Jacinta Collins (Victoria, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Hansard source

In speaking to the motion I, too, join the chair in commencing my comments by highlighting the difficult circumstances in which the committee’s inquiry was conducted and the committee’s attempts to put politics aside and, with the assistance of the Senate privilege resolutions, establish the facts and make findings by its usual means. I, too, commend all senators who participated in this committee consideration. These efforts, as evidenced by the report, were largely successful, and I note here that the Senate Standing Committee of Privileges has only split in its findings on one occasion. This was back in 1974 during the loans affair, again a highly contentious matter, but on this occasion, with another very contentious matter, we have been able to reach a unanimous report.

Because the matters it deals with are so serious—going as they do to the protection of the integrity of the Senate and its processes—unanimous reports by the committee are highly desirable. This is more difficult to achieve where senators may be subject to investigation, as Senator Brandis indicated, and there will necessarily be some element of partisanship. Such was the case with the second of the committee’s terms of reference. It is a matter of record that the opposition opposed these terms of reference on the first occasion—and, I think, on the second occasion. Consequently, government members of the committee were very mindful to ensure that the inquiry was not a witch hunt, as was alleged at the time, and that the report was unanimous so far as possible. The chair should be commended for some of his suggestions about how we could achieve this.

The irony is that, while Mr Grech and some senior Liberal Party identities sought, as the chair indicated, to bring against the Prime Minister and the Treasurer very serious allegations of political interference and misleading the parliament, what is before the committee is an enormous amount of material that indicates that Mr Grech himself was involved in what I would describe as cronyism, duplicity and misrepresentation. This material, consistent with the normal practices of the Senate privileges committee, has been included in the three volumes of material, and members of the public will be able to reach their own conclusions on reviewing some of this subject matter. But let me cover some of it.

Mr Grech was engaged in doing exactly what he was falsely accusing the Prime Minister of doing. Mr Grech was giving preferential treatment to a car dealer who was a Liberal Party supporter and donor and who was known to Mr Turnbull. While engaged in giving this preferential treatment, Mr Grech was gloating about misleading the Prime Minister to promote his cause of helping that car dealer. This duplicity and misrepresentation is demonstrated repeatedly in the email communications attached to the committee’s report, with Mr Grech’s use of derogatory terms accusing the Prime Minister of being ‘a fraud’, ‘dodgy’, ‘a left-wing loony’, ‘a pure fake’, ‘dishonest’ and ‘misleading’. What I conclude from the material is that Mr Grech and his cronies were often simply projecting their own behaviour onto others, particularly the Australian Labor Party and the Prime Minister. As an aside, Senator Brandis himself said only last week on Sky News:

We all know about the Labor Party and mates.

Much of the material in this case before us is a story about Liberal mates. Mr Sinodinos, for instance, actually adopts the language usually attributed to the Labor Party with his use of the reference ‘mate’ in his communications.

But, on a more serious note, the committee was also presented with material relating to the pressure Mr Grech was under with respect to his evidence by virtue of his relationship with senior Liberal Party identities. As rumours of a document linking the Prime Minister and Mr Grant turned into reports that there may indeed be such a document, Mr Grech would have been under pressure in the lead-up to his evidence before the Senate Economics Legislation Committee hearing. These matters are closely associated with Mr Grech’s relationship with some senior Liberal Party identities, including Mr Turnbull. This relationship and the consequences for Mr Grech as the results of his assistance to the opposition began to surface in the public may in themselves have been a source of pressure for him.

The nature and depth of that relationship was such that Mr Grech provided Mr Turnbull and other senior Liberal Party identities with a range of advice on policy and strategy, including drafting detailed policy documents and advice directly to Mr Turnbull. Further examples of the nature and type of this comprehensive advice provided by Mr Grech to Mr Turnbull and senior Liberal Party identities include the following. There are examples of policy direction and strategies for dealing with the media as well as backgrounding the media on lines of inquiry to pursue the Rudd government. There are strategies on the focus and direction of Senate hearings such as the agenda, the order of appearance of witnesses and the provision of questions for Senate hearings. There was advice on Mr Turnbull’s elevation to Leader of the Opposition and nominating personnel for positions within Mr Turnbull’s office. This is a phase in the documentation that I refer to somewhat glibly as ‘recruitment central’.

There was advice on how the opposition should deal with the ETS issue, suggesting the backing of amendments, the avoidance of a double dissolution and then the attacking of the shortcomings of the legislation once it was passed into law. Mr Grech’s advice also extended to providing Mr Turnbull advice on his dealings with the National Party, an assessment and strategy for the 2010 election, and plans for a Turnbull victory in 2012-2013 and, indeed, on fundraising. Some of the advice offered by Mr Grech was taken up by Mr Turnbull. I should also take the time to make an aside that much of this material was circulated on Mr Grech’s Treasury email address, utilising government resources and presumably occupying some of the lengthy amounts of time during which, it was described, Mr Grech was working tirelessly in his role as a public servant.

There is no doubt from the material as I would assess it that Mr Grech believed that Mr Turnbull saw him as a dedicated operative of the Liberal Party with a partisan political agenda. In a series of emails between Mr Grech and a Liberal Party contact, it was suggested to Mr Grech that he consider a senior role within Mr Turnbull’s office as either a strategic or an economic adviser. A Liberal Party contact also told Mr Grech that Mr Turnbull held him in high regard and with absolute respect. It would have been clear to Mr Turnbull and, perhaps less so, to Senator Abetz that in Mr Grech they were not dealing with a public servant trying to discharge a public duty but a dedicated operative of the Liberal Party with a partisan political agenda who was placing himself at some risk in doing so.

Mr Grech met Mr Turnbull and Senator Abetz in Sydney on 12 June, at Mr Turnbull’s wife’s office. Mr Grech’s actions when he tabled the emails, allowing them to be viewed and notes to be taken but not copied, suggests that he considered the emails themselves would not be used but merely the information contained in them. Mr Grech may have believed that there was enough information provided in the content alone for Mr Turnbull to pursue the issue without the need to table any of them in parliament or in a Senate inquiry. But, subsequent to that meeting, a more comprehensive set of interactions took place between Mr Turnbull and Mr Grech than Mr Turnbull stated in a joint press release on 4 August 2009. On 16 June a strategy was proposed by Mr Grech on how to deal with the journalist, Mr Lewis, and this approach was approved by Mr Turnbull. The information was to be passed on to Mr Lewis as strictly background, off the record and on a not-for-publication basis. Mr Grech made it clear to Mr Lewis in an email, which was also forwarded to Mr Turnbull, that the information needed to be treated in accordance with Mr Grech’s views. Given the clear instructions from Mr Grech on how the information was to be handled, Mr Turnbull would have known that the information needed to be treated in accordance with Mr Grech’s wishes.

When Mr Turnbull discussed it publicly at the press gallery ball, and gave an indication that documentation existed, Mr Grech would have been placed under further pressure. Such pressure may have been compounded by any other backgrounding that may help explain Mr Lewis’s preparedness to publish details beyond any understanding with Mr Grech.

In conclusion, it is hard to reconcile Mr Turnbull’s and Senator Abetz’s claim in their joint press release that they had not had any reason to doubt the bona fides of a senior public servant such as Mr Grech. Mr Grech was clearly a zealot, projecting his own cronyism and duplicity on the Labor Party. (Time expired)