Kim Carr (Victoria, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Minister for Innovation, Industry, Science and Research) Share this | Hansard source

by leave—I move:

That the Senate take note of the explanation.

It's an extraordinary claim by the minister that simply providing the President with a letter to say that she needs more time should be satisfactory to this chamber. This is a proposition that is not just a matter of a few days; it was first moved two months ago—two months ago. In the first iteration of this proposition, it was directed at both the CSIRO and AIMS; and, in that case of the first iteration of this, the CSIRO had no difficulty responding. But this minister accepts the nonsense that AIMS should be exempted from this proposition.

There's a simple explanation here. The minister's office is absolutely more chaotic than the rest of the Turnbull government. Now, that's saying something. Equally, it's quite clear that this minister is preoccupied with what the Australian Federal Police are doing. She's not concentrating on doing her job. She's not concentrating on actually fulfilling her obligations to this chamber. She's preoccupied with what the Federal Police are saying to her and about the prospects of being charged for what is clearly a criminal offence—the actions that were taken in regard to the AWU raids. It is abundantly clear now: the actions of this minister, who's not able to even manage her office, let alone manage the affairs of the statutory authorities for which she is of course responsible.

What is equally clear is that there's been a botched arrangement in regard to half a billion dollars being allocated to the Prime Minister's very, very wealthy mates—arrangements that have been entered into because the Prime Minister effectively panicked. He panicked because President Obama, in November 2014, made the observation that he wanted the Great Barrier Reef to be there for his grandkids to see. Some two years later, nothing had been done. This is a government that had a windfall advantage in terms of its receipts. Instead of going through the normal processes of procurement, or through a normal appropriation, for public good research by a public sector research agency, it chose to hand out half a billion dollars, under the most extraordinary of circumstances, to a group of incredibly wealthy men and women that happen to be directly connected with the Prime Minister.

What we sought to do was get information from the CSIRO and from AIMS, and two months ago we asked the Senate to agree to an order for the production of documents. The Senate agreed. The CSIRO was able to respond, but AIMS was not, according to this minister. So I reduced the scope of the request, to assist the minister. What do we find even there? That, instead of doing her job, this minister gives us a lousy letter and says 'Well, that should satisfy you.'

Under the normal arrangements in the Senate, the normal courtesies were extended. I waited a little while and then got my office to ring up the minister's office and say 'Well, when will they be available?' In a very offhand way, her office replied 'Well maybe in the next sitting period.' With this government, you wouldn't be certain there will be a next sitting period, because this government is, of course, preoccupied with its own survival, not with meeting its obligations to this parliament. With all the attendant speculation about an early election, I think we are entitled to see what's been going on with the allocation of such an extraordinary amount of money. I understand that the Liberal Party is somewhat distracted this week. I understand that this has been an extraordinary set of difficulties, with the Prime Minister about to be dismissed, probably as early as tomorrow. But I don't think that's any excuse for the minister to allow her office not to do any of its work.

But, of course, that assumes that you've got a functioning office. In the Industry portfolio, we know that people are flat out even getting an appointment, let alone meeting elementary requirements for the production of documents for this chamber. We know the really basic reason for that is that the AFP takes up so much of this minister's time. We know that this minister has made a great pretence that there's been no fallout from that raid or from her obsession with playing politics with this parliament. But now we know that, over the last 300 days, about all she has done is try to defend her indefensible position, in terms of the fact that there has been such an extraordinary abuse of power by this government in regard to its pursuit of the trade union movement and the Australian Labor Party, and in regard to her behaviour.