INDEPENDENT COMMISSION AGAINST CRIME AND CORRUPTION BILL

Second Reading

Adjourned debate on second reading.

(Continued from 26 September 2007. Page 777.)

The Hon. B.V. FINNIGAN (20:17): The government opposes this bill, and I will go through the reasons for the government's opposition. I will look at the number of mechanisms that currently exist in South Australia to deal with corruption issues; the record showing issues that have been dealt with in recent years without the benefit of an ICAC; the danger of allegations causing damage or a threat of action; the cost involved in such a proposal; and, finally, I will reflect a little on the Democrats' position on this issue across the board and why they might be moving this bill.

I will turn first to the mechanisms that exist in South Australia to deal with potential problems of corruption. Neither the commonwealth nor half the jurisdictions of Australia have an independent commission against corruption or like body, and the South Australian government is yet to be convinced that South Australia needs one. ICACs are very expensive. The government believes that we have a good system for investigating allegations of corruption and complaints here in South Australia.

We have the Police Anti-corruption Branch, an independent and very disciplined force; the Auditor-General and the Ombudsman, who can investigate any administrative decision of any government agency, including local government; and the Police Internal Investigations Branch, all of which are fighting corruption here in South Australia. We also have whistleblower legislation and the Police Complaints Authority, to which members of the public and others can direct complaints about the actions of the police. It is the government's view that South Australia is better served by these agencies than it is by the $30 million ICAC proposal of the Hon. Ms Kanck.

By having a variety of anti-corruption forces in South Australia, we have achieved a certain creative tension among the organisations. If a person has a complaint and they take it to one agency and do not get satisfaction, they can move on to the next one. If you have a monopolistic anti-corruption commission, you have only one go at it. Moreover, all the investigative power is concentrated in one agency, creating yet another forum where corruption can breed.

I will turn now to events in recent years that have been dealt with without the benefit of an ICAC. Some may argue that, by this government voting this bill down, it looks like the Labor Party has something to hide, or that, if one opposes an independent commission against corruption at a price tag of about $30 million a year for taxpayers, we are somehow turning a blind eye to corruption.

It is not the Labor Party that had a Premier who was found by an inquiry to have lied to parliament; it is not the Labor Party that had a Deputy Premier who was found by an inquiry to have lied to parliament; it is not the Labor Party that had a minister resign in disgrace for commercial conflicts of interest; and it is not the Labor Party that used something like $350,000 in taxpayers' money to pay off the personal debts of their ministers. All of those things happened during the last term of the Liberal government, but all were able to be brought to light and dealt with, in most of those cases, by resignations of the ministers concerned, and even the premier, without the need for an ICAC.

I turn to the danger of allegations being used to damage people who have done nothing wrong, or the threat of action being used to coerce people or prevent them from fulfilling their duties. Earlier this year, The Advertiser published an article written by Mr Brian Carr. Mr Carr was the chief executive of the Liverpool council in New South Wales, and is currently the Chief Executive of Light Regional Council. He has been a CEO in local government for 26 years. Of his experiences with the New South Wales ICAC Mr Carr wrote: 'If you want to destroy someone, report them to ICAC.' The council was investigated three times while he was at the helm. Each time it was cleared of any wrongdoing, but not before enormous damage was sustained by the council and its workers.

The New South Wales ICAC commissioner recently admitted that, of the 2,500 complaints of corrupt conduct the ICAC receives each year, only 50 warrant serious investigation, and a mere five or six lead to full-blown inquiries. Mr Carr went on to say that, in New South Wales, there are two main groups that have become adept at exploiting the ICAC system. The first group comprises those who want to exert inappropriate pressure on government officials. To do this, they use the threat of an ICAC investigation in an improper way. This approach is designed to paralyse elected officials with fear and render them incapable of making hard decisions. Mr Carr continued:

One high-profile New South Wales lawyer, seeking to manipulate local government decisions, would regularly bully elected members by threatening them that if they acted contrary to his professional advice, their behaviour could be seen as 'ICAC-able'...The second group is made up of political opponents and those with an axe to grind. For personal or political reasons they wish to maliciously damage the reputation of those in public office. As former CEO of Liverpool Council, one of New South Wales' largest, I saw many disgruntled parties, community groups, mayoral aspirants, political candidates, developers and companies who'd lost out on tenders all misuse ICAC in this way. For them, ICAC was the perfect vehicle to vent their spleen, leak their spurious allegations to the media and publicly injure the elected official they held a grudge against.

