Newman backtracks on shift for CMC

QUEENSLAND Premier Campbell Newman has signalled a backdown on the restructure of the Crime and Misconduct Commission.

Queensland Premier Campbell Newman with Prime Minister Tony Abbott. Picture: Mark Cranitc

QUEENSLAND Premier Campbell Newman has signalled a backdown on the restructure of the Crime and Misconduct Commission.

Draft amendments, which were given the green light by a Liberal National Party-dominated parliamentary committee, proposed that the CMC should focus on fighting serious crime and not combating corruption.

But yesterday Mr Newman said the government might “tweak’’ the amendments to give the watchdog equal focus on corruption and crime.

But Mr Newman is refusing to budge on the proposals to remove the legal requirement for bipartisan support for any government appointee to head the watchdog.

The move has been condemned by corruption fighter Tony Fitzgerald, whose 1989 report into widespread corruption during the Bjelke-Petersen-era led to the establishment of the CMC’s predecessor.

“This debacle will adversely affect Queenslanders and ultimately end in tears for the government, which has staked our future and its future on the whims of a few inexperienced, arrogant fools who seem unaware of the extent of their own ignorance,” Mr Fitzgerald wrote to the ABC yesterday.

“Of course, anyone who knows the numbers on the committee doesn’t need to see the report to know the outcome.’’

Mr Newman conceded the amendments might be changed to give equal emphasis on corruption and crime. “We should perhaps tweak that, so that the emphasis is that they do both, rather than putting one against the other,” he said.