Analysis: Annastacia Palaszczuk finally does the right thing on integrity

Annastacia Palaszczuk threw everything she could at her deepening integrity crisis, but nothing worked, writes Jessica Marszalek.

It was four weeks ago that Queensland’s Integrity Commissioner quit her job amid an integrity storm that was about to erupt into full public view.

Dr Nikola Stepanov had been for months embroiled in a backroom brawl with the Public Service Commission, led by Robert Setter, that had led to a secret raid, claims of interference in her office and ultimately a CCC probe.

But her quitting released some kind of torrent.

As more extraordinary details leaked into the public domain, more and more of her colleagues grew concerned about the vulnerabilities of their own positions.

Some of them felt they knew all too much about what she’d been going through and started speaking out.

Mike Summerell was the first but not the last to go public.

The former state archivist delivered a visceral assessment of a culture of a cover up in the bureaucracy and things snowballed.

It was a sustained political pressure Premier Annastacia Palaszczuk had not personally faced before and she didn’t appear to know what to do – because it was coming from credible, independent third parties, not enemy politicians.

She played it down, she produced corruption fighter Tony Fitzgerald, she evoked the ghost of Campbell Newman, she bit back at journalists, she announced a narrow review, she apologised to those who hadn’t been listened to, she sent public servants a letter, she fled the Brisbane press pack, she made announcements to try to change the news cycle.

But nothing worked. The leaks and the crisis continued.

Palaszczuk will today announce, after weeks of insisting it wasn’t necessary, a review into culture and accountability.

It will examine treatment of independent integrity bodies by public servants and ministers, the strength of legislation underpinning ethics and integrity and a host of other related issues.

And it is, finally, the right thing to do.