

When I referred a dealer to the Treasurer’s office for assistance, did he have a phone conversation with the dealer before referring them to the Treasury? Did the Treasurer also receive updates on this case to his home fax?

Wayne Swan (Lilley, Australian Labor Party, Treasurer) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

The first thing I will say to the member for Grey is that not every dealer sought a conversation. But I do know one thing: those dealers that contacted my office were dealt with promptly and appropriately—

Chris Pearce (Aston, Liberal Party, Shadow Minister for Financial Services, Superannuation and Corporate Law) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

By you?

Wayne Swan (Lilley, Australian Labor Party, Treasurer) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Of course they were not all dealt with by me you moron.

Harry Jenkins (Speaker) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

The Treasurer will withdraw.

Wayne Swan (Lilley, Australian Labor Party, Treasurer) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I withdraw, Mr Speaker. Anybody who knows me and my political life knows that I have always endeavoured to deal as directly with constituents—

Steve Irons (Swan, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Mr Irons interjecting

Harry Jenkins (Speaker) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

The member for Swan will leave the chamber for one hour under standing order 94(a).

The member for Swan then left the chamber.

Wayne Swan (Lilley, Australian Labor Party, Treasurer) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I have always sought as a member of parliament and as a minister to deal as directly as I possibly can with people who have problems, and in this case there were lots of car dealers with some very big financial headaches and the employment of thousands of Australians was on the line. So, many, many people were calling my ministerial office, many people were calling the Treasury directly and many people were going through their industry organisation, and all of these things were being handled in the Treasury. As regards those that contacted my office, they were all forwarded on to the Treasury to be dealt with as quickly and as effectively as was possible. Certainly, many were. It is also the case that some dealerships may not have fitted the criteria for assistance that could have been provided either through OzCar or by existing finance companies. I am more than happy to follow up the details that the member for Grey has asked about, but the one thing that I can say is that the government and I, through all of these times, were motivated by one central factor, and that was to support the industry at a time of global financial crisis that was threatening jobs and threatening the supply chain right through to the auto manufacturers.

This was a very serious situation. Many people thought that they were indeed probably going to lose their finance by March. That is what it was like in February and, as I indicated to the House the other day, the Prime Minister and other ministers and I spent a lot of time on this issue through that period—day after day working with the Treasury; day after day making sure that we could get OzCar up and running, knowing through all of the period while OzCar was not up and running the only option available to the Treasury, which was in receipt of the information about those financiers who were staying in the market and those dealers who might be without finance, was to work with them all. There were updates coming through to me through that period. Some did go to my home fax. Many went to my email tray in the office. It just depended on where I was. But, in relation to the ones that went to my home fax from Mr Grech, they simply went there because he hit ‘reply all’ to a communication from my office. That is why they ended up there. I never asked for them to be sent there—in the first instance—by Mr Grech because my office was using my home fax to put a lot of material through. I do not apologise for one minute for having sensitive material sent to my home fax, because during this period we were working right around the clock, not only on this issue but on many other issues. I do recall that, as we were doing this, we were opposed every inch of the way by those opposite. So not every car dealer sought a conversation, but I certainly hope that every car dealer that went through my office got the treatment they should have received through the Treasury.

Sharon Bird (Cunningham, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

My question is to the Minister for Finance and Deregulation and Minister representing the Special Minister of State. Will the minister advise the House of allegations regarding misuse of public resources? What steps should be taken with respect to the investigation of these allegations?

Lindsay Tanner (Melbourne, Australian Labor Party, Minister for Finance and Deregulation) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I thank the member for Cunningham for her question. Misuse of public resources is of course a serious matter. With respect to investigation of any allegations of misuse of public resources, anybody who has any knowledge or any involvement or any connection with such alleged misuse has an obligation to make information available to investigating authorities to help clear up the matter.