Mr Brian Carr went on:

Is this really the kind of unchecked anti-corruption system we want for South Australia? In my view, it merely paves the way for a more sinister form of corruption to flourish.

So, there is a real danger that people can use the threat of ICAC action to coerce public officials, elected councillors or others into acting in a particular way. Similarly, when allegations are made and are then made public, the mere investigation can be enough to seriously damage someone or end their career. The Hon. Ms Kanck, in her contribution when introducing the bill, said:

Back in 2005 we saw allegations of paedophilia being made against a state MP, and that would have been cleared up very quickly without all of the endless media speculation if we had been able to refer the matter to an ICAC.

To me, that is a rather extraordinary proposition because, had such a body been in existence and such a reference been made to it, it is quite likely that the identity of that person would have become public and there would have, in fact, been much more media speculation and much more hyperbole and public hysteria, almost, about that issue. The use of an ICAC to seriously damage someone or to vent allegations that have no basis in fact would be an extremely damaging development for this state and would, in fact, do nothing to reduce corruption, but would seriously damage people's confidence in the institutions of the state. It would be a very unfortunate development if a body could be used to irreparably damage people's reputations for no good reason, other than someone has a vendetta against them.

I turn to the cost. In New South Wales, the cost of the ICAC is around $30 million a year. In an article in The Advertiser, the New South Wales ICAC Commissioner said that he has 120 staff and it costs around $30 million a year for their investigations. That money could otherwise be used to employ teachers, nurses and police. Instead, they have 120 staff—

The Hon. D.W. Ridgway interjecting:

The PRESIDENT: Order! The Leader of the Opposition has just entered the chamber and he is disrupting it already.

The Hon. B.V. FINNIGAN: Instead, those 120 staff are used to run ICAC when they could be more usefully employed.

The Hon. T.J. Stephens: What about Miltie?

The Hon. B.V. FINNIGAN: I believe that the Hon. Mr Stephens interjected, 'What about Miltie', which I assume is a reference to Milton Orkopoulos, who is—

The PRESIDENT: The Hon. Mr Stephens is out of order.

The Hon. B.V. FINNIGAN: —facing significant charges or has faced significant charges—I am not sure where that is at the moment and whether he has been convicted. I am not sure whether those charges have anything to do with an ICAC. He has been charged with criminal offences. He has been prosecuted by the police and charges have been laid by the DPP. So, thank you to the Hon. Mr Stephens for adding to my arguments against an ICAC. The police and the criminal system are dealing with the offences with which that man has been charged.

The Hon. S.G. Wade: We haven't got time to go through all the corrupt Labor politicians.

The Hon. B.V. FINNIGAN: Again we have just heard the Hon. Mr Wade say that we have not got time to go through all the corrupt Labor politicians. I mean, this is the classic opposition—

The PRESIDENT: The Hon. Mr Wade is out of order, and you are out of order for responding.

The Hon. B.V. FINNIGAN: I stand humbled, Mr President. It is the opposition's continual tactic to rubbish and slur, rather than come out with facts. It shows why there are those who are advocating an ICAC, because what they want is this nice conflagration of issues and controversy and ministers being brought down. They are not really interested in whether people have done something wrong; they are not interested in good government: they are just interested in feeding the opposition fires. That is why they set up these committees to which they are not interested in turning up.

Finally, I turn to the Democrat position regarding this matter. It is a puzzle to me as to why the Australian Democrats have not moved to try to establish an ICAC at the commonwealth level. Indeed, the last time I checked—fortunately, we are sitting this week, because I may well be incorrect in asserting this in a few days' time—the Liberal Party is in federal government.

