Steve Hutchins (NSW, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I seek leave to make a brief personal statement.

Leave granted.

After question time in the House of Representatives today, Mr Slipper, the member for Fisher, made a statement in relation to an article that appeared in a number of News Ltd publications on Sunday. The article was written by Glenn Milne. In that article, a number of allegations were made about the events that transpired on an ADF program that Mr Slipper and I attended, along with Senator Bushby and Mr Don Randall, the member for Canning.

In the article it was alleged that Mr Slipper had potentially jeopardised the safety and wellbeing of a number of sailors on HMAS Stuart. I just wish to correct the record this evening. I was advised on Friday morning that Mr Milne was writing this article on Mr Slipper. The basis of the article, as I was told, was that Mr Slipper demanded to use the ship’s satellite phone to ring a number of people. Mr Milne tried to ring me on Saturday. Eventually he got hold of me on Saturday afternoon and he asked me for my version of what occurred. What he had been told by Defence sources was my recollection of events as well.

In the week of 14 July this year, the other three colleagues from parliament and I were part of the ADF program that went to the Middle East. In the second week of the program, we were on HMAS Stuart. Mr Slipper has claimed that the article by Mr Milne was full of, to use his term, ‘misrepresentations’. That is not true. I was there, along with my colleagues whom I have already named, and this is what, as I recall, happened.

Cory Bernardi (SA, Liberal Party, Shadow Parliamentary Secretary for Families and Community Services) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Madam Acting Deputy President, on a point of order: we gave permission for a personal explanation by Senator Hutchins with regard to what was said in the lower house today. We do not need a blow-by-blow description of what transpired in the papers or previously in his conversations with Mr Milne.

Concetta Fierravanti-Wells (NSW, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Senator Hutchins, I think that you should come to the substance of what is the personal nature of the explanation. I am conscious of the time, so perhaps you could come to that aspect of it.

Steve Hutchins (NSW, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

The purpose of my explanation is this: I was not going to say anything about the article that Mr Milne put in the paper yesterday and would not have done so except that Mr Slipper got up this afternoon and said it was full of misrepresentations. It was not. Mr Slipper used that satellite phone on the ship. At some point we were about to be part of a boarding party on an oil tanker—that is, Mr Randall, Senator Bushby, Mr Slipper and I—but we were advised sometime during that morning that that had been cancelled because of what had been said on the satellite phone.

Cory Bernardi (SA, Liberal Party, Shadow Parliamentary Secretary for Families and Community Services) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Madam Acting Deputy President, on a point of order: I do not like to interrupt the senator in making a personal explanation, but a personal explanation is where you believe you have been misrepresented or inaccurately portrayed. It is not about dissent from what someone else has said.

The Acting Deputy President:

Senator Hutchins, I would appreciate it if you could come to the personal nature of your explanation insofar as you are concerned. Perhaps you could come to that.

Steve Hutchins (NSW, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I believe that I was personally misrepresented because I was part of that group that attended the ADF program and, as a part of that program, I felt that I had been impugned because of a collective guilt that has somehow or other been visited upon all of us who were part of that program. That is why I rise in this place to make these comments. As I said, if I may continue—I will not be much longer—

The Acting Deputy President:

I hope that you will not be too much longer.

Steve Hutchins (NSW, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

What occurred is that, as we were about to join this boarding party on an oil tanker, Central Command—which I gather is run by the Americans—advised the intelligence officer, who was furious as he brought us into the meeting.

Cory Bernardi (SA, Liberal Party, Shadow Parliamentary Secretary for Families and Community Services) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Madam Acting Deputy President, on a point of order: I think we have established what a personal explanation is for. This is debating about the merits of a newspaper article. If Mr Slipper has said something that directly affects Senator Hutchins, has named Senator Hutchins or has suggested that Senator Hutchins has done something inappropriate, Senator Hutchins should come to the point of it, but let us not try to cast a wider stone in order to detract from or highlight an article.

Stephen Conroy (Victoria, Australian Labor Party, Deputy Leader of the Government in the Senate) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Madam Acting Deputy President, on the point of order: I think Senator Hutchins is well within his rights. It is clear that he has been implicated in the cancellation of a military mission because of what Mr Slipper has alleged in the parliament today. I think Senator Hutchins is entitled to put his case on how the representations that Mr Slipper has engaged in in the other chamber have reflected in a very serious way on Senator Hutchins’s own conduct. I think he is entitled to clear the air on that. I appreciate some of the points you and Senator Bernardi have made about how perhaps we can speed the journey of this, but I do think Senator Hutchins is entitled to correct the impressions that Mr Slipper has left that impugn Senator Hutchins’s behaviour on board the ship.

Cory Bernardi (SA, Liberal Party, Shadow Parliamentary Secretary for Families and Community Services) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Madam Acting Deputy President—

Stephen Conroy (Victoria, Australian Labor Party, Deputy Leader of the Government in the Senate) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

You’ve already spoken.

Cory Bernardi (SA, Liberal Party, Shadow Parliamentary Secretary for Families and Community Services) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Can’t I have another go?

The Acting Deputy President:

I was just about to say that the standing orders are very clear that the matter ought not be debated.

Bob Brown (Tasmania, Australian Greens) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Madam Acting Deputy President, on the point of order: yes, that is absolutely correct. The standing orders say that the matter ought not be debated, but surely the senator has the ability to put his story without debate so that the Senate can hear it. That is what the standing order is there for.

The Acting Deputy President:

Thank you, Senator Brown. My understanding, Senator Hutchins, is that the standing orders are that you should put forward your personal explanation. I believe that you have done that, and I would ask you to conclude your remarks.

Steve Hutchins (NSW, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Thank you, Madam Acting Deputy President. I want to conclude my remarks this way: there is no doubt in my mind that whatever Mr Slipper said on that satellite phone on that day led to the cancellation of the proposed boarding. I sought to clear this up because I believed that it not only impugned me and my other parliamentary colleagues but also put at risk the safety of those brave men and women of our Defence Force on HMAS Stuart.

Cory Bernardi (SA, Liberal Party, Shadow Parliamentary Secretary for Families and Community Services) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Madam Acting Deputy President, I would like to place on record that I believe that what has transpired here is an abuse of leave, that it was not a personal explanation and that an adjournment speech could have been made. I think it is an inappropriate use of leave.

The Acting Deputy President:

Order! Senator Bernardi, I think the matter is now concluded.