Albanese cabinet to decide if Morrison will be censured over damning secret ministry report

Federal cabinet will decide next week whether to censure former prime minister Scott Morrison over his five secret ministries after former High Court judge Virginia Bell said his actions were “corrosive of trust in government”.

The review by Bell was ordered by Prime Minister Anthony Albanese after it was revealed in August that Morrison had himself secretly sworn in to administer the departments of treasury, home affairs, health, finance, and industry, science, energy and resources during his last term in government.

Former prime minister Scott Morrison during question time on Wednesday.Credit: Alex Ellinghausen

Morrison defended his decision to take on multiple portfolios after the release of Bell’s review, arguing in a statement on his Facebook page that “as prime minister, my awareness of issues regarding national security and the national interest was broader than that known to individual ministers and certainly to the inquiry”.

But Albanese said Morrison had “quite clearly” misled parliament and opened the door to taking the extraordinary step of censuring the former Coalition prime minister, in which the parliament formally expresses its collective disapproval of an MP’s actions.

Cabinet will discuss Bell’s report next week, including draft legislation to implement the former judge’s six recommendations and whether to censure or reprimand Morrison.

Former Coalition minister Bruce Billson was the last MP to be censured by the parliament, in March 2018.

The Bell inquiry revealed Morrison made plans to be appointed minister to the Department of Water, Agriculture and the Environment but ultimately accepted advice from the Department of Prime Minister and Cabinet that this would be too difficult given the personal responsibilities that came with the role.

The environment minister has wide-ranging powers to approve major project developments and can override departmental advice relating to endangered species. According to the Bell report, Morrison wanted authority over the portfolio so he could administer the Environment Protection and Biodiversity Conservation Act.

Bell found the secret appointments were “apt to undermine public confidence in government” and made six recommendations to restore public trust in democracy and improve transparency and accountability.

They included legislation to require public notice of the appointment of ministers to administer departments, the publication of acting arrangements for ministers, the publication of details of which ministers are appointed to administer departments and an outline of division of responsibilities where more than one minister is appointed to the same department.

The prime minister will recommend to cabinet next week that all six of Bell’s recommendations be adopted.

“It is very clear that this [report] is a scathing indictment on the Morrison government and the culture of secrecy,” Albanese said.

“The question here is, as well, what was the culture that allowed this to thrive? How is it that Scott Morrison had the confidence to be able to appoint himself to six positions and consider even more appointments, at least one further appointment potentially?

“Quite clearly, he’s misled parliament every single day in which he stood there.”

The inquiry’s six recommendations to improve transparency and accountability include:

• Passing new laws to make all ministerial appointments public.
• Publishing a record of the responsibilities of all ministers in an acting role for two weeks or more.
• Listing all acting ministerial arrangements on department websites on a regular basis.
• Publishing every minister’s full responsibilities on the Department of the Prime Minister and Cabinet’s website.
• Publishing a separate explanatory guide to ministerial responsibilities.
• Publishing all responsible ministers in every department’s annual report.

Morrison insists his decision “to administer a series of departments where ministers had specific powers not subject to the oversight of cabinet” was informed by the pressures of the pandemic — “an extremely challenging period where there was a need for considerable urgency”.

However, Bell dismisses this argument in her report, saying that by 2021, Morrison was being sworn in to additional portfolios “for reasons having little if any connection to the pandemic”.

Morrison pointed out the appointments had been valid and lawful, he had not issued instructions not to publish his additional appointments and that he had not acted as a co-minister “except in the specific case of the PEP11 [an offshore petroleum exploration permit] decision and not otherwise for that department”.

Opposition legal affairs spokesman Julian Leeser said the Bell report “makes a number of sensible recommendations for improving the clarity and transparency of ministerial appointments”, and the opposition would consider any proposed legislation following the report.

Leeser did not say whether the opposition would support a censure motion.

The majority of Morrison’s cabinet was unaware of the unusual arrangements, including former finance minister Mathias Cormann and former treasurer Josh Frydenberg, who has condemned the “extreme overreach” in the forthcoming book, Bulldozed, by journalist Niki Savva.

The report found former secretary of the Department of Prime Minister and Cabinet, Phil Gaetjens, knew about all the secret ministries and viewed the appointment of Morrison to health and finance as an “appropriate safeguard” during the coronavirus pandemic.

Bell pointedly criticised Gaetjens, stating it was “troubling” that by 2021, he “did not take up the issue of the secrecy surrounding them with Mr Morrison and firmly argue for their public disclosure, [but] the responsibility for that secrecy must reside with Mr Morrison”.

She also notes that the fact Morrison took up the ministries without intending to administer the relevant departments “might be thought to raise a flag for the secretary of PM&C”.

Gaetjens, who was interviewed by Bell for her inquiry, said he would have raised concerns with Morrison if he had “been provided with any concerns or requests to directly engage with the prime minister or his office in respect of any issue which is the subject of this inquiry”.

The former secretary, who left his job one day after the federal election, told Bell “he had seen no sign that Mr Morrison was seeking to become ‘a president’”.

Bell calls criticism of Governor-General David Hurley for signing off on Morrison’s multiple ministries “unwarranted”, saying that he had been bound to make the appointments if the prime minister had requested them.

The former justice agreed with Hurley’s decision not to participate in the inquiry because his conversations with the prime minister were confidential.

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