I saw John Howard on the 7.30 Report last night. He did not say anything about an ICAC. We have gone through six weeks of an election campaign; where is the call for an ICAC from Senator Nick Minchin, the Leader of the Government in the Senate, the Prime Minister, or the Minister for Foreign Affairs, South Australia's most senior minister? Not a word from them about how we need an ICAC, or a crime or misconduct commission at the federal level.

The federal government has a much bigger budget and deals with much greater issues. Let us look at some of the things that have happened with the federal government recently. It is now revealed that over $500 million—that is, half a billion dollars (about a third of the cost of our new hospital)—has been spent by the federal government on government advertising in the past two fiscal years. There is a $300 million wheat—

Members interjecting:

The PRESIDENT: Order! The Hon. Mr Finnigan will refrain from exciting the opposition.

The Hon. B.V. FINNIGAN: We have seen a $300 million wheat for weapons scandal at the federal level, and we know the regional partnerships program has been the subject of an Auditor-General's Report which has revealed the most extraordinary rorting of government funds.

The Hon. D.W. Ridgway interjecting:

The Hon. B.V. FINNIGAN: It has involved people being handed grants who have not even applied for them and councils being advised to double the amount that they should apply for when they have not applied for it yet. The Leader of the Opposition interjects and says, 'take home the Auditor-General's Report'. This is entirely our point. We have the Auditor-General, the Anti-Corruption Branch, the Police Complaints Authority and an Ombudsman and, if there is a problem, it is those officers who are charged with the responsibility of looking after it. Despite all these potential issues at the commonwealth level, certainly there is no move by the Liberal and National parties to establish an ICAC, and none by the Australian Democrats that I am aware of, although I stand to be corrected.

Finally, as far as I am concerned the real issue for the Australian Democrats is that they are against development and want to see development grind to a halt, and they are happy to support any move that may bring that about. The Hon. Sandra Kanck said in her contribution:

The mining and development booms in this state mean that a lot of money is being thrown around in South Australia, along with a lot of pressure on government authorities to make decisions that favour these investors.

This is the classic tactic of throwing around allegations. Where is this corruption? Where are these developers that are supposedly engaged in some sort of corrupt behaviour? Let us have an ICAC to investigate something that we do not even know exists, but we think there must be something going on because there is all this development and mining. There must be something fishy going on, so let us have an ICAC to investigate it. That is backed by the Liberal Party which, of course, has the most extraordinary record when it comes to political donations and other things that have gone on in the past in this state, and nationally.

So, members of the Liberal Party in this state are now, for political convenience, supporting the call for an ICAC. They are not doing it at the federal level when they are in government. I do not know whether they will do it in the City Council of Brisbane, since that will be possibly the only authority or government they have in Australia in a few days. If they get back into government I am prepared to bet any money I have, or I will go to the ANZ and say, 'The Hon. Ann Bressington recommends me. I want to borrow some money to pay off a debt to the Liberal Party because it will not introduce an ICAC.' No way in a million years, and we know that.

As the Hon. Sandra Kanck mentioned, there is all this development and mining, therefore there might be something fishy going on and we need an ICAC to investigate it. That simply reflects the fact that the Hon. Sandra Kanck, in my view, and the Australian Greens are not too keen on development and are happy to support anything that they think will put a spanner in the works. I respect that position. You do not have to support development. I am a bit of Luddite at heart. I would be quite happy if we had a Roman cityscape out there with nice beautiful ancient four-storey buildings and nothing else. But that is not what we have, and I do not take the view that we need to stop all development happening. I think that is the view—

The Hon. Sandra Kanck: What does this have to do with an ICAC?

The Hon. B.V. FINNIGAN: Well, in her speech the Hon. Sandra Kanck said that we need it to stop corruption in development. What corruption? There is none that we are aware of. So, let us spend millions of dollars, let us have a lawyers' frolic, in order to root out corruption that we do not know exists. There is no ICAC or similar body in Victoria, there is not one at a commonwealth level, there is not one in Tasmania—

The Hon. T.J. Stephens: It is a pity that there is not one in Victoria at the moment. You hardly need one there, do you?

