Christopher Back (WA, Liberal Party) Share this | Hansard source

It is disappointing in this place when you see people of the apparent status of the shadow Attorney-General, Mr Dreyfus QC, and indeed the Leader of the Opposition in the Senate, herself a solicitor, lowering themselves to the level that we have just heard from Senator Wong on a matter which is of itself relatively straightforward. I intend to explain how it is. The Attorney-General was in consultation with the Solicitor-General, at the request of the Solicitor-General, on the practice of briefing the Solicitor-General on questions of law, and here is what happened. On 12 November, the Solicitor-General raised the issue with Attorney-General Brandis. It resulted in a meeting on 30 November 2015 in which the Attorney-General asked the Solicitor-General to come to his office to have a discussion about the concerns the Solicitor-General had raised. There is no question about that. There were two solicitors in the office at the time, both of whom have provided notes of that meeting. I have not heard that Mr Gleeson has refuted or challenged the contents of the notes that were provided. What followed was the fact that the Attorney-General, as a result of that meeting in which he inquired further the details of concern by the Solicitor-General, asked Mr Gleeson to respond to him in writing. Isn't that an amazing process? The Solicitor-General asked for a meeting, the Attorney-General agreed to it and the Attorney-General said, 'So that I'm clear, will you put your note in writing?' which he did by March this year.

We then move from March to 20 April, all of which has been confirmed by the wasteful questions by the opposition today, and it was then that the Attorney-General, Senator Brandis QC, sought from his department to prepare a draft which would be a response to the Solicitor-General. Let's examine that a little bit further, if we may. This happened on 20 April this year. I now want to advise the chamber and anyone who might be listening what followed as a result. The department advised the Attorney-General on 29 April, recommending that the Attorney-General put into place the rule change upon which he had consulted with Solicitor-General Gleeson. The department told the Attorney-General that, to comply with the law, he would need to be satisfied that any consultation he considered to be appropriate and reasonably practical had been undertaken. In recommending that the rule should go ahead, the Attorney-General's Department head said:

We consider that your consultation with the Solicitor-General would meet this obligation.

Why have we had the waste of time in this place today? Why has Mr Dreyfus QC made a fool of himself in the other place when this was the advice of the department to the Attorney-General:

We consider that your consultation with the Solicitor-General would meet this obligation.

It is the case, as reported on the weekend by the legal affairs editor of one of the major newspapers, that Mr Gleeson SC is annoyed because he was not consulted about the final wording of the rule change. I quote:

But, with the greatest of respect to the Solicitor-General, so what?

I ask with the same level of respect to my colleagues on the other side: so what?

The Solicitor-General is a legal adviser to the government and to the Attorney-General. He has no power of veto over the government. Section 17 of the legislation act makes it clear that 'the consultation must be to the satisfaction of the rule-maker'. As I recall, the rule-maker is the Attorney-General, Senator Brandis. It is not the Solicitor-General, Mr Gleeson. He has badly overextended.