Election 2022: Impact in doubt as judges stir the pot on integrity

Former crown prosecutor Margaret Cunneen has launched a stinging attack on a group of retired judges who publicly advocated for a national integrity com­mission.

Former crown prosecutor Margaret Cunneen. Picture: AAP

Former crown prosecutor Margaret Cunneen SC has launched a stinging attack on a group of retired judges who publicly advocated for a national integrity com­mission, saying “former judges will always have an interest in jobs for former judges if they have no stomach for the real world of the Bar”.

“Those of a particular political bent will always favour an organisation that can smear their enemies for years without need of proof required in a proper court,” Ms Cunneen said.

Now a barrister in private practice, Ms Cunneen was wrongly accused of misconduct by the NSW Independent Commission Against Corruption over a car accident at which she was not present.

Ms Cunneen said in response to the judges’ open letter: “No one who has not experienced the ­horrendous assault of an ICAC on his or her own family can ever understand the harm that these faceless bureaucrats … can do to good, innocent people”.

“Public servants in an ICAC, unlike ethical police trained in disinterested investigation, have an axe to grind.

“ICACs choose their targets so they are not disinterested.

“It must come as no surprise that most ICAC targets have been independently proved not guilty.”

The 31 former judges who put their names to the letter to Scott Morrison, Anthony Albanese and the leaders of the other parties included former High Court judge Mary Gaudron, former Queensland Court of Appeal president Margaret McMurdo and former Queensland chief justice Catherine Holmes.

They asserted that the case for a “well-designed” anti-corruption commission had been “widely ­accepted”.

“Where billions are to be spent and significant power is available to dispense it with little oversight, greedy people with convenient consciences and powerful connections will ensure that, with the manipulation of their influence, they will obtain illegal or un­ethical advantage to the detriment of the interests of the general public,” the former judges wrote.

Only a “specialist anti-corruption body” would have the “skill and power to detect” the means by which such greedy people would do so.

The Prime Minister brushed off the criticisms about the strength of his proposed integrity commission and said the judges were “entitled to their opinion”.

“I’m happy for them to make their contribution but what I do know is that we have a policy of 347 pages with extensive powers, part of our program to ensure that we can put an integrity commission in place, and that’s what we will be proceeding with,” Mr Morrison said.

The open letter would trigger renewed interest in the divisive issue, said former Labor senator Stephen Loosley, but it was unclear whether the judges’ views would have any impact.

“Momentum is critical in politics and this letter will undoubtedly serve to reignite interest in this issue,” he said of the letter, published on Wednesday.

“How persuasive it will be remains to be seen.”

Mr Loosley has opposed any federal anti-corruption body resembling the NSW ICAC and opposed that body’s establishment in 1988.

He said in an opinion piece in The Australian in January that his unease about the NSW ICAC was partly based on the treatment of Ms Cunneen, which he ­described as an example of ­“appalling treatment”.

Another former Labor senator, Graham Richardson, who was also against the NSW ICAC from its inception, said that while former judges had the same right to participate in political debate as anyone else, “Certainly when you get this kind of publicity, some people will take notice of it, but I don’t think it will have a huge impact”.