Bernardi and Hanson to foil Labor probe into Angus Taylor

Crossbenchers Cory Bernardi and Pauline Hanson will stymie a Senate probe into Energy Minister Angus Taylor’s investments.

Minister for Energy Angus Taylor during Question Time in the House of Representatives at Parliament House in Canberra, on Wednesday. Picture: AAP

Energy Minister Angus Taylor is banking on the support of conservative crossbenchers Cory Bernardi and Pauline Hanson to avoid a Senate probe into his investments, and allegations he misused his position for private gain.

Senator Bernardi and the One Nat­ion leader told The Australian they were unlikely to support a Labor-backed inquiry into Mr Taylor for failing to declare an indirect interest in a family company linked to an investigation into ­alleged illegal land clearing.

“I will not stand by and see a witch hunt be played out at the ­expense of ministers’ reputations,” Senator Hanson said. She said she would finalise One Nation’s position on the matter with colleague Malcolm Roberts today.

Centre Alliance senator Rex Patrick had earlier lifted Labor’s hopes that its proposed inquiry would succeed after reversing his opposition to the probe, to be moved today in the Senate by the ­opposition.

Senator Bernardi said it was “fair to say” he was unlikely to support the proposed inquiry.

For the matter to be referred to the environment and com­­munications references committee, it needs the support of either One Nation or Senator Bernardi.

The government will this week put pressure on Labor over its links to the union movement, intro­ducing a bill that would make it easier to deregister badly behaving ­unions and officials.

The bill is set to sail through the House of Representatives, but Centre Alliance is demanding amendments in the Senate.

The opposition will keep its focus on Mr Taylor over the March 2017 meetings he had with Environment Department officials and the office of then-­environment minister Josh Frydenberg, where he lobbied to have environmental protections for ­endangered grasslands watered down.

The meetings were held as investigations were under way into the alleged poisoning of 30ha of grasslands on a NSW property owned by Jam Land Pty Ltd.

Mr Taylor’s brother Richard is one of Jam Land’s directors, while his family investment company, Gufee, is a shareholder.

Mr Taylor has denied wrongdoing, saying he was not obliged to declare indirect interests and his meetings with environment officials were merely to represent farmers in the electorate. “I make no apology for sticking up for the farmers in my electorate on issues that are having a serious impact on them. It’s what the people of Hume expect of me,” he said.

As it seeks to deflect parliamentary attacks on Mr Taylor, the government will accuse Labor of “failing to meet its own test” over the use of private trusts by MPs, including Tanya Plibersek’s failure to declare investments held in her husband’s family trust, listed on her register of pecuniary interests,

Ms Plibersek’s spokeswoman said parliamentary rules dictated she did not have to declare the indirect interests of her spouse, ­Michael Coutts-Trotter, because she did not know what investments it held. “Ms Plibersek receives no benefit and has no involvement in the running of the Coutts-Trotter trust, which was established by Mr Coutts-Trotter’s mother more than 20 years ago,” she said. “Ms Plibersek understands Mr Coutts-Trotter is the sole beneficiary of the trust (as ­declared), but is not aware of the trust’s interests.”

Government sources also accused Labor’s legal affairs spokesman, Mark Dreyfus, of failing to declare the interests of a trust he owned, although he did declare in his register of interests it was “dormant”. “Fairbank Tower Pty Ltd is a dormant company that owns nothing. It has no shares or any other assets,” a spokesman for Mr Dreyfus said.