James Campbell: Teals make big mistake with ICAC demands

The sanctimonious crossbench are once again showing that they have failed to understand the enormity of a federal anti corruption commission by trying to push through legislation by the end of the year, writes James Campbell.

One of the selling points of the sanctimonious MPs who currently populate the crossbench of federal parliament is that they’re supposed to be all about something called “good government”.

Which is why it is so strange that with less than five sitting weeks to go they’re demanding the government push through legislation to create an anti-corruption commission by the end of the year.

The reason it’s strange is that even though anyone can see that the powers parliament chooses to give this body will forever alter how politics is played in this country, they’re insisting it pass this year before they’ve seen exactly what it is the government is proposing.

The Bill, which will finally be revealed on Tuesday by Attorney-General Mark Dreyfus, is by all accounts a monster, rumoured to be run to close to 300 pages with an explanatory memorandum of 500 more. The government has signalled that despite its length and complexity it wants the Senate Committee report into it to be wrapped up by November 21, when the final two sitting weeks of the parliamentary year begin. This will allow it to be passed by the time parliament rises for the final time on December 1.

Both Labor and the Opposition agree that Australia will get some sort of federal ICAC, the only question is what sort of powers will it have. The Victorian independent MP Helen Haines, who has her own Bill before parliament to create one, wants to give it powers to investigate private organisations, including unions and businesses.

She said recently she also thinks it should have powers to probe examples of “things like pork-barrelling – those grey areas that wouldn’t directly come under the tighter definition of corruption”.

On Friday, Peter Dutton told reporters he had spoken to the Prime Minister on the issue and that the Opposition was approaching it in “good faith”. It’s good to know at least one of them is, I suppose.

If you speak to federal ministers they will tell you they are sure that their anti-corruption body will somehow avoid the mistakes of their state counterparts. By this, NSW folk tend to mean the public hearings that ICAC is famous for, which have destroyed so many reputations for so very little return. The standout for me was the Margaret Cunneen affair – the 18-month saga that saw the crown prosecutor pursued by ICAC after she was caught on a phone intercept making a joke about her son’s girlfriend’s boob job.

When 10 years ago the then Victorian premier Ted Baillieu created his IBAC, he went to great lengths to make sure it avoided NSW’s mistakes.

The threshold required for investigations and public hearings was higher and the power to investigate the catch-all offence of misconduct in public office was deliberately withheld from the body.

It was supposed to make sure there would be no repetition of the NSW ICAC circus. It hasn’t worked out that way.

True, unlike their NSW counterparts no Victorian premier has ever appeared in public at IBAC. Daniel Andrews has appeared twice, – sorry, at least twice – but in private. His political enemies in the moderate right of the Victorian ALP on the other hand got the full star-chamber treatment which destroyed their careers due to public hearings which resulted in no one being charged.

Hopefully one day doctors will be able to target cancer with the same precision IBAC has targeted the enemies of the Victorian Premier.

If you believe a federal anti-corruption commission will be immune from this sort of stuff, well good luck to you.

Certainly plenty of MPs from the former government are under no illusion that the whole purpose of this thing is to target them, a fear which the Prime Minister has only made deeper by his “inquiry” into his predecessor’s bizarre fetish for multiple ministries.

Not that they fear it equally. Those who were only backbenchers in the previous government know they’re safe because they were never in a position to make decisions over how money was spent. They know it’s the former ministers who should be feeling hot under the collar.

It’s probably too late for sense to prevail and that in return for Coalition support Labor avoids creating a monster that goes after politicians for just doing politics. But they should heed the warning of the former Victorian Labor attorney-general Martin Pakula who, in his valedictory speech warned Victorian MPs to guard their sovereignty jealously.

“Representative democracy,” he said, “is a good thing. Making commitments to voters in return for their support is not improper.

“The allocation of public funds is not something that should be solely within the purview of public servants.

“If voters disagree with our priorities they have a way of letting us know … I do fear that an idea is taking root that voters can’t be relied on to assess these matters and the only way to keep politicians in line is to have lawyers and judges be the final arbiters of the appropriateness of political decisions.

“I know how devoted the judicial arm of government is to the notion of the separation of powers. Let us never forget that it cuts both ways.”