Russell Broadbent (McMillan, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I want to appeal to the Australian public tonight about decisions made by governments that are purely populist. They have no substance whatsoever. There are headlines like this from Jessica Irvin: 'Corruption will never die, but we can do more to stamp it out'. It then goes on with a general discussion about the possibilities of corrupting government decisions. I've never seen a government decision corrupted in this country. We may think they're bad decisions or we may not agree with the policy, but I've never seen a decision corrupted—not by a politician. Her piece at the end says:

As we enter 2018, corruption of government decision making is rightly a growing focus. Calls for a federal corruption body are well overdue—

with nothing to substantiate why you'd have a federal corruption body. Timely, Richard Mulgan writes about the 'flimsy case' for a federal ICAC.

If you want to ingratiate yourself to the general public, you become the anti-politician-politician-person. You stand back and you say: 'Yes, all politicians are corrupt at a local, state and federal level. Therefore, I'm going to champion the anti-corruption body.' And everybody says, 'He's on our side! He's on our side!' What are we offering? No-one has said what this body might do or how it might be shaped. Mr Mulgan's article is very interesting. It says:

Influential advocacy for a federal ICAC has also come from—

surprise, surprise!—

several former judges and senior barristers, including those with direct experience in the NSW and Queensland anti-corruption commissions. Keen to see their state-based successes repeated on a larger stage, they have argued forcefully against Commonwealth exceptionalism …

How dare the Commonwealth not do what the states have already done! How dare we! How dare we be different and stand up and argue the case that Commonwealth politicians are so separated from opportunities for corruption. It is blatantly obvious that corruption in this field is very difficult. There were the two examples that I expressed the other day: one was trial by press—which I've never agreed with, with regard to Dastyari—and the other was Theo Theophanous, who was found to be corrupt and was jailed. In both cases, the system of law and the coverage of our press worked as we expect this open, democratic society to work.

If you step out of line in this country, we have 26 organisations in place to oversee government and what we do, to oversee the Public Service, to oversee the delivery of services and to ask people to be accountable for the expenditure of government money, and there are all the committees we have to assess what the government's doing at any time. We have the most open government system, I believe, anywhere in the world. We have the most scrutinised politicians anywhere in the world—perhaps in America it may be a little bit more, but it's a different system. There is the scrutiny of all our expenditure: our personnel expenditure, our office expenditure, what we do in election campaigns and how we raise money. There's all of that, yet there's always the innuendo. Somebody comes along and says:

The Australia Institute's research director and report co-author, Rod Campbell, was quizzed on this point by Crikey. Asked how a federal ICAC would help reduce corruption in a tangible sense, he talked in general terms about restoring trust in our institutions.

That's the only reason this man could come up with. Is trust in our institutions completely gone? I don't think so. I think that if you were to ask somebody, 'Do you trust all politicians?' they'd say, 'Probably not.' I know in this world that if someone is corrupt they will find a way to get around the system; they always have and they always will. Corrupt people in any situation will find a way to advantage themselves in the system.

I don't see any reason at this stage for us to have a another very, very expensive oversight body that the judiciary would control. It would cost the taxpayer a bucketload of dough when we haven't got any tangible evidence of corruption. Why are we as a government so keen to tap into a vein in the Australian community that is not part of good governance of the country? What do the people require of us but to govern fairly, to govern in equity and to govern on their behalf? We should get on and do our jobs as politicians and refrain from the populist politics of saying, 'There must be corruption somewhere, and this ICAC, a federal ICAC, will spend their time searching for it!' Are they only going to be a reference body? Who are they going to be? They're going to have to be judicial. They're going to have to be appointed. They'll be on figures like—member for Leichhardt, you know how much these people are paid: $500,000 to $600,000 each?

Warren Entsch (Leichhardt, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Absolutely.

Russell Broadbent (McMillan, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

To perhaps find some corruption, or suggest that there is corruption. Wow, what a ripper job that would be! And then they'd have their employees under that and their employees under that to support them. Don't forget, we'd have to rent a very, very expensive building. Now, the member representing Darwin would have his hand up, and he'd say: 'We'll do that in Darwin for you. We've got just got the building for you. We'll have our federal ICAC in Darwin.'

Warren Entsch (Leichhardt, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

No, no, no; Cairns.

Russell Broadbent (McMillan, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

The member for Leichhardt thinks it should be in Cairns. What would happen is that there would be a bipartisan compromise, and the federal ICAC, with probably 50 employees by now—because you need some backup, you need IT people and you need investigators—could do the investigation in Darwin and then they could have the headquarters in Cairns. They could fly all of their families with them because there has to be family leave. This is absurd.

I'd like to appeal to the Australian people to not to be blindsided. By their calls for a federal anticorruption body, they're really suggesting to you that people like myself and the other members of this parliament are corrupt. I can tell you, we're not. Mr Richard Mulgan's case for a federal ICAC is very flimsy. There's actually not a place for a federal ICAC here. Do you know what I think is going to happen?

Warren Entsch (Leichhardt, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Tell us.

Russell Broadbent (McMillan, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I think that the government of the day, of either sort, will roll over and say: 'Oh, well. The public have called for it. We're just going to have to have it.' Then they'll be able to say: 'I brought this ICAC in. It's a very popular move and I'm on the side of the people'. Don't be fooled, don't be blindsided, don't be conned.