The Hon. B.V. FINNIGAN: Well, there are things being investigated in Victoria by another body, and this is my point again. We have already the mechanisms, the processes and the structures that deal with these things. So, having another one that costs millions of dollars that is simply a lawyers' picnic is not going to address this issue. In my mind, it is designed to substitute a quasi-judicial body for the processes of law. We see this again and again where, if you cannot get someone in the courts because you do not have the evidence, just set up some other body with a lower standard of evidence so you can get them. That is an appalling approach. I cannot believe that people such as the Hon. Mr Lawson—a QC—thinks that we should have some sort of quasi-judicial body that does not apply the standards and processes that apply to the Supreme Court or to the other courts in this state.

We have proper process in relation to the police and the courts. We do not have a history of, or evidence that there is, widespread corruption. This is simply an opportunity for the opposition—and, with all respect, the minor parties—to do what they do best, which is create all this drama all the time, throwing out allegations and aspersions about what people have or have not done, with no evidence. There is nothing to suggest that there have been significant levels of corruption which need to be investigated.

Members interjecting:

The ACTING PRESIDENT (Hon. I.K. Hunter): Order!

The Hon. B.V. FINNIGAN: Members opposite say, 'Rather than going after outlaw motorcycle gangs'—who are the people we should be going after in this community—'let's spend $30 million and let's employ over 100 people to investigate allegations of corruption that we know don't exist.' There is no evidence of widespread corruption in South Australia. What the opposition and the other parties are suggesting is that we spend millions of dollars to employ dozens, if not hundreds, of staff to try to investigate things in the hope they will uncover something.

Members interjecting:

The ACTING PRESIDENT: Order! The leaders might like to take their discussion outside.

The Hon. B.V. FINNIGAN: We know from those bodies interstate that they spend millions of dollars—

The Hon. D.W. Ridgway interjecting:

The Hon. B.V. FINNIGAN: I am floored—I must sit down and recover from such a barb! These bodies spend millions of dollars and employ many staff with the intention of creating a lot of work, because that is the nature of bureaucracy; we all know that. The idea is that you spend a bit of money to show that you approve of and want to invest in something, and people will not roll up three years later and say, 'Not much corruption happening around here; we think you should wind us up.' Of course, that will not happen, and we all know that. It becomes a mushrooming bureaucracy that must justify its own existence, so it continually expands its ambit.

We have seen that in other states, where they are spending millions of dollars to investigate things while acknowledging that very few matters they investigate result in prosecution because the evidence is not there. That is the fundamental problem. For all those reasons—because it is not required, because it costs money, because it is an exercise in grandstanding—I believe this bill should be opposed; and the government opposes this bill.

The Hon. R.D. LAWSON (20:37): It is a pleasure to follow the Hon. Bernie Finnigan. Mr Finnigan told the chamber that one of the reasons we should not have an independent commission against corruption in South Australia is that we already have the mechanisms for this: we have the police Anti-Corruption Branch, the Auditor-General, the Ombudsman, and so on. Let me tell the council what the former auditor-general said earlier this year when he retired after 17 years in the role.

Members interjecting:

The ACTING PRESIDENT: Order!

The Hon. R.D. LAWSON: He said:

We don't have the mechanism which would enable us to deal with the types of issues that have been identified in some other jurisdictions.

He supported the establishment in South Australia of an independent commission against corruption. But he is not the only one. The distinguished retiring member for Port Adelaide (Rod Sawford) calls for the establishment of an independent commission.

Members interjecting:

The Hon. R.D. LAWSON: Those opposite are keen to bag Mr Sawford; and no doubt they will bag the next Labor member. Senator Penny Wong has called for its establishment in South Australia. Former ALP senator and regular ABC commentator Chris Schacht has called for the establishment in South Australia of an independent commission against corruption, as has Dean Jaensch, the distinguished South Australian professor of politics, as has Alex Ward.

The Hon. P. Holloway interjecting:

The Hon. R.D. LAWSON: The honourable member talks about Professor Dean Jaensch in disparaging terms, and I think that is appalling. The Leader of the Government says that Dean Jaensch is incompetent.

