Sue Lines (WA, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Hansard source

I rise today to talk through my very serious concerns about the National Integrity Commission Bill 2013 and what the Greens are proposing. The bill seeks to establish a National Integrity Commission. It is established as an independent statutory agency and consists of an Integrity Commissioner, a law enforcement commissioner and an independent parliamentary adviser.

I just heard some of what Senator Ludlam had to say, and I have to say that, if I have any concerns about entitlement, I phone the state office. I thought that was their role. They give independent advice about what is under entitlement and what is not. Of course they are not going to put a political spin on that and, quite frankly, neither is an independent parliamentary adviser. I think that they would give the same advice that the state office do. We call them regularly for that advice.

I also think that, if the Greens were serious about this bill, a bill with such broad powers and scope, they would have canvassed with other parties and Independents the intent of the bill. The fact that the Greens have just presented this bill without consultation leads me to conclude that it is just another grandstanding effort, another stunt to appeal to their base.

I also note that in this place there are some politicians who think they are not politicians, who think there is a 'them and us'. The Greens are particularly good at this, trying to set themselves up as some kind of pure other, and this bill smacks of that 'other'.

This bill has been examined by the Parliamentary Joint Committee on Human Rights. In the summary of the committee's report, a number of key concerns were raised—and, yes, Senator Milne put forward a letter in response to those concerns, but it barely goes to the issues raised. The committee felt that a number of provisions in the bill breach a range of human rights: freedom of association, privilege and so on. These went to coercive investigative powers of the National Integrity Commissioner, compelling a person to provide information, to produce documents and attend investigations and hearings, and the power to arrest. It interferes with the right of a person not to incriminate themselves and limits the application of legal professional privilege. It is all starting to sound rather familiar, like another bill that certainly I strongly oppose. That just names some of the rights which are restricted or removed altogether.

The Law Council also considered:

… the threshold issue of the desirability of a federal anti-corruption body should be considered by Parliament, ideally through a Senate Committee inquiry, before more detailed proposals like the current Bill are progressed.

From a party which stood with Labor in its opposition to the reintroduction of the ABCC, this bill, the Greens bill, has powers and penalties which are similar and in fact go further than the obnoxious ABCC bill. So again, for me, it reinforces this 'them and us' mentality.

The bill seeks to establish and combine an investigative body to examine Commonwealth departments and agencies, federal politicians, our staff, the AFP and the ACC and in addition to have the officer to provide some kind of independent parliamentary advice, which I said in the opening I believe is already available. I am not sure what the wisdom is in creating a unit which would investigate a range of agencies with very different powers, all under the one agency. The AFP and the ACC operate very differently to a Commonwealth agency or statutory authority. Their mandates and authorities are completely different. It would require a bank of lawyers to sort through what could be investigated by this new Greens authority and what could not. Surely the Greens are not suggesting this new body have supreme authority over all agencies mentioned in the outline of the bill. And who is this body answerable to? What are its checks and balances to ensure that it operates in an entirely ethical way? What are the inbuilt protections to stop it becoming stacked with friendly bureaucrats? Who watches the watcher?

Given that investigations are conducted in the utmost secrecy, what happens if a state authority and the new federal body are investigating the same person? Imagine the Keystone Kops-like scenarios of listening devices being planted, mobile phones being tapped and emails being intercepted by different agencies completely ignorant of the activities of the other. What would the information-sharing protocols be between state authorities, police, the AFP and this new body be like, when the AFP is one of the bodies this new body has the power to investigate? How would data be gathered and stored? From a party that was hell-bent on data protection, this bill is open slather.

Of course accountability is important. It is critical to the jobs that we have been elected to carry out. That is why I talk to other politicians when I am not sure of an entitlement—and yes, I have tripped up. In my first three months here I overspent on staff travel, and I paid that back. That was a valuable lesson I learned, because now every time I am not sure about something I call the state office and I get it in writing. Most of us take this responsibility seriously. It is a privilege to be elected to parliament, and we as parliamentarians should never forget that. With that privilege comes a very serious responsibility that all of our actions should be transparent and that we should be held accountable for the expenditure of public moneys.

Labor has political accountability in its party platform. Of course we will consider this Greens bill, but are they prepared to listen and change the bill? This bill in similar form has been presented to the parliament on three other occasions. Therefore, I question the merits of the bill.

Of course when it suits the Greens they act in their own interests. Just yesterday in the Senate they supported the government's Medical Research Future Fund Bill 2015. Of course Labor supports medical research, but we want a fund where the awarding of funds to medical research is completely independent, and what the Greens have signed up to with this fund is one where the health minister advises the finance minister which groups get funds and what gets funded. Part of what the Greens' so-called integrity bill is seeking to expose is overt lobbying, but what the Greens agreed to yesterday in relation to the Medical Research Future Fund leaves ministers totally exposed to those who are the slickest lobbyists, with plenty of money, influence and vested interests. For years we have seen how the tobacco and alcohol lobbies use sophisticated methods, and even so-called medical research, to advance their causes. Again, if the Greens were serious about integrity they would have stood with Labor yesterday and demanded the inclusion of a proper independent body to award the research funds, but they did not do that. They signed up to a system which is open to the slickest lobbyist.

Senator Milne, in introducing this bill, made this remarkable statement:

The federal Parliament cannot end the 44th session remaining as the only jurisdiction left unchecked against the very real threat of internal corruption or maladministration across the federal public service.

Unchecked? If the Greens have evidence of internal corruption and maladministration, they should report it. If the Greens think that our Public Service is inherently a corrupt organisation, they should say it, not hide behind the pretence of some kind of 'integrity' bill. Australia has a strong record on combating corruption. Australia has a strong record of global, regional and domestic action to prevent and expose corrupt activity. We are consistently ranked as one of the least corrupt nations in the world in the Transparency International corruption perceptions index. In fact, in 2014 we were listed as the 11th-least corrupt nation out of 175 countries.

Responsibility for fighting corruption should not rest with a single body. I think that is inviting trouble into the future, and it is not clear how that body would be regulated. Fighting corruption should be ingrained in the culture and practice of our Public Service. There are several specialised agencies which already exist to promote accountability and integrity at the Commonwealth level. The distribution of responsibility is one of the great strengths in Australia's approach because it creates a strong system of checks and balances. And what the Greens are seeking to do is to take all of that responsibility for integrity and following through on corruption and put it in the one agency. That is not going to work. Fighting corruption should be part of every agency that we have, and we believe that the Australian Public Service, by and large, is a uniquely corruption-free zone.

What I would like to talk about today—and today is a very good day to do that—is political donations, completely missing in the Greens bill. That is something that needs to be addressed. Today we see in our newspapers the fact that the head of the witch hunt royal commission into trade unions has indeed been invited to a Liberal political fundraiser.

Debate adjourned.