Kim Beazley (Brand, Australian Labor Party, Leader of the Opposition) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

My question is again to the Prime Minister. I refer to the letter he has, and which the Cole commission provided to the opposition in response to correspondence from us, in which Commissioner Cole says it would not be appropriate for him to ‘seek amendments to the terms of reference to enable him to determine whether Australia has breached its international obligations or a minister has breached obligations imposed upon him by Australian regulation’. It also says that such matters were ‘significantly different to that in existing terms of reference’ and that ‘it is of course open to the executive government to change the terms of reference’. Prime Minister, given that the terms of reference that Mr Cole has identified—

Mrs Bronwyn Bishop (Mackellar, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Mr Speaker, on a point of order: this is the fourth time that the opposition has asked the same question. It has not deviated—

David Hawker (Speaker) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

The member for Mackellar will resume her seat. The Leader of the Opposition has not completed his question. I am listening carefully. I call the Leader of the Opposition.

Kim Beazley (Brand, Australian Labor Party, Leader of the Opposition) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Prime Minister, given that such terms of reference would go directly to the question of whether or not civil law had been breached and directly to ministerial competence, given that all interested Australians would expect exactly that level of accountability of your ministers arising from the Cole commission and given that you have been caught out providing carefully narrow terms of reference to Commissioner Cole, will you now act to close those massive holes in the terms of reference?

John Howard (Bennelong, Liberal Party, Prime Minister) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

The government’s decision to establish the inquiry was in response to a request from the Secretary-General of the United Nations to, where appropriate, act against companies falling within their jurisdiction. What we have done is to establish an inquiry to determine whether there has been any illegal behaviour by the companies named in the Volcker inquiry. Plainly, the commissioner is investigating those matters and, plainly, the commissioner has said that, if he came across material that suggested that people, including ministers—I repeat: people, including ministers—had behaved illegally, he would ask for an extension of the terms of reference. The government regards that as an entirely appropriate situation. It is exactly what we were asked to do and it is what we ought to allow the commissioner to determine.