Deborah O'Neill (NSW, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Hansard source

I rise to take note of answers to the questions that were put to Senator Abetz, the Minister representing the Prime Minister today. Senator Wong asked the minister to give some plausible indication of what the future arrangements are around the standing down of Senator Sinodinos, now departed for an unknown period from his role as the Assistant Treasurer while Operation Credo and Operation Spicer are concluded. We think it would be in the public interest to know some time frame is being considered by the government. Certainly the financial services sector would like to know, given the massive and dangerous changes being proposed by this government to the FOFA reforms, which come under that minister's responsibility.

I have to say that I am disappointed but not surprised by the minister's response. I am disappointed but not surprised because there is an emerging pattern here. Given the opportunity to put on the record the sort of transparent, clear and factual plan of the government to deal with the fact that it has had to distance itself from one of its senior ministers around the area of probity, the minister representing the Prime Minister in this chamber, Senator Abetz, chose to avoid the facts and to use instead weasel words to cover up.

We got a lesson in one thing today: this government's seeming obsession with prepositions. We were told 'Senator Sinodinos stood aside'—stood aside, not down. The fact is that Senator Sinodinos is off the front bench and he is out of his role because there are concerns about the probity of this minister. I doubt anyone was impressed by the affirmation from Senator Abetz today that Senator Sinodinos is intending to forgo his ministerial entitlements. I think ordinary Australians would have expected that was immediately the case, not a mere expressed intention.

I return to take note of what was not answered by Senator Abetz, who is representing the Prime Minister here today. The fact is that there is a now a great deal of uncertainty around the portfolio area that Senator Sinodinos was responsible for, with the former minister now caught up with Operation Credo and Operation Spicer. Surely the stakeholders in the portfolios that were overseen by the former Assistant Treasurer deserve a little clarity moving forward? The questions we asked remain unanswered. How long will Senator Sinodinos be out? The fact is that his former portfolio is now being held, in addition to his finance portfolio responsibilities, by Senator Cormann. What is going on there? Is this just a holding pattern? Surely, the Australian people deserve a bit more information than we got from Senator Abetz at question time today?

Further, despite the opportunity here today to put on the record a clear and transparent indication of when the Prime Minister became of aware of Senator Sinodinos's conduct, which is now subject to not one but two ICAC investigations, we are still none the wiser as a result of Senator Abetz's responses in this place today as to what the Prime Minister knew and when he or his office knew it. Operation Credo and Operation Spicer are no small investigations. Surely, someone from the former Assistant Treasurer's office or perhaps Senator Sinodinos himself would have advised the Prime Minister, his chief of staff or someone—anyone—in the Prime Minister's office that these investigations were underway and that Senator Sinodinos was caught up in them? Sadly, despite the opportunity to give us a clear and honest answer to the question about what changed between Tuesday, when Senator Sinodinos had the Prime Minister's full confidence, and Wednesday this week, when he clearly did not, we just cannot seem to get an answer from Senator Abetz. There is no fulsome explanation and there is no acknowledgement that something shifted between Tuesday and Wednesday this week. They are not revealing important pieces of information the Australian people have a right to know.

Why is he hiding from the Senate the new information that must have emerged to so change the Prime Minister's view in that 24-hour period—and all this just six months after forming a government? The fact that the questions today were not answered is another concern. It is alarming that, despite the outrage that is being expressed by the determined secrecy of this new Abbott government, we cannot get answers to these questions. We are concerned. Here is a government compromised from within already; a government that, after six months, is trying cover its tracks, deny facts and hide the truth from the Australian a people; a government that is secretive, slipshod and arrogant; and a government that is already unravelling because of its entrenched arrogance. The Australian people deserve answers to the questions asked today and this week, and this arrogant government— (Time expired)

Question agreed to.