Integrity watchdog Linda Waugh powerless to investigate unlawful lobbying

Queensland’s Integrity Commissioner warns ‘lots and lots’ of lobbying can occur outside of the state’s scheme but she has no powers to investigate.

Premier Steven Miles at the launch of the Australian-first Women and Girls’ Health Strategy at the Royal Brisbane and Women’s Hospital.

Queensland’s Integrity Commissioner says “lots and lots of lobbying” can occur outside the Miles government’s touted crackdown on the sector but her office has no powers with which to investigate secret lobbying.

Linda Waugh, appointed in 2022 to oversee the state’s lobbying register, told a parliamentary committee on Monday that while she is concerned about undeclared lobbying, she could do nothing about it.

Ms Waugh said there had been a 48 per cent jump in the number of registered lobbyists in Queensland to 337 in February this year.

The Liberal National Party opposition on Sunday called for Ms Waugh to investigate reported links of former Labor cabinet minister Kate Jones to a lobbying firm set up last December as Steven Miles became Premier.

Ms Waugh said she was aware of the report, published in The Weekend Australian, but was unsure whether “they have been engaging in lobbying activity that would fall within the act in Queensland”.

“So in Queensland, that would have to be where a person is paid by a third party … prior to any lobbying contact being made,” she said.

“There’s lot of things that can happen that won’t be captured, potentially, by the way that this scheme is structured and ­operates.”

It was revealed by The Australian that lobbying firm Akin Agency – for which Ms Jones is a “specialist consultant” – had expanded into Queensland, registering eight clients just a day after a factional deal was struck for Mr Miles to replace Annastacia Palas­zczuk as premier.

Ms Jones, an NRL commissioner tipped to replace Peter V’landys as chairman of the code’s governing body, has privately boasted of playing a central role in Ms Palaszczuk’s ousting and helping to secure factional support for Mr Miles to become Premier.

Ms Jones’s involvement with the firm is absent from the firm’s mandatory declaration on the Queensland Lobbyist Register and is not mentioned on her LinkedIn page.

The firm’s only registered lobbyist, Alex Dickson – Ms Jones’s former ministerial staffer and policy adviser – also failed to declare his work history as a former senior official in the government.

Ms Jones, public records showed, had since quitting politics in 2020 also organised meetings between ministers and companies, some of which are now clients of the Akin Agency.

Asked by the LNP’s Ann Leahy at parliamentary hearing on Monday whether she had concerns about the reports in The Weekend Australian, Ms Waugh said: “I’m an Integrity Commissioner so I’m generally going to be concerned with all matters relating to integrity.”

“But I guess ultimately, if there were instances of improper influence occurring, I would be concerned about them,” she said.

“Can I do anything about that? No, I cannot. I’m not an investigative authority. My job is to advise, regulate and raise awareness.”

On Saturday, when asked about Ms Jones’s links to the lobbying firm and details of her organising meetings last year between companies and ministers, Mr Miles said he was “bemused” by the report.

“It’s not front-page news that I’m friends with Kate Jones – we’ve known each other since we were teenagers, we’ve grown up and got old together in the Labor Party,” he said.

“I don’t have any reason for concern. What I do know is Kate will comply with our tough lobbying laws.’’

Ms Waugh said she would be concerned about “a person engaging in lobbying activity for a third party”, which is a criminal offence.

“I guess my commentary about the scheme; my job to implement the scheme is it is limited … to those definitions within the legislation,’’ she told the parliamentary committee.

“There’s lots and lots of lobbying that can go on that’s outside of the scheme and I have no functional … responsibility in relation to those.

“I might have views about lobbying … but in terms of what I can do and what my function is, my function is to regulate registered lobbyists.”

In the past year, the government passed laws to criminalise undeclared lobbying and banned lobbyists from being involved in political campaigns after The Australian revealed three lobbyists had run Labor’s 2020 re-election campaign.

A 2021 review by a former ­director-­general of Premier and Cabinet Kevin Yearbury concluded that granting the integrity commission specialist powers to investigate lobbyists would be a waste of public resources.

He said the Crime and Corruption Commission was the best agency to investigate lobbyists.

Asked if Ms Waugh’s office should have investigative powers, Mr Miles on Monday said: “We have suitable and appropriate arrangements in place for the integrity commissioner.”

“I would be happy to look at a proposal but we have some of the best and strongest integrity laws in the country,” he said.

Akin Agency and Ms Jones have said they complied with all government requirements, including the Integrity Commissioner’s rules about lobbying.