Nick McKim (Tasmania, Australian Greens) Share this | Hansard source

What an insult to the Australian people! We've got a situation where the Senate collectively required Senator Cormann to place certain information on the record and, at one second to midnight—or perhaps I should say one second to noon, given the time of day—he waltzes into this chamber and hands a letter to Senator Wong which, as I rise to debate, I still have not seen. That is no criticism of Senator Wong but it is every possible criticism of Senator Cormann. He is denying the Senate the opportunity to have an informed debate. What we can surmise from Senator Wong's contribution is that Senator Cormann has failed to comply with an order of the Senate.

Let's be very clear about this: the Prime Minister should never have made this telephone call. It was a clear attempt to use his personal relationship with the New South Wales police commissioner to either influence the course of the New South Wales police investigation into Mr Taylor or otherwise discover information that should not have been available to Mr Morrison and certainly would not have been available to any other ordinary Australian person in this situation. But not only should the PM not have made this call; the Attorney-General should not have allowed him to make this call. How extraordinary it is that we now know that the Attorney-General was in fact with the Prime Minister when he made that call—at the very least an implicit endorsement by the Attorney-General of the Prime Minister's decision to make this call. So these are two gross failings here from the Prime Minister and from the nation's first law officer.

The New South Wales police commissioner should never have accepted this call. It looks shocking, it looks dodgy and it stinks to high heaven. In other words, the optics are extremely poor. Secondly—and I'll use a military analogy here—the Prime Minister is not in the line of command of the New South Wales police commissioner. The New South Wales police commissioner does not report to the Prime Minister; he reports to the New South Wales police minister.

So this call should never have been made by the Prime Minister, it should never have been endorsed by the Attorney-General and it never should have been taken or accepted by the New South Wales police commissioner—three gross errors of judgement from people who should have known better. Former Liberal staffer Nikki Savva said, 'Someone should have said to him "Do not make that call."' I completely agree with Ms Savva there. She also said, 'Porter, as the first law officer of the land … should have grabbed the phone out of his hand and said, "Don’t do this; it’s not a good idea."' Again, I completely agree with Ms Savva there. They are three gross errors of judgement that call into question this government's capacity to act in a lawful and meaningful way.

This is a shocking example of how power truly operates in Australia today. It's also a shocking example of how the Liberals think they are above the law and above basic standards of propriety. Put simply, this government do not respect the rule of law and they certainly do not respect the Senate and the parliament. To those people listening who wonder why the rule of law is so important, let me explain. The rule of law is one of the foundations of our democracy. It is one of the principles that stand between a Liberal democracy and a totalitarian or fascist regime. We have to ensure that the doctrine of the separation of powers is respected and maintained, and that includes not only the separation of powers between parliaments and courts but also the separation of powers between governments and police investigators. The Australian people have a right to know that when there is a criminal investigation underway, which there currently is, it will be conducted without fear, without favour and the cards will fall where they may. Right now, we've got a situation where, quite reasonably, there will be many people in the country asking whether they can have confidence in this New South Wales police investigation because the Prime Minister intervened in such an extraordinary manner.

Let's be clear about why we're even discussing this today. Minister Taylor and his office passed on apparently forged documents to The Daily Telegraph in order to smear a political opponent. We don't know who forged those documents but, on the face of it, whoever did is guilty of a crime and potentially more than one crime. That question—who forged these documents, who committed these crimes—is exactly what the New South Wales police are currently investigating. The Prime Minister should never have made this call. The Attorney-General should never have allowed him to make the call, or endorse him making the call, and the New South Wales police commissioner should never have accepted that call.

Unfortunately, we are still talking about Minister Taylor here. The Prime Minister should have stood him aside while this investigation into the potential commission of a crime is underway. In fact, that's what the ministerial code of conduct says should have occurred. That code, by the way, is written by the Prime Minister and should be enforced by the Prime Minister. Given Minister Taylor has decided to dig in, huddle down, keep his head down and ride this political storm out, and given that he has refused to offer to the Prime Minister to stand aside, the Prime Minister should now stand him aside. Ministers hold their commissions from the Governor-General on the advice of the Prime Minister, so the buck stops with the PM here. The Prime Minister should stand Minister Taylor aside until this investigation is complete.

That we would have a phone conversation between the PM and the New South Wales commissioner of police, relating to an investigation of a potential crime by a federal minister, with the Attorney-General present, and that there would be no notes made or transcript taken of that phone call, beggars belief. We are left with only two conclusions that can be drawn here: that there are notes or a transcript, and Senator Cormann has refused to comply with an order of the Senate to produce them, or that the Prime Minister and the Attorney-General are running such shambolic offices and such a shambolic government that they would struggle to organise a beer in a brewery.

Now, it's one or the other. Either there are notes or a transcript, and they have not been provided in accordance with the order for the production of documents, or it is 'beer in a brewery time' inside our government, which portends very poorly for the Australian people. There are any number of crises that need to be dealt with by this government, headed up by the climate emergency and the complete and utter breakdown of our climate that is occurring before our very eyes. That's what the government should be focused on, not on whistling out of orders from the Senate and running a shambolic, chaotic and disorganised government. The minister needs to come clean and he needs to comply with the order. (Time expired)