The Hon. P. Holloway interjecting:

The Hon. R.D. LAWSON: He is right on this—

The Hon. P. Holloway interjecting:

The Hon. R.D. LAWSON: The honourable member is very keen to disparage Professor Dean Jaensch. I think it appalling that, under parliamentary privilege, the leader would make such remarks about a highly-experienced commentator—a regular commentator on Carole Whitelock's show; as well as Leon Byner. We hear Professor Jaensch all the time, yet here he is being rudely, crudely, under parliamentary privilege, attacked in this cowardly way.

And there are others—not only members of the Australian Labor Party—who have called for the establishment of an independent commission against corruption. For example, Law Society President Alex Ward, university criminologist Allan Perry, and, of course, and more importantly, the leader of the Liberal Party in South Australia, Mr Martin Hamilton-Smith—who made an innovative policy announcement to which we in the Liberal Party are committed when elected in 2010, namely, the establishment of an independent commission against corruption.

The Hon. Bernie Finnigan talked about the fact that there is no evidence to suggest corruption in governments around the country—a most amazing claim. Look at what is happening in Western Australia. This very week the Western Australian Premer had to stand down a significant figure in the Australian Labor Party. And, of course, I mention that the activities of the notorious Brian Burke have been exposed in Western Australia by an anti-corruption commission.

Amazingly, in Victoria only this very week senior police officers have had to resign as a result of the activities of a body established in that state. They could not call it a commission against corruption; they established a special body to investigate police and, when that body was given sufficient independence, it exposed corruption at the highest levels of the Victorian police. If we in South Australia think that corruption cannot infect our police, one only has to cite the example of Barry Moyse, who was the head of the drug squad in South Australia.

The Hon. P. Holloway interjecting:

The Hon. R.D. LAWSON: The honourable member says what about my legal colleagues? What about the judiciary? Well, if he has some information about corruption in the South Australian judiciary, I would be surprised to hear about it. But if that exists that is yet a further need for the requirement of an independent commission against corruption. If the leader of the government is saying tonight that there is corruption in the judiciary—

The Hon. P. Holloway interjecting:

The Hon. R.D. LAWSON: Well, I am talking about the police and you are accusing the judiciary of corrupt—

The Hon. P. Holloway interjecting:

The Hon. R.D. LAWSON: What I am saying is that if South Australians think that corruption within the police does not happen here, it does. The scales should have fallen from their eyes years ago when the head of the drug squad, Barry Moyse, was found to be using and dealing the very drugs he was seizing from criminals. Police corruption can occur. I am not accusing any current serving officer of South Australia Police of corruption, but there ought to be a mechanism which exists, first, for the purpose of investigation for prosecution; and, secondly, for clearing people if their reputation deserves to be cleared.

This government by its very actions has changed our minds about the need in this state for an independent commission. Take the Randall Ashbourne affair where the Premier's senior adviser was charged with corruption in relation to an incident involving the Attorney-General.

The Hon. B.V. Finnigan interjecting:

The Hon. R.D. LAWSON: He was ultimately acquitted, but that should have been dealt with by a commission against corruption. When the McGee case occurred there were suggestions that the police might have gone light on a prominent criminal lawyer. The government had to establish a royal commission for that very purpose, which cost millions of dollars to run—

The Hon. P. Holloway interjecting:

The Hon. R.D. LAWSON: You had to establish such a commission. If it had been in existence, an anti-corruption commission could have dealt with that matter in the ordinary course. You would not have had to go to New South Wales and call in a retired judge or pay countless privately-engaged lawyers to conduct the mechanism, because you would already have it.

Take the 'stashed cash affair' involving the Attorney-General and the Crown Solicitor's Trust Account where, because of the lack of cooperation from the government, we had to establish a select committee—which the government has sought to frustrate at every opportunity. An independent commission against corruption would have dealt with that and it would have been finalised a long time ago. There are issues with conflicts of interest with ministers in the current government: the Minister for Agriculture, Food and Fisheries, for example, was recently the subject of protracted discussion, and a commission against corruption could have examined that matter and resolved it to the satisfaction of the public. If we, in South Australia, somehow think that we do not have corruption that requires investigation we are kidding ourselves.

