Defence chiefs reveal VIP flight data on politicians’ travel published online is ‘corrupted’

Despite documenting travel in real time on Instagram, Anthony Albanese and Richard Marles say it’s too dangerous to publish where they are flying.

Defence chiefs have revealed the VIP flight data on politicians travel published on its own website is “corrupted” and has underestimated and over-estimated the travel of federal ministers and MPs.

The extraordinary claim emerged under questioning at Senate estimates on Wednesday as defence secretary Greg Moriarty and Chief of the Airforce Air Marshall Robert Chipman AM CSC were grilled over the mess.

It follows Defence department claims Defence Minister Richard Marles spent $3.6 million on VIP flights.

The data mess may also provide a clue as to why the defence department media unit has stonewalled questions from journalists over the debacle for months, including refusing to explain it has failed to hand over the data to the Independent Parliamentary Expenses Authority as required for more than a year.

Since 1967 successive federal governments have adhered to a practice of publishing quarterly reports about the VIP flights after the so-called “VIP affair” nearly brought down the then prime minister, Harold Holt, and minister for the air, Peter Howson.

The grilling comes as Anthony Albanese continues his trip to Washington with partner Jodie Haydon ahead of a state dinner with President Biden and his wife.

The defence department claims Defence Minister Richard Marles spent $3.6 million on VIP flights.

But the Albanese government has stopped that process after it was paused under the previous government, citing a security review.

“In particular the AFP and ASIO have particular concerns,‘’ Defence Department secretary Greg Moriarty said.

“The environment has changed internationally in relation to designated persons, Members of Parliament, ministers.

“Our security agencies believe that the level of threat towards those people has heightened and we‘ve seen an increased number of threats, really uncivil, unpleasant discourse in social media

“They have very legitimate concern that we should as, as government agencies, take steps to ensure that pattern of life data which might go to identify the movements or likely activities patterns in relation to important persons are protected.”

Mr Moriarty said the Protective Security Boarc which included “very senior officials” from a range of relevant agencies had met to discuss the matter and agreed that Home Affairs and the AFP should jointly work across government regarding the publication of data.

He also hinted that these considerations may include a further crackdown on the publication of MPs travel and expenses and Comcars and accommodation and offices.

“This is not limited to the use of special purpose aircraft but it‘s also extended to other means of transport and accommodation and offices.

“That work is going to be undertaken with a focus on the safety of high officials that is that is the primary driving concern.“ Chief of Air Force Robert Chipman AM CSC said it now appeared there were significant errors in he material published.”

Defence secretary Greg Moriarty was grilled over the issue.

He described the errors as “quite a complex” and originally included technical errors with a database but it now appeared they had also stopped checking the data with ministers office leading to further errors.

“We went back through the information that had been published on the 18th of August, and it became apparent that we had not actually captured all of the data that had been corrupted,‘’ he said.

“Then, it became apparent that the process of ceasing to publish schedules which occurred late 2021, that an unintended consequence of ceasing to publish the schedules was that we were no longer doing the checks and balances in air force with the offices of the approving authorities to make sure the data in the database was correct.”

“There will be some ministers where there are additional costs that they will incur because we they have undertaken flights that were not represented in the schedules published on the 18th of August.

“There will be other ministers, where the costs attributed them to them will decrease because there were flights attributed to them incorrectly.“

Chair of Foreign Affairs, Defence and Trade Legislation committee, Victorian Senator Raff Ciccone led the questioning.

Senator Ciccone is factionally aligned with the Defence Minister Richard Marles, who he hinted may have had flights attributed to his bill that he did not take.

Mr Marles has not claimed to date that the information was incorrect but has defended the flights as in the national interest.

The guidelines require the government to make details of flights public every six months. Senate estimates heard that the former minister Peter Dutton was the first to end that practice, citing a pending security review by the federal police, finance department and others.

“It is based on their recommendation that we have settled on a new format in consultation with the Office of the Deputy Prime Minister (Richard Marles) before publishing the current schedules back to January of 2021,” the Air Force chief said.

“So we had ceased publishing schedules under the former the former Defence Minister, Mr. Dutton in the second half of 2021.

“My understanding … is there was a decision that was reached in consultation with the office of the former Defence Minister because there were concerns of then, that publishing the data in that format would establish a pattern of life.

“So there was a decision taken that we would review the guidelines then in the second half of 2021 to make sure that we were not putting information into the public domain that would compromise the security of our VIPs.”