I would remind members of an investigation that is currently occurring with respect to an email, which has now been determined to be a fake email, that was, according to the Australian Federal Police, created on a Treasury computer and emailed from Treasury to the computer at the home of Mr Grech. Although it was subsequently deleted from the Treasury computer, the AFP was able to determine the origins of the email. In response to these extraordinary events, the government has been quite prepared to make available all of its computer records with respect to the inquiries that are proceeding—by both the Auditor-General and the Australian Federal Police—in order to ensure that they can complete their investigations and that they can get all of the available information that they can in order to determine whether any offences have been committed and, if so, by whom. Unfortunately, the opposition thus far have not agreed to make available their email and computer records to the inquiry by the Australian Federal Police in order to assist in the investigation of these matters in order to determine the origins of the email and any parties involved in its dissemination or in any way connected to the email and its dissemination more broadly.

If you—

Malcolm Turnbull (Wentworth, Liberal Party, Leader of the Opposition) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Mr Speaker, I am interrupting ‘Superintendent Tanner’ to state that the fact of the matter is that we have promised full cooperation with the Federal Police. We expect the investigation to be done by the Federal Police, not by the—

Harry Jenkins (Speaker) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Order! The Leader of the Opposition will resume his seat. That is not a point of order.

Lindsay Tanner (Melbourne, Australian Labor Party, Minister for Finance and Deregulation) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I am not quite sure—

Harry Jenkins (Speaker) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

The minister for finance will resume his seat. I call the member for Warringah on a point of order.

Lindsay Tanner (Melbourne, Australian Labor Party, Minister for Finance and Deregulation) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

All I have said is ‘I am not quite sure’. Does that qualify for anything in particular?

Tony Abbott (Warringah, Liberal Party, Shadow Minister for Families, Housing, Community Services and Indigenous Affairs) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Mr Speaker, the clear imputation from this answer is that the opposition is not cooperating with the AFP. We will fully cooperate.

Harry Jenkins (Speaker) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Order! The member for Warringah will resume his seat. The minister for finance has the call.

Lindsay Tanner (Melbourne, Australian Labor Party, Minister for Finance and Deregulation) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I am not exactly sure what the opposition leader means by ‘full cooperation’ but if he has just made an undertaking to make all the opposition’s computer records available for examination by the Australian Federal Police—

Sharon Bird (Cunningham, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Ms Bird interjecting

Harry Jenkins (Speaker) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Order! The minister for finance will resume his seat. I could give the member for Cunningham the opportunity to listen to the answer to her question outside.

Judi Moylan (Pearce, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Mr Speaker, I draw your attention again to section 100 of the standing and sessional orders. It makes it very clear, at subsection (d), that questions must not contain any inferences or imputations. Mr Speaker, I put it to you that the answer to this question is making both inferences and imputations.

Harry Jenkins (Speaker) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Order! The member for Pearce—

Judi Moylan (Pearce, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Mr Speaker, if I may have your attention just for a moment, because it says in (c):

For questions regarding persons:

(i)

questions must not reflect on or be critical of the character or conduct of a Member, a Senator …

There are other forms of this House to deal with that.

Harry Jenkins (Speaker) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

The member for Pearce will resume her seat.

Opposition Member:

An opposition member—Well done.

Harry Jenkins (Speaker) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

There are degrees of ‘Well done’. The member has quoted the standing orders that apply to the question and the question was in order. In fact, it was very cleverly crafted.

Honourable Members:

Honourable members interjecting—

Harry Jenkins (Speaker) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

No, it was absolutely in order. I might add, having indicated to the chamber that I will listen carefully to the answers, whilst I appreciate that some might not appreciate the robustness of the answer, the answer has not gone into territory which should cause concern under the standing orders.