It is not only political people who are calling for such a commission, not only experienced Labor members; George Mancini, chair of the South Australian Council of Civil Liberties, has also called for the establishment of, as he described it, a 'properly equipped, well-resourced body that could demonstrate to the community that corruption was going to be investigated.'

Why does the Labor government fight so fiercely against the establishment of such a commission? The rather weak ground given by the Hon. Mr Finnigan was its costs but, as I have just illustrated with the McGee case, we now have to establish a separate commission every time some event happens or the investigations of the parliament are frustrated by foiling select committees established for that purpose.

The Hon. Bernie Finnigan also says that a commission against corruption is an invitation for false accusations and for people's names to be blackened on the basis of false allegations. However, if the possibility of false allegations against some person were a valid reason not to have a commission why would we have a criminal justice system? Why do we have courts and police if people might use those systems to make false allegations? False allegations are made in every walk of life on a fairly constant basis; just because someone might make a false allegation is no reason to say that we should not have a commission.

We are not so concerned about the false allegations; we are more concerned about the allegations that may ultimately be proved. When you see the work being done in Queensland by the Crime and Misconduct Commission, in New South Wales by the ICAC, and especially in the Western Australian commission, you see the good work and the sound public policy that can be fortified by the establishment of such a commission.

As I indicated, the Liberal Party supports the second reading, and the Leader of the Opposition has indicated that a Liberal government will (if this government has not already done so) establish such a commission—and we know, of course, that this government will not establish a commission, we know that it is scared of such a commission. We will present a fully costed proposal, and there is plenty of fat in this government that can be cut. Admittedly, the cost of establishing a commission is significant, but the cost of corruption and the corrosion and undermining of public confidence in government is a matter that ought be considered. Of course maintaining integrity has a price, but the government is keen to avoid the imposition of any independent scrutiny of its activities.

As I said, we will present a fully costed policy. We notice that the Hon. Sandra Kanck's bill does not really seek to go into the precise costs, but we regard this bill as—

The Hon. P. Holloway interjecting:

The Hon. R.D. LAWSON: The leader asks why the federal government has not established—

The Hon. P. Holloway interjecting:

The Hon. R.D. LAWSON: He mentions AWB. The commonwealth government quickly established a royal commission to get to the bottom of it. It did not hide behind that at all. Perhaps if it had established an independent commission against corruption it would not have been necessary to establish that sort of royal commission, but do not suggest to us that the federal government has run away from these things. They have all been fully investigated. One does not see the sort of corruption at a federal level as one sees at the state level around this country. It is no justification to deny—

Members interjecting:

The ACTING PRESIDENT: Order! Entertaining as it is, the honourable member will ignore interjections.

The Hon. R.D. LAWSON: The fact that some other places might not have a royal commission is no reason at all for us not to have one. They should have one in Victoria, as everybody says, given the events that are going on there. Their mechanism (they only have a Police Integrity Commission) is virtually, although not under that name, a crime and misconduct commission in relation to the police but, for some reason, the government there (like the government here) is not prepared to allow itself to be the subject of scrutiny.

The Hon. B.V. Finnigan interjecting:

The Hon. R.D. LAWSON: They may not have one in Mongolia either. The fact that somebody has not—

The Hon. B.V. Finnigan interjecting:

The Hon. R.D. LAWSON: I will not be diverted by listening to the nonsense that is being talked by those on the other side, all anxious to cover up what this government is doing. We will be supporting the second reading of this bill. We do not believe that all of the provisions in it and all of the mechanisms that are required to be addressed are addressed in this particular bill. However, we strongly support the establishment of an independent commission against corruption, and we look forward to the committee stages of the bill.

The Hon. M. PARNELL (20:52): The Greens strongly support an independent commission against crime and corruption. We do so in South Australia as we have done in New South Wales and Tasmania and in every state where the Greens are represented. We think it is an important addition to our laws, keeping governments accountable.

