Mathias Cormann (WA, Liberal Party, Shadow Assistant Treasurer) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Tonight I would like to talk about the circumstances in which Senate orders are made to statutory agencies like the Productivity Commission and others to produce reports, documents and other information and the increasing incidence under this government where the statutory agencies are now joining government departments in not complying with these legitimate orders of the Senate seeking information. Seeking information from government is core business for the Senate. This is all part of our democratic function to scrutinise the activities of government. Asking questions, obtaining answers, asking for information and getting access to information—including information which government might not otherwise be prepared to provide—is core business when it comes to parliamentary scrutiny of the activities of government.

Earlier today the Greens moved a motion which was not supported by the Senate in relation to a proposed order for the production of a report by the Productivity Commission on the development of a sovereign wealth fund. The coalition opposed that motion, and in the two minutes that were available to me at the time I was not able to properly explain the reasons for the coalition's decision in relation to that. I would like to elaborate tonight and perhaps offer to the Greens an opportunity to discuss this further, because I think that there are some unresolved issues here that go directly to the Senate's authority to obtain information from government, including from statutory agencies which were set up by the parliament.

Obviously, the coalition had concerns about the motion itself. To talk about a sovereign wealth fund at a time when the government is taking us to $107 billion of government net debt and when we are currently looking at the second-highest deficit on record—a $50 billion deficit this year after we had a $55 billion deficit last year—is of course a ridiculous proposition. What seems to be implied in the Greens' proposed move to set up a sovereign wealth fund now is that the government somehow should borrow more money to invest in the wealth fund. That hardly seems to be a very sensible investment. The time to talk about sovereign wealth funds is when the budget is in surplus and at least when government net debt has been properly paid off, which was of course the circumstance under the previous Howard government. By 2005-06 John Howard and Peter Costello had led the charge in paying off $96 billion of government net debt, and future surpluses were to be directed into the first sovereign wealth fund that Australia has ever had: the Future Fund. To have a discussion about setting up a sovereign wealth fund at a time when this government has completely mismanaged our finances is of course very bad timing, and we would not subscribe to the proposition that we should borrow money in order to invest it in the wealth fund.

However, there are some broader issues in relation to the process and some unresolved issues around the process of the Senate ordering statutory authorities like the Productivity Commission to produce reports. Back in November 2010 the Senate ordered the Productivity Commission to produce a report on the design of a process for the selection and ongoing review of the superannuation funds to be included in modern awards or enterprise agreements as default funds. It was a requirement that the process was to be based on objective criteria and evidence and be subject to systematic review so that the selection and ongoing review of eligible default funds would be transparent and competitive. The process had to help maximise employees' retirement incomes by ensuring that only those super­annuation funds that deliver and continue to deliver the best results to their members were able to be included as default fund options in modern awards and enter­prise agreements. In designing the process, the Productivity Commission had to make reference to the existing sophisticated system of super­annuation fund ratings which has evolved over the past 20 years and is already used widely by employees, employers and financial planners.

The deadline for the report was 31 May 2011. I am very pleased that you are here, Mr Acting Deputy President Ludlam, because this is an issue that I am very keen for you to explore in your party room at the right opportunity. Here we have an order passed by the Senate in November 2010 requiring the Productivity Commission to report to the Senate by 31 May. The feedback that the Productivity Commission sent to the Senate was, 'We cannot do this because under the act that rules our operations we are not empowered to provide reports for the Senate.' According to the Productivity Commission chair, Mr Banks, only the minister can ask the Productivity Commission to provide such reports. This is, of course, completely false. This is not a partisan statement, because there is a track record in this parliament under governments of both persuasions—whether the Hawke government, the Keating government or the Howard government—where the Senate has passed orders for the production of documents directed at organisations like the ACCC, ASIC, the National Audit Office and others. Many of these orders were initiated, incidentally, by crossbench senators, whether they were Democrat senators or the Family First senator—there might even have been some Greens' senators, Acting Deputy President Ludlam; I am sure there would have been. Under the Howard government and under the Hawke and Keating governments all of these organisations complied with these orders and produced the reports that they were asked to provide on a whole range and variety of issues—until we got to the Gillard government. This was supposed to be the era of openness and transparency. The sunshine was going to come in. This government was going to be accountable to the parliament. Under this government we are actually going in exactly the wrong direction. The Productivity Commission has outright refused to comply with the Senate's order. The pretext was that they did not have the power under their legislation to comply with that request and that the Senate, in their view, did not have the authority to force them to do it. The Clerk of the Senate provided very clear advice that, yes, under the Constitution the Senate has the undisputed power to order the production of documents necessary for its information—a power which encompasses documents already in existence and, importantly, documents required to be created for the purpose of complying with the order.

The Greens happen to oppose both the original motion, which was initiated by the coalition back in November 2010 and supported by the Senate despite the opposition of the government and despite the opposition of the Greens, and the follow-up motion clarifying the Senate's power, which is why we were somewhat intrigued when the Greens today sought to ask the Productivity Commission to do exactly what we, through our motion, had asked the Productivity Commission to do back in November 2010. We think this is an issue that ought to be resolved and we urge the Greens to work with the coalition on clarifying this issue. If the Greens and the coalition work together then the Senate will be able to impose its will on a government that is reluctant to comply with basic principles of accountability to the parliament.

Mr Acting Deputy President, there are consequences for this. You might have seen in the Australian Financial Review last week that there are hundreds of thousands of Australians who are getting hurt because, through the selection of default super­annuation under the modern awards process right now, they get channelled into underperforming super funds. The govern­ment recognised this problem in the lead-up to the last election. This Labor government in the lead-up to the last election said they were going to fix it. The new minister, Minister Shorten, forgets too often that he is required to act in the public interest, because he gets distracted by acting in the vested interests of a section of the superannuation fund movement and is very unenthusiastic about fixing this particular issue. So, even though it was Labor Party policy before the election, he has refused to comply with the order that was passed by the Senate back in November 2010, because he wants to continue to protect the current anticom­petitive, closed shop arrangement for the selection of default superannuation funds which are channelling hundreds of thousands of working Australians into underperforming funds. Just read the articles about the MTAA in the Fin Review last week.

What does Minister Shorten say? Minister Shorten says the Productivity Commission is too busy. This is the minister who whenever he is under the slightest bit of political pressure runs to the Productivity Commission, asking them to commission another review. Whatever the issue is, if there is a little bit of political pressure, at the drop of a hat he asks the Productivity Commission to come up with another review; but, when it comes to actually fulfilling an explicit and emphatic Labor Party pre-election commitment to get the Productivity Commission to design an open, transparent, competitive process for the selection of default funds under modern awards, he is not prepared to do it. The Greens, I am sad to say, were complicit with the government when this motion was before the chamber back in November. It is a serious issue and, if the Greens want to pass their sorts of motions in the future, they should work with the coalition on a well-established policy framework around these things.