Penny Wong (SA, Australian Labor Party, Leader of the Opposition in the Senate) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I seek leave to make a five-minute statement about an answer given by Minister Nash today in question time.

Leave granted.

I thank the Senate. I rise to address a most serious matter which relates to the obligation of all of us in this place to not mislead the chamber. Of course, in the case of ministers who are accountable to the chamber, the obligation is even more onerous.

Senators would be aware that the opposition has asked the Assistant Minister for Health a series of questions this week arising from her decision to order the removal of the Health Star Rating system website. The minister misled the Senate during question time on Tuesday by stating her chief of staff had 'no connection whatsoever' to the food industry. The minister came in during the adjournment debate some five hours later to correct her misleading statement. In doing so, the minister revealed that her chief of staff has a direct interest in a lobbying firm that represents the food industry, including Cadbury, Kraft and the Beverages Council.

Today, in question time, the minister was asked if she would reverse her decision and restore the website, which was removed without consultation with the Legislative and Governance Forum on Food Regulation. In response, the minister said:

… the forum took a unanimous decision to have an extensive cost-benefit analysis done that was due to report back to the forum in June this year. It was premature to have the website live until this report was completed.

It is very important to understand that this is one of the reasons that this minister has given for her decision to intervene to take the website down. One of three reasons was that she said 'the forum took a unanimous decision'.

On the face of the documents, including the communique from the meeting, this statement is inconsistent with the record of the meeting. On the face of the documents the statement is not true. The communique from the forum held in Melbourne on 13 December and attended by the minister and her conflicted chief of staff records that the forum did not unanimously agree to an extensive cost-benefit analysis before the website went live. In fact, the communique records the forum made no decision, unanimous or otherwise, to conduct a more extensive cost-benefit analysis before the website went live. In fact, the communique notes that the minister would direct her department—not a unanimous decision, but the minister unilaterally directing her department—to conduct a more extensive cost-benefit analysis; that is, it was the minister's initiative, not the forum's.

Not only does the minister's answer today not provide any justification for her decision to phone a public servant to demand that a website be taken down; but on the face of these documents Assistant Minister Nash has misled the Senate for a second time. Twice in three days the Assistant Minister for Health has on the face of these documents misled this Senate. Three or four hours after question time has concluded, this minister has not come into the chamber to correct the record. She must do so. She must explain the inconsistency between the formal record and her answer to this chamber, and she must do so immediately.

George Brandis (Queensland, Liberal Party, Attorney-General) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Mr President, I seek leave to make a five-minute statement.

Leave granted.

What Senator Wong and the opposition have just done is a disgraceful act. Senator Wong advised me moments ago, just before our new colleague Senator O'Sullivan was about to be sworn in, that she would seek leave to make this statement. She has taken the opportunity to do so in the absence of Senator Nash, who, like the rest of the government, was given no notice, beyond a few seconds, of this statement and has made the most serious allegation that one can make about a colleague in this place—that is, that Senator Nash, a minister of the Crown, has misled the Senate, according to Senator Wong, not once but twice.

Senator Wong, you are an experienced parliamentarian. You, Senator Wong, well know the gravity and weight and seriousness of the allegation you now make, and you make it on virtually no notice and in the absence of the person against whom the allegation is made and without the decency of giving her the opportunity to respond in terms to your allegation. Nevertheless, Senator Wong, your having decided to pull this stunt irrespective of all of the decencies and the protocols of this place, I can tell the Senate—and remind those who may be listening to the broadcast this evening that may not have heard Senator Nash's detailed and specific responses to the questions asked of her today and yesterday by members of the opposition—that Senator Fiona Nash, the Assistant Minister for Health, has throughout these events conducted herself in a totally honourable and proper way. All the disclosures that were required to be made according to the Prime Minister's guidelines have been made, as Senator Nash assured the Senate not once but twice, both yesterday and today, and not a scintilla of evidence has been produced by the opposition to refute what Senator Nash has said.

Furthermore, what Senator Nash has also been able to refute comprehensively and in detail is the suggestion that there was a conflict of interest between her chief of staff, Mr Alastair Furnival, and his position by reason of an alleged shareholding in a lobbying firm. As Senator Nash pointed out in question time today, Mr Furnival had no managerial involvement in the lobbying firm and the lobbying firm had no involvement whatsoever in the taking down of the website about which the Labor Party complains. As it happens, not only do I know Senator Fiona Nash and know her to be a person of perfect integrity but I also happen to know Mr Alastair Furnival. I have known Mr Alastair Furnival for 30 years, and I can vouchsafe his absolute integrity as well.

Senator Wong, shame on you. You should know better. There is a place and there is a time to make serious allegations and cast serious aspersions on the integrity of a Senate colleague, but it is not at the end of the week, after 6 pm on a Thursday afternoon, with virtually no notice to the person against whom you wish to make these scurrilous allegations and without giving the person against whom you make these scurrilous allegations the opportunity to defend themselves. Your behaviour is unprincipled, it is unparliamentary, it is despicable and you should be ashamed of yourself.

Penny Wong (SA, Australian Labor Party, Leader of the Opposition in the Senate) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Mr President, I seek leave to make a one-minute statement.

Leave granted.

I would like to ensure it is on the record that, after we became aware of this, my office did in fact contact Senator Nash's office—I think prior to six o'clock.

Mitch Fifield (Victoria, Liberal Party, Assistant Minister for Social Services) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

One minute to six.

Government senators interjecting—

John Hogg (President) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Order! I asked, reasonably, for silence when Senator Brandis was speaking. Senator Wong is entitled to be heard in silence.

Penny Wong (SA, Australian Labor Party, Leader of the Opposition in the Senate) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

We did in fact ensure that Senator Nash was contacted.

A government senator interjecting—

Her office, that is correct.

Honourable senators interjecting—

No amount of outrage around process can change the fact that the minister has said something to the Senate which, on the face of the documents to which I have referred, is simply not true.

George Brandis (Queensland, Liberal Party, Attorney-General) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Mr President, I seek leave to make a 10-second statement.

Leave granted.

We have made inquiries. The inquiry to which Senator Wong refers was made at one minute to six.