Mathias Cormann (WA, Liberal Party, Shadow Parliamentary Secretary for Health Administration) Share this | Hansard source

One of the core responsibilities of parliament is to scrutinise the activities and performance of executive government, in particular the way executive government spends public money. The Senate, of course, has a very particular responsibility in relation to that. We have significant responsibilities under our Constitution, and over the last 108 years the Senate practices and procedures have developed to ensure that the Senate is a very effective institution helping to hold executive government to account.

One of the core requirements for us to be able to do our job as senators in this chamber is that we can ask questions of government, and we are entitled to expect answers. We are able to ask for documents that are held by government, and we are entitled, indeed, to get access to those documents. The default position should be that, if in the context of Senate committee inquiries a question is asked of a public official or of a minister, the minister or official will answer that question or he will provide a particular document that is being asked for. That is the default position unless there is a justifiable and specified public interest ground as to why it would not be in the public interest for the minister or that public official to provide either access to that information or access to that document.

There has been a lot of confusion for the time that I have been in this place, whether it was confected confusion or real confusion, as to how some of the past procedures and principles of the Senate were to be applied in the context of Senate inquiries. Indeed, ministers have been confused, officials have been confused and chairs of Senate committees have been confused when the issue was raised that, if a minister declines to provide access to a particular piece of information then he has to, first, point to a recognised public interest ground and, second, make a statement of the reasons as to why it would not be in the public interest for that particular information to be provided.

The purpose of the motion passed by the Senate on 13 May was to set out very clearly the process to be followed by ministers and officials when they are in a position where they want to decline to provide access to information because they think that it might not be in the public interest for that information to be provided. Of course there have been over the last 108 years a number of recognised public interest grounds that have developed. I will just read them back into the record. They include that, essentially, if there is a prejudice to legal proceedings, if there is prejudice to law enforcement investigations, damage to commercial interest, unreasonable invasion of privacy, disclosure of executive council or cabinet deliberations, prejudice to national security or defence, prejudice to Australia’s international relations, and prejudice to relations between the Commonwealth and states. If there are any of these then the government may be able to claim proper public interest immunity as a reason not to provide access to a particular piece of information. The problem is that ministers and officers have continued to refuse to provide information to Senate committees without properly raising claims of public interest immunity and, indeed, chairs of Senate committees have not always been as enthusiastic as they should have been in enforcing that particular requirement.

I am just going to reflect on some of the experiences that I have had, and point to one other experience. During Senate estimates I asked an official from the Department of the Prime Minister and Cabinet whether advice had been provided to the Prime Minister in relation to the alcopops tax measure. I was given a number and in a particular period of time seven pieces of advice have been provided. I asked whether that advice had been part of the cabinet deliberations or whether it was routine advice to government. It was not part of the cabinet deliberations. Okay, so there was one public interest ground that was excluded. The question then was: can we have access to copies of that advice? The answer was, ‘No, it’s advice to the government,’ and the question was ultimately taken on notice. Still no answer has been provided to this day, and no reason has been given as to why it is not in the public interest for the Senate committee to be given access to that information. I asked Senator Faulkner, who supposedly is in favour of openness and transparency in government, what the recognised public interest ground was. Why is it not in the public interest for the Senate to be given access to that particular piece of advice? He was not able to point to any and he did not even try. The question arises: would it put our national security at risk? Is there an infringement, or would it prejudice legal proceedings or law enforcement investigations? Which one is it? There is not one.

Of course, I had an even worse experience with Senator Conroy. There is quite a serious issue at play, and I really urge every individual senator to reflect on this quite carefully. The Leader of the Opposition announced in his budget reply speech an alternative savings model to take the place of Labor’s broken promise on the private health insurance rebate. The Leader of the Opposition quite constructively and positively proposed instead that the excise on tobacco should be increased by 12½ per cent. Clearly the government sought advice from Treasury on that and, as part of a political exercise, that Treasury advice was released to the media on 17 May. The media spontaneously went out and reported it, and, essentially, the purpose of the government was to discredit the very constructive and positive alternative proposal made by the Leader of the Opposition. When we asked questions in Senate estimates whether we could have access, as a Senate committee, to a copy of that same advice we were told no and it was taken on notice. To this day it has not been provided. I think that is a complete disregard of the Senate. If a copy of a piece of advice can be handed to the media, what possible public interest can there be for a copy of that same piece of advice not to be provided to a Senate committee, which is there to scrutinise the activities and performance of the government, and which is there to scrutinise whether the public expenditure is appropriately effected.

I will point to one more example before concluding my remarks. Senator Coonan asked a question of Dr Ken Henry, ‘When did you first become aware of the government’s infamous $43 billion National Broadband Network plan?’ He refused to answer the question following which Senator Bushby asked, very sensibly and in complete compliance with the order passed on 13 May, whether he was claiming public interest immunity and, if so, on which ground was he basing his public interest immunity claim. Senator Bushby asked him to give us a statement of reasons. He said, ‘No, I’m not claiming public interest immunity; I’m just not answering your question,’ without giving any sort of reason whatsoever. These examples demonstrate complete arrogance. This is not the open and transparent government that we were promised by the Rudd government before the last election. This is secretive government at its worst. It is fair to say that officials are obviously being protected by senior ministers in this government. Ministers are treating this Senate and the Senate committee system with complete disregard—dare I say, with contempt. I really urge all senators to have a very close look at the report of the Procedure Committee. Clearly, it was never the expectation that a very bad culture that has become entrenched in this current government, of not wanting to reveal information, would be changed overnight. I believe that the order that we passed on 13 May will continue to do its work. Hopefully, it will over time continue to encourage officials and ministers to reflect very carefully on their obligations to be accountable to the Senate and, through the Senate, to the Australian people.

I would suggest that the Clerk of the Senate be asked, and be required, to make regular reports to the Senate on how this order operates after each Senate estimates period so we can reflect on, observe and monitor how the implementation of this particular order is progressing as we move forward. Indeed, I think these regular reports should perhaps be provided after each estimates for a period of up to five years. Hopefully, by then everyone will understand what the requirements are and everybody will understand that government should provide access to information and documents unless there is a recognised public interest ground as to why that should not be the case. I am sure that we would have significantly better government for it. Open government makes for better government; secretive government makes for bad government. This government are a very secretive government irrespective of what they tried to make people believe before the last election.