YU5 Tanner, Lindsay, MPMr TANNER—Thank you very much, Mr Speaker. I will not further speculate on what the Leader of the Opposition means by full cooperation, but I would in conclusion draw your attention to a few statements that have been made today by the Leader of the Opposition and by the shadow Treasurer, the member for North Sydney. I note, for example, that when he was asked on Sunrise today whether he had ever seen the fake email the Leader of the Opposition said that he was ‘not going to compromise the police investigation by answering that question’. I note also that there has been some confusion between the Leader of the Opposition and the member for North Sydney with respect to contacts that may have occurred between them and Mr Grech prior to the Senate hearing on Friday, which is when this matter first appeared in the public domain. I note, for example, that the shadow Treasurer stated on the doors, ‘I’d imagine people in the opposition did have contact with Treasury officials,’ in response to the question, ‘Did you or anybody in the Liberal Party have contact with Mr Grech prior to his testimony?’ Then the shadow Treasurer said, ‘I would expect that this is the case. I don’t want to compromise police investigations at all.’ In other words, far from providing full cooperation, they are now using the existence of police investigations as an excuse to maintain a smokescreen and to refuse to answer questions about their knowledge of these matters. On Sunrise, the shadow Treasurer, the member for North Sydney, when asked what his knowledge of the email was, said:

There’s been talk about it around the place for ages. I heard it around the place.

Has the minister for finance concluded?

Lindsay Tanner (Melbourne, Australian Labor Party, Minister for Finance and Deregulation) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

No, I have not, Mr Speaker.

Harry Jenkins (Speaker) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

In that case, I call the member for Warringah on a point of order.

Tony Abbott (Warringah, Liberal Party, Shadow Minister for Families, Housing, Community Services and Indigenous Affairs) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Mr Speaker, under standing order 89 members are not supposed to use offensive words, and it is offensive to be accused of failing to cooperate with an AFP investigation. We will fully cooperate with the investigation, and I ask that the minister refrain from making these offensive—

Harry Jenkins (Speaker) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

The member for Warringah will resume his seat. There is no point of order.

Lindsay Tanner (Melbourne, Australian Labor Party, Minister for Finance and Deregulation) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Thank you, Mr Speaker. The fact remains that this email was first read into the public record by a frontbencher of the Liberal Party, Senator Abetz, and there has been a variety of media reports indicating that it had been hawked around the gallery prior to its first being put into the public domain. We have now got a variety of admissions—in some cases, contrasting admissions—from different leading figures in the opposition about their involvement here. Full cooperation should mean full cooperation and participation in full by delivering all computer records to the AFP. I note—

Harry Jenkins (Speaker) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

The minister will commence summing up the answer.

Anthony Albanese (Grayndler, Australian Labor Party, Leader of the House) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Nineteen.

Chris Hayes (Werriwa, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Nineteen.

Harry Jenkins (Speaker) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I simply say to the member for Werriwa that that perhaps is why you are a tallier—you can count! Really, under a general warning, you are very lucky.

Judi Moylan (Pearce, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Mr Speaker, on a point of order: I appreciated your instruction in relation to standing order 100 but I would draw your attention to standing order 90—’Reflections on Members’. I think that the way this question is being answered is an imputation and an improper reflection on members, in particular the Leader of the Opposition. I would ask that you rule this out of order.

Harry Jenkins (Speaker) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Order! I think that, inter alia, I have ruled on this matter to the member for Warringah. There was nothing said after that caused me to change my mind. As I have indicated before, sometimes there are things said in this place, because of its robust nature, that cause concern for people. But I have listened carefully to the minister for finance. He will respond to the question and, as I have invited him to do, he will commence to sum up his answer.

Lindsay Tanner (Melbourne, Australian Labor Party, Minister for Finance and Deregulation) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Thank you, Mr Speaker. I would remind the House in conclusion that what we are dealing with here is the fallout from an accusation made in public on Friday against the Prime Minister alleging that he was corrupt and that he had lied to the Australian people. That is what we are dealing with. I will read the quotation for you again, if you would like. That is what we are dealing with. I note, and his behaviour today is underlining it, that on 25 August 2008 the member for Warringah described the Leader of the Opposition thus:

At his worst, Malcolm can be a bit of a volcano.

That certainly says it all.

Harry Jenkins (Speaker) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

The minister will resume his seat.

Malcolm Turnbull (Wentworth, Liberal Party, Leader of the Opposition) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Mr Speaker, my question is to the Treasurer. Can the Treasurer inform the House: of the 240 car dealers the government says required support, how many did the Treasurer personally speak with on the telephone?

