Bill Shorten weighs move to force Sam Dastyari to go

Bill Shorten is pushing to end the damaging controversy surrounding embattled Sam Dastyari within days.

Opposition Leader Bill Shorten with Labor senator Sam Dastyari. Picture: AAP

Bill Shorten is pushing to end the damaging controversy surrounding embattled NSW senator Sam Dastyari within days, with sources close to the Labor leader ­saying the situation is “unsustainable’’.

A senior Labor source said last night that Mr Shorten was “no fool”. “He knows the situation can’t continue,” the source said.

Mr Shorten’s intervention comes as Labor heavyweight Kim Beazley called on Senator Dastyari to consider what was best for the Labor Party.

The former Labor leader’s comments came as two frontbenchers, Linda Burney and Catherine King, broke ranks to say Senator Dastyari did not have a political future amid Labor’s widening China influence scandal and should consider his future as a parliamentarian.

Despite the high-level manouverings against Senator Dastyari, NSW right-wing powerbroker Tony Burke and left-wing frontbencher Anthony Albanese, who was a leadership rival to Mr Shorten after the 2013 election loss, continued to publicly back him.

The Coalition continued to exploit the controversy yesterday, with the Malcolm Turnbull ­declaring Mr Shorten’s continued support for the NSW powerbroker showed he was not fit to be leader. “Dastyari should resign from the Senate and Shorten should boot him out of the Labor caucus,” the Prime Minister told The Australian in an interviewto mark the end of the year.

“It is an indictment on Shorten. It is extraordinary for him to assert that he is a fit and proper person to remain in the parliament, let alone the Labor Party.

“Shorten wants to be the prime minister. The prime minister has to be the leader on national security. There is no one that should be more focused on national security … More than anything this is about Shorten.

“What it demonstrates is that Shorten is not taking seriously the obligation he has as a leader of the opposition and an alternative prime minister to put Australia first. It is scandal … Shorten’s failure to act is a scandal.”

Key backers of Senator Dastyari concede he is increasingly unlikely to be able to ride out the growing row over his pro-China activities. Even some of his closest right-faction backers in caucus speculated that Mr Shorten would encourage him to retire from parliament soon.

One of his allies said it was ­possible the former NSW Labor general secretary might retire from the Senate ­before Christmas. “You have got to make a judgment (as to whether) you can ride this out,” the ally said of Mr Shorten’s deliberations.

The senator’s future worsened after another damaging revelation yesterday that he had tried to convince then opposition foreign ­affairs spokeswoman Tanya Plibersek not to meet an anti-­regime academic in Hong Kong. The revelation followed last week’s report that Senator Dastyari had told Labor Party donor Huang Xiangmo that his and Senator Dastyari’s phones might be tapped when they met at Mr Huang’s home.

Mr Beazley, a former defence minister and Australian ambassador to Washington, said the senator must consider ending his political career.

“Sam needs to ask himself the question, and he probably is asking himself the question, how do I ­advance the cause of the Labor Party — by being there or going away?” he told Fairfax Media.

“As he looks at his obligations to the party and the country, and the ­capacity of the party to focus on its arguments … What is his best service? And he may want to take a look at examples of folk who’ve got caught up … and find themselves in a position where they’re a distraction.”

Ms King, Labor’s health spokeswoman, said Senator Dastyari’s position in the Labor Party was a matter for him to reflect on, adding to a call from human services spokeswoman Ms Burney earlier yesterday that it was up to the NSW right factional player to consider his position.

“His political career is, in ­essence, going nowhere,” Ms King said. “Bill (Shorten) has been clear about that. He said he paid a price for his actions. I think those are all matters for Sam to reflect upon.”

Asked whether she was comfortable with Senator Dastyari ­remaining in the Senate, Ms King said: “That’s a matter for Sam. He’s someone who has been a very ­effective politician, but I think Bill made it very, very clear that his political career is not going very far … I think that Bill’s made it very clear that he’s not going to be getting any promotions, not going to be having any of those positions within the party structure.”

Ms Burney told Sky News: “Bill Shorten took very decisive action in removing Sam Dastyari from all of those positions that he had in the Senate, and that was a very ­appropriate thing to do.

“It is now up to Mr Dastyari to consider his position, and I’m sure that he’s doing that, but in relation to the continued role of Sam within the parliament, that is a matter I think very much for Sam. Tanya Plibersek has made a very clear statement. Bill Shorten has taken decisive action. Sam Dastyari I’m sure is thinking very deeply about his role within the party.”

Mr Turnbull would not comment on whether Senator Dastyari’s actions could have been considered a crime under the new foreign interference legislation introduced to parliament last week. “I won’t give a legal option …. all I would say is look at the bill and reflect on what Dastyari has done,” he said.

Section 92.3 of the Foreign Interference Bill speaks of “reckless foreign interference”, allowing for imprisonment of 15 years of a person who “engages in conduct . . on behalf of, or in collaboration with, a foreign principal or a person acting on behalf of a foreign principal” where a person is so reckless that it could “support intelligence activities of a foreign principal or prejudice Australia’s national ­security”.

The new foreign interference laws have been rebuked by China’s Foreign Ministry and the embassy in Canberra. China hit back through an editorial in the Communist Party’s ­official newspaper, People’s Daily, accusing the Turnbull government of colluding with the Australian media to smear Beijing’s reputation. The editorial said media coverage was “hysterical, paranoid and racist’’ and had “tarnished the image of Australia as a multicultural country”.

Labor’s Melbourne Ports MP Michael Danby said yesterday of the senator’s predicament: “I think … he’s got sucked into an area he didn’t know all that much about and he’s been punished for it by Bill and the leadership, and he’s very aware of it. But there are much bigger fish in this debate and I think they should be criticised — both on our side, (those) who are out of politics like Bob Carr, the former foreign ­minister.

“To have him running a pro-Chinese think tank, ACRI, in Sydney largely funded by Huang Xiangmo is a controversial thing ... and Andrew Robb to have been the trade minister and to start on a major Beijing-based company’s payroll the day after he finished and having controversially had that same firm purchase the Port of Darwin for $500 million for a 100-year lease.”

Mr Carr told The Australian yesterday Mr Huang no longer funded the Australia-China Relations Institute, nor did he ­donate anymore to the Labor Party.

Senator Dastyari still has the backing of Labor’s NSW general ­secretary, Kaila Murnain, who holds enormous power within the party. The NSW right’s backing of Mr Shorten was critical in him ­becoming Labor leader over Mr Albanese, particularly through the rank-and-file party vote which ­determines 50 per cent of the leadership vote.

Additional reporting: Rachel Baxendale