Bill Shorten (Maribyrnong, Australian Labor Party, Leader of the Opposition) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

My question is to the Prime Minister. All this week the Prime Minister has expressed confidence in the Deputy Prime Minister. Given it's been confirmed this week that the Deputy Prime Minister personally oversaw the reallocation of staff where he had a conflict of interest, breached the ministerial standards by asking for rent-free accommodation, repeatedly misled the House and allowed agencies to use taxpayers' money to pay his close business mate, when will the Prime Minister do as is required under his own ministerial standards and sack the Deputy Prime Minister?

Tony Smith (Speaker) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

The Leader of the House on indulgence.

Christopher Pyne (Sturt, Liberal Party, Leader of the House) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Mr Speaker, there are two assertions made in that question which are clearly factually untrue, and they should not be allowed to stand as a question.

Mr Hill interjecting—

Tony Smith (Speaker) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

The member for Bruce will leave the chamber under 94(a).

The member for Bruce then left the chamber.

Could the Leader of the House rewind a bit? I didn't hear it, thanks to the bellowing of the member for Bruce.

Christopher Pyne (Sturt, Liberal Party, Leader of the House) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Fair enough, Mr Speaker. There is a great deal of licence given to questions, but questions also have to contain some truthfulness. There are two assertions made in that question which have already been dealt with and are clearly untrue. The first of them is that the Deputy Prime Minister asked for free accommodation. He's made it perfectly clear that that was not the case. The second one is that he intervened to provide funds for a business person, for a grant which he would never have been asked to meet as a decision-maker. I don't believe that question should be allowed to stand. The opposition should be allowed to rephrase it if necessary, but as a question it breaches section 100 of the standing orders.

Tony Smith (Speaker) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I have listened to the Leader of the House and heard his point. I wanted to hear it carefully, which is why I asked him to repeat part of it when I had to deal with an interjecting member. His point about whether something's factually accurate or not is not a requirement of the standing orders. You may well argue it is something to be considered, but it would be something impossible to judge in question time. My approach on that is allowing the capacity for an answer, if a question does have factual inaccuracies in it, to deal with and expose them for the House to consider.

The concern I have is with imputations of improper motives. That question did go close, but they were assertions and it was to the Prime Minister. The previous question from the member for Grayndler I almost ruled out of order. Actually, on reflection, the last part probably should have been for the same reason as with the member for Isaacs, which is that it is highly disorderly to impute an improper motive for the reason why a minister might be acting in the way they have or their department's acted in the way it has. I have listened very carefully to that. I sympathise with the position of the Leader of the House, but I am going to allow the question because I'm just not in a position to judge factual accuracy in question time. Assertions can be made. As far as the Leader of the House is concerned, they might be ridiculous assertions. They might be factually incorrect assertions. But for me to just rule them out actually prevents those being answered, so I'm going to call the Prime Minister.

Malcolm Turnbull (Wentworth, Liberal Party, Prime Minister) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Honourable members have heard the comments of the Leader of the House. In terms of the ministerial standards, I have received absolutely unequivocal assurances from the Deputy Prime Minister that he has fully complied with all parliamentary disclosure requirements and with the Statement of Ministerial Standards. He has given me unequivocal assurances that he has been scrupulous in ensuring the legitimacy and accuracy of any claim for entitlement to ministerial, parliamentary or travel allowance. If the honourable members opposite wish to assert that he has breached a clause in the ministerial standards then they should identify the clause.

We will now deal with the matter relating to Mr Maguire. The ministerial standards say at 2.21:

Ministers, in their official capacity, may therefore accept customary official gifts, hospitality, tokens of appreciation, and similar formal gestures in accordance with the relevant guidelines, but must not seek or encourage any form of gift in their personal capacity.

The Deputy Prime Minister has given his response to that. He's made it clear. His account is that he did not encourage or solicit the gift. Unless honourable members opposite are able to present a case that his statements are false then he has not breached that particular ministerial standard which I just quoted from.