Scott Morrison’s loyalty to Bridget McKenzie ends in bid to cauterise scandal

Prime Minister Scott Morrison speaks at a press conference at Parliament House in Canberra. Picture: AAP

Blind loyalty ... until it risks hurting the Prime Minister himself, of course. That’s the message behind the departure of Bridget McKenzie.

The former sports minister and deputy Nationals leader was backed in the strongest possible terms when the sports rorts saga first came to light. The defence of what transpired was a knee-jerk reaction. Rather than take a step back and consider what standards ministers and a PM should adhere to, the partisan wagons circled around McKenzie. But loyalty only goes so far.

The PM has been similarly loyal to embattled Energy Minister Angus Taylor and controversial new MP Gladys Liu. Concern about the length of time Queensland LNP maverick George Christensen spent overseas was virtually non-existent. Morrison continues to stand by all three, but loyalty to McKenzie had to come to an end — her taint was reflecting too badly on Scott Morrison as the crisis rolled on. Eventually she had to go.

The PM said repeatedly the sport grant allocations were “within the rules”, even though the Auditor General found they breached guidelines. Even though 73 per cent of the grants approved went against the recommendations of Sport Australia. Morrison pointed out all recipients were “eligible”, even though eligibility was never the point.

But when the scandal threatened to engulf the PM’s political office, with this newspaper revealing that two senior advisers in the PMO were heavily involved in the divvying up of the grants, suddenly McKenzie was shovelled out the door. By an “independent” investigation by the head of the department of Prime Minister and Cabinet, Phil Gaetjens, who as an aside was formerly the political chief of staff in Morrison’s office.

The reason used for bringing an end to McKenzie’s ministerial career was clever and self-contained: she breached ministerial guidelines by not declaring a membership of one of the clubs that received grant funding (to the tune of $35,000). This is a red herring in the wider sports rorts saga (which involved the allocation of $100m), but one that is self-contained and doesn’t include links back to the PM’s own office.

The hope from within the PM’s brains trust is that this quite separate issue to that of who knew what and when with respect to the substance of the sports rorts saga means that the political wound has been cauterised. There is nowhere else for this scandal to go, so the theory goes. The fall guy (or woman in this case) has been identified and dealt with. Case closed. Wrong.

The role of the PM’s senior adviser for infrastructure and sport requires further answers. The role of a second PMO staffer, whose primary purpose at the time was as a campaign strategist — liaising with the Liberal Party’s federal secretariat — needs further answers. Just as the electoral entitlements scandal early in the life of the Howard government had tentacles which stretched all the way into John Howard’s office — eventually claiming his then chief of staff — this sports rorts scandal has links deep inside Morrison’s office.

And we know we can’t trust their claims no links exist.

This is the same office that told us the PM wasn’t in Hawaii on holidays when he was. It is the same PM who told the world in his UN speech that Australia has the highest per capita investment in renewables, when we do not.

Truth in politics has always been scratchy, but its more challenged now than it has been in a very long time.

We still don’t know if Brian Houston really was invited to the White House state dinner — Morrison simply won’t answer questions about it. This is but one of many examples of the PM batting away questions he’d rather not answer. Direct questions don’t get direct answers. I asked him at the National Press Club ahead of last year’s election why he walked out of the chamber rather than honour the plebiscite result the cabinet he was part of insisted on to give Australians a say on same-sex marriage. No answer was forthcoming. Morrison refused to answer questions routinely when he was immigration minister, citing “on water matters” as the reason for doing so.

Denials when they do come are often carefully worded — like the already mentioned claim rules in this grants scandal weren’t broken, even if the guidelines were independently found to have been breached. It’s semantics on steroids.

The Liberal Party’s federal secretariat issued a statement denying any involvement in the sports rorts saga, which simply sheets responsibility back to the PMO and of course the then sports minister’s office. But how sure can we be that this saga doesn’t extend wider?

For example, taxpayer-funded political staffers often take up residence in campaign headquarters run by party organisations in the lead up to elections. Were any of these staffers involved in the sports rorts saga? My understanding is they were.

State corruption bodies take a dim view of such blurring of the lines between public service and party political activities. But there is no federal watchdog similar to state crime and corruption bodies. Perhaps there should be. Perhaps the blurred lines is just one of the reasons the government opposes a federal ICAC.

It may be a case of a party organisation being able to issue a plausible denial of involvement in matters such as sports rorts because the political staffers were doing the work on unofficial secondment.

It’s time the curtains get drawn wide open on the political class, in order to end all the dodgy practices the public — were it better informed — would never condone. While we are at it that should include party political fundraising, wherein big donors buy time with ministers, and the use of sophisticated software to track voters, which violates private laws for private organisations other than because political parties have legislatively given themselves exemptions to the relevant privacy act provisions.

Challenge the PM and journalists can find themselves put under enormous pressure, accused of partisan bias and with complaints to their superiors (a long way up the food chain I should add) to follow.

That’s been my experience and readers absolutely deserve to know about it. Such conduct is an important part of the story of this administration — academically and practically. Too often as journalists we don’t out such complaints deliberately designed to intimidate.

If Morrison is to grow into the job of PM these facets of his conduct must change. The actions and missteps to date are easily repaired because they have occurred so early in his first term as an elected PM. Time is on his side if he cleans up his act going forward.