Slade Brockman (WA, Liberal Party) Share this | Hansard source

A chairman of an industry super fund communicating directly with the Treasurer about a government policy, and what did the CEO of that fund have to say? The CEO of that fund said, 'Mr Swan made announcements on housing funding without the CEO's knowledge.' My goodness me. This has more than a whiff of corruption about it. The President of the Labor Party, communicating directly with the Treasurer, commits an industry super fund that should only be responsible for the money of its members to supporting a government's policy without telling the CEO. I mean, this is absolutely unbelievable. In fact, the CEO had no knowledge of the discussions between Mr Swan, the President of the Labor Party and Treasurer Chalmers regarding a $500 million commitment to this Labor Party policy.

That is an utter disgrace, and it reveals the cancer at the heart of the industry super fund system—the fact that the industry super funds have these guaranteed board positions for union members. The union, in this case, is the CFMEU, a union that this Labor government, kicking and screaming, has put into administration. You couldn't write this as a script for a Hollywood movie—the president of the Labor Party has been talking directly to the Treasurer about investing $500 million of members' money in a Labor government policy. Surely Mr Swan had the brains to realise that that was an extraordinarily crass, dangerous and potentially corrupt thing to do—surely! It's absolutely unbelievable that this is the way the chairman of a super fund would behave, it's absolutely unbelievable that the Labor Party would defend this, and it's absolutely unbelievable that they cannot see this core of corruption at the heart of the industry super fund system. (Time expired)