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

My question is to the Attorney-General, Senator Brandis. Can the Attorney-General advise the Senate when he first determined that he would issue the Legal Services Amendment (Solicitor-General Opinions) Direction 2016? When did he instruct his department to draft the direction?

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

I will check the precise date, but it was in 2016. Your question gives me the opportunity to address a misconception that lay at the heart of your colleague Senator Collins's question, when she suggests that there is a difference between me and the Solicitor-General in relation to what he says in paragraph 29 of his statement.

There is plainly a difference of view, Senator Wong, between the Solicitor-General and me as to whether the discussion that we had at the meeting in my office on 30 November 2015 constituted a consultation within the meaning of section 17 of the legislation act. That is a difference. I consider that it was. Mr Gleeson disputes that view. But that there was a discussion in my office on 30 November in relation to these matters cannot be disputed.

Gavin Marshall (Victoria, Deputy-President) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Senator Wong, supplementary question.

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

I refer to the evidence of the deputy secretary of the Attorney-General's Department, which reveals that the department was first instructed to prepare the direction on 20 April 2016. Can the Attorney-General confirm that this instruction was given some five months after he alleges he consulted with the Solicitor-General about the direction?

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

Senator Wong, with respect, you make my point for me. I did not approach the meeting of 30 November 2015 with any preformed view as to how the issue which had been raised with me by the Solicitor-General should be dealt with. The purpose of that meeting was to listen to what the Solicitor-General had to say to me and have a discussion with him so that we could proceed to fix the problem he had identified. I asked him to put before me his views, which he did the following March, and it was on the basis of both that conversation on 30 November and the material he put before me in March 2016 that I arrived at a view. It was my view and it was my department's view that that was consultation within the relevant meaning of the act.

Gavin Marshall (Victoria, Deputy-President) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Senator Wong a final supplementary question.

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

Noting that this minister did not instruct his department to prepare the direction until 20 April 2016, isn't this the reason that neither the notes of the meeting circulated by the Solicitor General's office nor the comments provided on those notes refer to the issuing of a direction? Why does the Attorney-General continue to deny that he has misled the Senate?

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

Senator Wong, you rather make my point for me when you say that the instruction to the department occurred both subsequent to the meeting on 30 November and subsequent to me receiving the Solicitor-General's written suggestions in March 2016. I had regard to both of those events in making my decision, and, in my view, that constituted a consultation.