Victorian Labor cabinet needs to stand up

Victorian Premier Daniel Andrews and Health Minister Jenny Mikakos. Picture: Andrew Henshaw

In a stunning development, former Victorian health and human services minister Jenny Mikakos has confirmed that a breakdown in cabinet procedures and governance was the main cause of the hundreds of deaths that took place in Australia’s biggest industrial accident: the Victorian hotel quarantine.

The Australian detailed how the cabinet accountability and responsibility breakdown took place in my commentary earlier this week.

But it’s one thing for a journalist to make a comment setting out an event, and another for a participant in the breakdown to break ­their silence. Four ministers have been named in the request to WorkSafe chief Colin Radford to launch a prosecution under the Victorian Occupational Health and Safety Act. Under law, Radford must reply to that request by December 29.

Arguably, in the light of the latest Mikakos statement to the Coate inquiry, the prosecution request should be extended to all members of cabinet who did not ensure that cabinet responsibility was maintained.

In a strange and ironic coincidence, we are also watching first-hand how corporate governance broke down in the Crown Resorts mess, which may force Crown to abandon its plan for a Sydney ­casino. And it has forced James Packer to agree to cut his ties with the Crown group.

While the Crown breakdown in governance has captured national and regional headlines, the Victorian government governance breakdown was far worse, with much greater consequences. All Australian and state governments have now learned that if cabinet responsibility is bypassed, the whole government process can collapse.

In my commentary I set out how a series of “missions” were set up that encompassed the disastrous hotel quarantine operation. They reported to the Premier and bypassed the cabinet process. Victoria had a carefully prepared crisis management system that adapted cabinet responsibility to the speed required to manage a crisis. The plan was ignored and the untried missions structure was used instead.

Had the cabinet responsibility system been used, each stage of the quarantine operation would have been examined by all the ­departments and their public service heads. As a result the outcome would have been clear decision-making, with allocated responsibilities. Accordingly, the use of Defence forces would have been debated; the use of police would have been discussed with the police minister in the room. And if there was no other alternative to security companies then how they were to operate, be monitored and staff trained would have been discussed and responsibilities allocated.

Every Victorian ALP politician, irrespective of which faction they belong to, now knows that by not making sure there was cabinet responsibility, all the cabinet ministers are now vulnerable to Occupation Health and Safety prosecution. Of course, that does not mean they are guilty.

But many ALP politicians themselves outside the cabinet would also be feeling a sense of guilt. While they are unlikely to be prosecuted, they know that because they didn’t watch what was going on, they contributed to the horrible death toll.

In hindsight, because it was without precedent, making such a mistake is understandable. But now everybody knows what happened. And if the situation is not rectified then there is every reason for blame to be allocated to non-cabinet ministers. If non-cabinet ALP politicians make sure that cabinet responsibility is restored to Victoria, then the very first thing the re-empowered cabinet must do is to fix up the contact testing system.

In Australia and overseas well over half those who become infected with COVID-19 do not show symptoms. Accordingly, Victoria is vulnerable to more outbreaks, particularly if movement restrictions are eased.

I call on the Victorian ALP parliamentarians of all factions to do the right thing.