Wayne Swan (Lilley, Australian Labor Party, Treasurer) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I have said it here; I have said it publicly: I was approached by the member for Oxley and he said, ‘Will you speak to Mr Grant?’ I did, for about two minutes, and I referred him to a DLO. Through that period I was dealing with the problems and challenges in the industry. Many of those dealers were either contacting my office, contacting the Treasury directly or contacting the MTAA. I make no apology for talking to a small business person in an environment such as that—none at all. I do endeavour in my political life to speak to as many as I possibly can. I did speak to Mr Grant. And what I did do—and what the government—

Opposition Member:

An opposition member—Just resign.

Wayne Swan (Lilley, Australian Labor Party, Treasurer) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

There we go—more of the smear, right across the table. The grubby smear campaign has been laid bare.

Harry Jenkins (Speaker) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

The Leader of the Opposition will cease interjecting and the Treasurer will ignore the interjection.

Wayne Swan (Lilley, Australian Labor Party, Treasurer) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

The grubby smear campaign was laid bare across the table again from the Leader of the Opposition to the Prime Minister. He went out there to smear the Prime Minister and myself on a baseless email, which he had been peddling around this building for weeks. He had been peddling it around for weeks—peddling it around the business community.

Joe Hockey (North Sydney, Liberal Party, Shadow Treasurer) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I rise on a point of order. It goes to relevance. Why can’t he say, ‘Just one car dealer got a phone call from the Treasurer.’

Harry Jenkins (Speaker) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

The member for North Sydney will resume his seat. The Treasurer will respond to the—

Honourable Members:

Honourable members interjecting—

Harry Jenkins (Speaker) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

People on either front bench ought not to think that they are immune to the general warning. Whether there have been 20, 50 or 100 points of order, I indicate that I will listen to the points of order. I then have to judge and rule on the points of order. I do not need the advice of people who should be showing some leadership to the House.

Wayne Swan (Lilley, Australian Labor Party, Treasurer) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I do think the Leader of the Opposition, and the opposition as a whole, have got some very serious questions to answer, because they have been involved in a grubby smear campaign against the Prime Minister and myself and particularly my family. They have been very active in the last four or five days putting around their smears against the Prime Minister and myself. What has happened in the last few days is that the basis of that smear has now emerged—there has been a fake email, which the Leader of the Opposition—

Malcolm Turnbull (Wentworth, Liberal Party, Leader of the Opposition) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Created in your department!

Harry Jenkins (Speaker) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Order! The Leader of the Opposition.

Wayne Swan (Lilley, Australian Labor Party, Treasurer) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

The fake email that the Leader of the Opposition has been using to smear the Prime Minister and the Treasurer is the fault of the Treasurer! Where does he get that logic? He has no credibility—no credibility whatsoever. All of this today is just to camouflage the very serious questions that each and every one of those frontbenchers over there needs to answer. Did any member of the opposition or their staff have an electronic or hard copy of the text of the email in their possession before Friday? Did any of them? When did any member of the opposition or their staff first see the text of the fake email?

Tony Abbott (Warringah, Liberal Party, Shadow Minister for Families, Housing, Community Services and Indigenous Affairs) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I rise on a point of order. Under the standing orders I was not aware that this was the opposition’s question time but we are happy to answer questions. We would love to make speeches at this time of the day. We really would.

Harry Jenkins (Speaker) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

If the member for Warringah wants to devote his time to putting a submission on that to the Procedure Committee that might keep him occupied, but I would not wish him much luck in getting it up. As I have said before, these rhetorical questions have been used quite often in this place through the terms of several governments.

Wayne Swan (Lilley, Australian Labor Party, Treasurer) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

There are questions that need to be answered. Did any members of the opposition or their staff have any contact with Mr Grech in the last two months, or did any recently departed staff have any contact with Mr Grech in the last two months? This goes to the core of the smear campaign that has been mounted by the Leader of the Opposition.