Kimberley Kitching (Victoria, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Hansard source

I rise to take note of the answers given, or rather not given, by Senator Cormann to questions by senators on this side asked in relation to the fact the current Prime Minister, Mr Morrison, was unceremoniously sacked as managing director of Tourism Australia in 2006. Senator Cormann cannot claim he had no notice of these questions. He must have known, following the extensive reporting of this matter over the weekend, that there would be questions on this matter in the Senate today, yet he deliberately chose not to inform himself of the facts. This immediately raises the question: what is Senator Cormann afraid of? Why does he feel the need to dodge and wibble-wobble when he is asked about this matter?

We know Senator Cormann's home branch of the Liberal Party in Western Australia is a branch that I'm sure is close to your heart, Madam Deputy President, since you can observe its travails up close and personal on our great western coast. What's come to light over the weekend is that the Liberal Party has been asking children to sign extraordinary talent release forms that seek to ban people from criticising or satirising the party in public or in private for five years. These North Korean style forms also seek to ban signatories from associating with other political parties. The Western Australian Liberal Party would make Kim Jong Un proud. The question for today— and perhaps this will help Senator Cormann—seems to be: where the bloody hell are you? If you look at Sean Kelly's piece in The Monthlyhe does a more metaphorical take on this—you will see the answer is, 'Looking for Scott Morrison.' And, I have to tell you, he is a pretty difficult man to find. Is he on the bus—the SloMo express? No, he is on a VIP. Is he making a video for Twitter? No, he is sculling a beer. All the while, he is stealing food from the poor, cutting funding for Foodbank. Not since 'Thatcher, Thatcher the milk snatcher' have we seen this level of villainy—from 'Scott no heart, Scott no clue and Scott no decency'. Margaret Thatcher, two decades later, still regrets snatching milk from schoolchildren. The Prime Minister is the moral equivalent of the person taking coins from the blanket of the homeless person in the city streets. How does he sleep at night?

Let's go back to his wonderful time as the CEO of Tourism Australia. There seem to have been some personality difficulties between Mr Morrison and the Minister for Tourism, rather surprising perhaps given they were both from the Liberal Party, but Mr Morrison's resistance to the plan that Ms Bailey planned to put in place is a key reason behind his messy exit. But there is more. Morrison was 'not a team player'. They're not my words; they're actually Ms Bailey's words. Ms Bailey said of Mr Morrison's departure, 'We've moved on. It was without question the right decision by the board.' She said she was seeking a replacement for Mr Morrison who would be 'more of a team player' capable of working closely with state bodies, industry and the government. Of course, we have seen in recent months that Mr Morrison, when he gave that fatal hug of death to the then Prime Minister, Mr Turnbull, still isn't much of a team player.

In The Australian on 7 September 2006, there was an article around the unanimous board decision to dismiss Mr Morrison. Referring to Ms Bailey, it said:

She said she did not dismiss Mr Morrison—it had been the unanimous decision of the board, which felt he had to go because it had lost confidence in him and could not work with him.

Ms Bailey told the committee the issue with Mr Morrison was not one of personality but—

wait for it—

performance.

The Sydney Morning Herald on 16 August 2006 said:

Ms Bailey's office declined to comment last night but the strengthening of Tourism Australia is expected to be welcomed by the travel industry after the dramatic departure of its managing director, Scott Morrison, following a unanimous decision by the board to remove him … Sources close to the Tourism Australia board told the Herald it was a unanimous decision to force Mr Morrison out. "There was no dissent whatsoever. Nobody was happy and we wished there had been a better outcome, but the board was absolutely unanimous."

There is a line between someone who acts like that and the way we have seen the Prime Minister behave recently. (Time expired)