Julian Hill (Bruce, Australian Labor Party, Assistant Minister for Citizenship, Customs and Multicultural Affairs) Share this | Hansard source

Uh-oh! Here it comes—a new scare campaign. But he did say he'd work with the government, so we'll see where they end up, with a little bit of noise on the way.

I'll finish on this point. The big reason for the failure, under the former government, and the national shame of plummeting in Transparency International's rankings—the slump in transparency versus the jump we've seen under this government—was their failure for years to introduce a national anticorruption commission. Labor put principles on the table, and the then government had a little con trick. They drafted a bill; it was a ridiculous proposal. The former prime minister used to wave it around in here. We'd say, 'Well, introduce it into the parliament.' They wouldn't introduce it into the parliament, because they knew that a whole bunch of their own members would cross the floor and amend the bill with Labor. They didn't want that. Their bill, actually, was a giant con trick. It would've literally given the power to the government to decide whether Liberal MPs would or wouldn't be investigated by the anticorruption commission.

This government has proudly introduced a national anticorruption commission with teeth, with the powers of a standing royal commission, with a truly independent commissioner and with real power to investigate public servants, public agencies and members of parliament and their offices—and rightly so. The contrast could not be clearer. As a result of the actions we took in just our first term, we jumped to 10th place in the Transparency International rankings in 2024. Now, of course they go up and down from year to year because they're relative to what other nations are doing. But that big reform alone, which they in their decade in office refused and failed to introduce, has had a fundamentally important effect on our public administration, undermining the culture of corruption and secrecy that had built up. I'm sure other speakers can talk about robodebt—that fine little episode. But it has also helped to restore our international standing.

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