David Pocock (ACT, Independent) Share this | Hansard source

This is a momentous moment, to have a National Anti-Corruption Commission being legislated in Australia. I'd like to thank the Attorney-General for his leadership on this, for the way he has engaged, from very early on after the election, on the principles for the NACC and, as more details have been added, his further engagement. I also want to acknowledge the Greens, who first introduced the Federal Integrity Commission Bill to the Senate in 2010. I'd like to acknowledge Senator Shoebridge and his work through the committee stages and the way he's been pushing to ensure that we get the very best possible NACC we can. I acknowledge the former and current members for Indi, Cathy McGowan and Helen Haines, and their unwavering work to represent their community and to push for more transparency, more integrity and ultimately more accountability for the people who make big decisions that affect all Australians. I'd also like to acknowledge the member for Clark, Andrew Willkie, a whistleblower himself who has lived experience of what whistleblowers face when they come forward with information that is in the public interest. He has consistently talked about the need for more accountability and transparency.

Clearly integrity infrastructure in Australia is far from perfect. Recent examples of questionable spending decisions that we've seen in the news and that Australians have been concerned about include the commuter car parks, sports rorts, security contractors at offshore detention centres and water purchases, to name just a few. While members of our communities across the country are struggling, we're seeing decisions on how to spend public money made without transparency or accountability. Communities across this country deserve a strong federal integrity body. They deserve a world-class and world-leading NACC. Integrity was a key issue at the election. When I was doorknocking, or meeting people across the ACT for Politics in the Park, integrity came up again and again.

People want to have faith in decision-makers. They want to have faith in politicians and the political processes and the Public Service that are making all these decisions that affect every part our lives. It's not just here in the ACT. Across the country Australians overwhelmingly support a strong integrity commission. Transparency International's corruption perception index shows that Australia slipped by four places, from 14th to 18th internationally, between 2020 and 2021.

Corruption is clearly not new, nor is the need for an integrity commission. In the face of people seeing what they perceive as a widening gulf between them and elected representatives, this is urgent. New South Wales established their ICAC in 1988 and the federal jurisdiction will be the last to establish an equivalent body in Australia. The delay we've seen has created urgency, but urgency is no excuse for getting parts of this bill wrong. As many before me have highlighted, I would like to stress the importance of having public hearings when it's in the public interest for them to take place. Public hearings are an important part of transparency and integrity. They encourage new witnesses to come forward, they offer a strong deterrent and they increase public trust; people can see that there is a process underway.

The National Anti-Corruption Commission fact sheet from Labor at the recent election sets out what the now government promised Australians before the election. There are a number of dot points, all of them powerful and good. One of them does speak about public hearings. It explains that the NACC will:

… have the power to hold public hearings where the Commission determines it is in the public interest to do so …

An honourable senator: What did it say?

It said the NACC will:

… have the power to hold public hearings where the Commission determines it is in the public interest to do so …

Exceptional circumstances are too high a threshold. To put this into context: in Victoria, where the IBAC has an exceptional circumstances clause, between 2012 and 2021 the IBAC held just five public hearings. In New South Wales, where they aren't limited by exceptional circumstances, they held 45 public hearings. If exceptional circumstances do not exist there will be no public hearing, even if it is in the public interest for there to be one.

I really don't understand why we are putting the private interests of politicians and officials over the public interest in transparency and accountability. We are now in a situation where Australians have voted for more transparency. The now Labor government promised a national anticorruption commission, which we are seeing, but there is the very crucial element about giving an independent commission against corruption the ability to decide for itself if it's in the public interest to have public hearings. The government is hamstringing them due to a deal with the now opposition. We have the Attorney-General, Mark Dreyfus, doing a deal with the Leader of the Opposition, Peter Dutton, to stitch this up. It provides more protections for politicians which aren't afforded to people in our community when they are found to be corrupt.

I understand the desire for consensus, but I really believe on this point that integrity is too important. We have to get this right. We have to ensure that an independent commission can decide for itself when it's in the public interest and not add this really high hurdle for them to get over. Many integrity experts, as we heard during the committee process, agree that exceptional circumstances should be removed. The National Integrity Committee, the Accountability Round Table, the Centre for Public Integrity, Transparency International and leading academics, like Professor Anne Twomey, have also raised concerns. She says that as 'exceptional circumstances' is a 'very high hurdle', 'it can confidently be predicted that almost all hearings will be in private'. As pointed out earlier, we even heard from the Victorian IBAC commissioner, the Hon. Robert Redlich AM:

The NACC must be permitted to hold public examinations without a requirement for exceptional circumstances, so long as there is a specific provision that the Commissioner cannot call a witness unless satisfied that there is no unreasonable damage to reputation and that there will be no damage to the witness's welfare.

In surveying people in the ACT about the NACC and what they would like to see, I received a response from Laurie Dunn. Laurie was a public servant for more than 30 years and describes declining standards of integrity and an erosion of community trust in politicians and the political process across his 30-year career. To quote Laurie Dunn: 'A federal anticorruption commission is essential to have any hope of re-establishing trust in the federal political process. The current model proposed is acceptable, except in relations to public hearings. This should be based on a public interest test and not on an exceptions basis. Corruption thrives when no-one is looking.' I support an amendment to remove 'exceptional circumstances'.

I also believe that parliamentary oversight of the commission should be strengthened. I note that there are a number of amendments that speak to that. To have an independent NACC, we need an impartial parliamentary committee. As I it stands, the government chair will have the casting vote on the joint standing committee on the NACC. That means it will be less effective in ensuring that the right commissioner is appointed. It is a really important job and clearly important that the government of the day cannot just put who they want, if the rest of the parliament doesn't think that they are the best person for the job.

There are other concerns which I will raise in the committee stage, and I will move amendments, as Helen Haines moved in the House. The definition of 'corruption' should include pork barrelling; third parties should be able to be investigated where they act to corrupt public officials who have no knowledge of the attempt, be that through tenders or the way that they present information; and safeguards need to be in there to ensure that the NACC is adequately resourced. There needs to be real transparency around what the NACC is requesting to perform optimally and what is being given to them.

The Attorney-General has said that whistleblower protection will be dealt with separately, but I want to highlight just how crucial this is. Whistleblower protections are fundamental to ensuring integrity. I welcome the whistleblower reforms to be introduced at the end of this week and call on the government to act as quickly as possible to establish a whistleblower protection commissioner and provide whistleblowers with the protection they deserve. There should be really clear processes and pathways for people in public service and in the private sector to come forward with information that may well be politically inconvenient and that may be, frankly, embarrassing for Australians but is crucial if we are to continue to improve the open democracy we have and to have all the benefits of living in such a system.

This National Anti-Corruption Commission is a huge step in the right direction. Australians have wanted it for some time. I really welcome the introduction of this legislation. Clearly there's more work to be done. This is a start. This is ideally a safety net that doesn't get used much. There's much work to do in terms of cultural change and driving the right behaviours, and there's clearly more work to be done to restore public trust in government. We need whistleblower law reform, we need electoral law reform and we need truth in political advertising laws. I urge the government to amend the bill to strengthen this and make it a world-leading anticorruption commission and the anticorruption commission that Australians have asked for and deserve.