Deborah O'Neill (NSW, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Hansard source

I want to hold up these documents, containing 144 pages of emails, that continue to reveal the nature of deception that was involved in the matter to which this report seeks to put some context around. It is a convoluted tale. It's really worth looking at the report, because the extraction-of-teeth method that we've had to go through, to get to this point, has been unbelievably painful. I want to say, right at the start, that it is an offence to me as a senator—and I find it offensive to the Senate, to my colleagues and to the Australian people we represent here—that PwC attempted a swiftie a couple of weeks ago, on a Monday morning, with a headline that indicated they had released the names.

Let's be very clear: they didn't release the names. They sent a list of names to us, which was different from another set of lists that was going around, and then they asked us to keep it secret. They got a headline. If they're going to continue to chase headlines and fail to respond to the orders of the Senate to tell the truth, it's going to get uglier and uglier. It is more than time for PwC to change their strategy. Spin's not going to get anyone out of this mess. There is a requirement for truth-telling to the Australian people.

Today this report into PricewaterhouseCoopers Australia—and, tangentially, PwC global—is a response to that behaviour so desperately and awfully revealed in that 144 pages of emails and the consequent behaviour that has followed as those emails became somewhat known in public. This document reveals a profoundly unethical nature of behaviour inside the organisation over many years and is a calculated breach of trust.

The scale and significance of the public interest in this matter has motivated the release of the report. I want to associate myself with the remarks already on the record from the chair, and certainly with Senator Pocock who has been pursuing this matter, and I want to applaud the powers of the Senate to do its job for the Australian people. These documents were released because of questions that were asked in estimates. The fact that we got them, in response to questions that were put on notice afterwards, has given us the shape and scale of what's reported today in this very important report.

To be clear, the view of the committee is that what happened with PwC Australia and PwC global was a deliberate and planned breach of trust by PwC. The actions of Peter-John Collins, ex-PwC, in intentionally sharing confidential information with PwC partners and in personnel risked at least $180 million per year of tax to which Australians, rightly, had a claim. It also generated at least $2.5 million of income for PwC.

This occurred at the time when Mr Tom Seymour, who has stepped down as the recent CEO of PwC Australia, was head of tax, and it occurred under the watch of Mr Luke Sayers, who was the CEO of PwC at the time. What is manifestly clear is that the company failed in its duty of care towards its own partners and personnel and to Australian taxpayers, and it failed to report the actions of unfit and improper persons in their midst.

This is a failure that extends because of the structure of PwC, thereby to all partners. Whether they were embedded in these emails, whether they had knowledge of it, whether they had degrees of knowledge of it, every partner is engaged in this breach. All the personnel who were working with PwC, by association, had their reputations tarnished.

As these internal PwC emails received and published by the Senate Economics Committee reveal, Mr Collins and other PwC parties had no regard for their obligation to confidentiality of their engagement with Treasury. While Mr Collins is a central figure in these events, it's evident from the internal PwC emails, brought to light through the Senate estimates, that his actions were understood by PwC to be problematic, for the company, if they were to ever be made public. So they knew it was 'dodgy as' but continued the practice anyway. There's no evidence that PwC colleagues or leaders called out this behaviour until it became publicly known in 2023—eight years after it commenced.

While PwC were out publicly and in their representations to the ATO supporting the new tax laws, they were in fact undermining those tax laws behind closed doors. Let me remind you of some of the communication in redacted PwC emails from an unnamed PwC employee:

It sounds like you haven't received this document in any form. Because it was provided to us on a confidential basis, I ask that you don't circulate it beyond us or discuss it outside PwC—it would really put PwC Australia and me in a real bind.

There is a procedure for me to get you confidentiality clearances—you sign a deed—if needed.

The name of the person that signed that particular email has been redacted. We don't know if that person still works at PwC. We don't know if that person could be working on government contracts. This person could be in a senior executive position at PwC or any other company globally. They could indeed be on the audit board for standards globally. We have no idea because the obfuscation continues from PwC Australia and PwC Global. The role and identity of that unnamed person and all unnamed persons are crucial to Australia's understanding of the depth of this issue and in allowing the correct course of justice to be enacted. I acknowledge that there is a tension between providing natural justice to those who were tangentially or peripherally involved, but there is a national interest in us knowing and an international interest in all of us knowing exactly who and how and to what degree people were involved. And we are no closer to that. No matter how many headlines about names being released get printed, the fact is we remain in the dark because PwC are not coming clean.

Ms Stubbins is the new CEO, and I would suggest that, like many who have gone before her, she simply doesn't seem to understand the nature of transparency and accountability. On Monday 5 June we got some information. Four partners were named: Peter Collins, Michael Bernstein, Neil Fuller and Paul McNab. They were happy to put them on the public record, but not others. They did, however, dribble out a bit more information to pretend that they were actually coming clean with Australians, and so there are nine partners who have gone on gardening leave. I don't care how good they are at gardening, and I'm really not satisfied that only four people were named. Are they the four people that they didn't like? Let me express some concern about reports from whistleblowers prior to the report landing. Even up to today people inside PwC are scared to death or are frightened to speak up because they are being intimidated. That is the culture of this organisation that is manifested today. And if you think you can frighten people so much that they are afraid to speak to their elected representatives, well, think again.

I have confidence in the Australian people deciding to stand up for what is right, and I have great confidence in people inside PwC who have done the right thing, who continue to do the right thing, who do act professionally, who are ethical, who want to participate properly in the economy and provide due and proper assurance to the market. I know they are in there because they are writing to me and to my colleagues. I don't think that PwC understand that the tactics of intimidation will not assist them. Sixty-three names have been provided to the committee, but they did not provide the committee with an indication of the extent to which those 63 individuals were involved. Let me convey my deep displeasure and my absolute frustration with PwC for placing our committee in such an invidious position. It is contemptuous to attempt to use the Senate in the way that they have tried. It was a big try-on, it was completely inappropriate, and if you think that is going to bring the matter to an end, it certainly won't. (Time expired.)