INDEPENDENT COMMISSION AGAINST CORRUPTION BILL

Second Reading

Second reading debate resumed.

The Hon. R.B. SUCH (Fisher) (11:14): This bill raises an interesting dilemma for me, given that I have been arguing for a long time that we could have the equivalent of an ICAC without actually establishing 'ICAC House', and I have been corresponding and lobbying the Attorney-General to that end. I take him at his word that he is working on that project and that he has people assessing some options, but I make it quite clear that, if we do not get some action soon on this issue, I will quite clearly come out in support of establishing an independent commission against corruption.

There are various elements to this. Mention was just made of the Police Complaints Authority. I have very considerable doubts about that organisation, and some of them relate to my own case. I have never, in my experience, found it to be an agency which pursues matters in the way in which I believe it should. In fact, generally, the authority comes back accepting what police say, dismissing allegations and not even thoroughly investigating matters.

I would say to anyone who thinks that the Police Complaints Authority is a body able to investigate complaints against the police thoroughly, 'You are absolutely and utterly misguided.' Someone said that it is police investigating police. I do not believe that is correct. The head of the Police Complaints Authority is a lawyer, and so are many of the people working there; but, nevertheless, it is not a body that is able in any significant way to act in relation to dealing with corruption, and I think that we need to acknowledge that corruption can be in various forms.

You can also have a corrupt process—where the process is not of the highest standard, where procedures have not been followed and where there is a lack of integrity. Many people think of corruption as someone giving money, a bribe, or something like that. Corruption and corrupt practice are also very much a part of what needs to be addressed.

The Police Complaints Authority, as presently constituted, tells me in correspondence that it cannot investigate the 300 or so complaints it gets a year, and therefore it is selective in what it investigates; and one could say at face value that is reasonable because some complaints would have more substance potentially than others.

The other agency I have absolutely no confidence in whatsoever is the Anti-Corruption Branch of the police department, and that is based on firsthand experience. I can talk about this now because my court case matter has concluded. The Anti-Corruption Branch was asked by the commissioner to investigate a leaked letter, which someone in the police force obviously thought was germane to my case. It was not. Because the letter mentioned the same road and it was written on behalf of constituents, someone thought that it was germane to my case. Well, it was not.

Anyway, it was leaked to Michael Owen of The Advertiser. The Anti-Corruption Branch never interviewed my staff, but its report said that one of my staff probably leaked it because they did not like me using letterhead. They had never interviewed them, anyway. It was an absolute nonsense, so I have no confidence in the ability of that branch. What you have is police investigating police, which is the point that has been made repeatedly in Queensland about corruption issues—you cannot have police investigating police. It does not make sense, and it is a complete abrogation of proper process.

That is what we have got in South Australia at the moment. I could detail some other cases where the Anti-Corruption Branch has done things which were quite unacceptable relating to a former president of the Legislative Council. It has been put to me that it tape-recorded his phone call and then, when he was extremely ill, went to him to get permission for what had already been done. That has been put to me by a very senior person within this parliament. I have no way of checking that, but it is a very serious allegation. I have no confidence whatsoever in the Anti-Corruption Branch.

What we have is an auditor-general who has his (or maybe in the future, her) hands tied in terms of investigating local government. It is not surprising we have had problems in councils—and it is not just the current matter of Burnside—because the Auditor-General has had his hands tied in investigating matters related to local government. He has had no oversight of financial matters, he has been unable to investigate council matters, and many councils run businesses. I know from personal knowledge that some of them have done things in the past which the public would be horrified if they knew. So that is the other dimension.

Then we have the Ombudsman who has the power of a royal commissioner, and I have argued that the Ombudsman's powers could encompass and be the focal point for complaints about alleged corruption and the ombudsman could engage someone from the independent bar, a senior counsel, to investigate a matter. That, I think, would constitute a pretty good model as an alternative to a standing ICAC, but if the government cannot come up with that alternative in a package which is meaningful and effective then I will support the Leader of the Opposition in her quest for an independent commission against corruption.

The idea of a national ICAC is nonsense. Most other states now have their own; they are not going to have a national one anyway. Anyone who thinks South Australia is immune from corruption is kidding themselves. If you follow what has been happening recently in Victoria, there has been evidence brought forward that the police department over there have been monitoring the phones of journalists who have written articles that are critical of the police, and there is a suspicion that has been raised by Ted Baillieu, the Leader of the Opposition, that the police may well have been monitoring the phones of MPs.

We do not know in South Australia, and you are not likely to find out, because we do not have a mechanism that can thoroughly and independently investigate those things. We also have a situation in South Australia where I believe SAPOL and the commissioner are not really responsible to anyone. Theoretically they are responsible to the Minister for Police but in reality I would like someone to tell me who they are actually accountable to. So we have a serious problem here in South Australia at various levels—local government, the police and other possible areas—that are not adequately covered at the moment in terms of any anti-corruption measures.

I implore the Attorney-General, who I believe is a capable decent person, to act promptly to bring in either an equivalent to an ICAC or, if he wants to have an ICAC, then that is fine. But if he cannot and the government does not want to call it an ICAC, then reform those other components, change them, so that they can do the work that an ICAC would be expected to do. I think the public in South Australia are calling for an ICAC or, as in my model, an equivalent.

Debate adjourned on motion of Mrs Geraghty.