I was very pleased to attend a breakfast some little while ago, where the guest speaker was Jerrold Cripps, of the New South Wales Independent Commission Against Corruption. He made the point that some 34 per cent of matters that it dealt with related to local government and that the vast majority of those matters related to local government exercising its controls in relation to planning. In this place, when people have dared to pose questions that might ask the government to explain the connection between political donations and business decisions that have been made by government—decisions to give favourable treatment to developers—we have been pilloried by the Premier.

The Premier says that only someone of the lowest character could possibly ask those questions; yet, when a prominent developer was asked by Matt and Dave on ABC Radio whether giving donations to the Labor Party is a way of buying influence or buying favours, the response was, 'Well, that's the way business works in this state.' Having an independent commission against corruption would be a very useful safeguard to look into political donations and their relationship to government decision-making.

The Hon. Bernard Finnigan made the remarkable claim that, if you support an ICAC, you must be against development. What is the flip side of that coin: if you are for development, you must also be for corruption? Do those two things go hand in hand? That is the logic of what the honourable member said. Support ICAC and you are against development; if you are in favour of development, you must accept the corruption that goes with it.

I was intrigued to hear the Hon. Robert Lawson recite a long list of people who have called for or supported calls for an independent commission against corruption in this state.

The Hon. R.I. Lucas: Was your name on it?

The Hon. M. PARNELL: It wasn't on it; we can add it to the list. I was most interested to read in The Australian a few months back on 27 August an article entitled 'Opposing the obvious: why are some premiers against corruption commissions?' I think it is informative for me to read a few sentences from that article. It states:

If the first sign a premier has been in office too long is a statement that independent oversight of the government is unnecessary, it is time for Labor MPs in South Australia to start thinking about a successor for Mike Rann. Last week, Mr Rann suggested South Australia does not need an independent corruption commission because in other states such agencies spend a lot of money on lawyers.

And that was the Hon. Bernard Finnigan's argument. The article goes on:

At best, this unforced error means Mr Rann is so unconcerned by what voters think that he now says the first thing that comes into his head.

At worst, it demonstrates that he is comfortable in power and so convinced of the probity of his ministers and mandarins that he genuinely does not see the need for independent investigators, including lawyers whose job it is to ask politicians and public servants hard questions.

But whatever Mr Rann thinks, from the wretched regime of Joh Bjelke-Petersen in Queensland a generation ago to the recent influence-peddling of Brian Burke in Western Australia, the evidence is overwhelmingly in favour of a well-resourced corruption commission.

I think that sums up the argument very well. The position of the Liberal Party, as I understand it, is that it has its own model that it will present to parliament next year. In fact, an article on the front page of The Advertiser states:

A Liberal bill aimed at giving South Australia its first independent anti-corruption body will be introduced to parliament early in the New Year.

The chances are that the Hon. Sandra Kanck's bill will still be on the Notice Paper, and we will have the ability to compare a couple of different models. I have an open mind about what model might be best. I look forward to seeing the Liberal version. But for now I think it is important for all members to keep this issue alive and to support the honourable member's bill by supporting its second reading.

The Hon. R.I. LUCAS (20:58): I had not intended to speak until I heard the contribution from the wholly owned subsidiary of the Attorney-General.

The Hon. P. HOLLOWAY: I rise on a point of order. Do we really have to put up with that? It is totally unparliamentary. Mr Acting President, I ask you to seek a withdrawal from the Hon. Rob Lucas.

The ACTING PRESIDENT (Hon. I.K. Hunter): I am not convinced that it is unparliamentary, but I do invite the Hon. Mr Lucas to withdraw and rephrase.

The Hon. R.I. LUCAS: Mr Acting President, no, I will not withdraw, and I will not rephrase. There is nothing unparliamentary in the phrase that I used. I was not going to speak until I heard an unparliamentary contribution from a member in this chamber. The first thing that I will say is that the reason that the Hon. Mr Finnigan got to his feet this evening to oppose the establishment of an ICAC in South Australia is that his master, the Hon. Mr Atkinson, has been trenchantly opposing and fighting the establishment of a corruption commission in South Australia for a number of years.

One might ask why the Hon. Mr Atkinson would be so trenchantly opposed to the establishment of a corruption commission in South Australia. The reason is self evident. There have been a number of examples where, had an ICAC been established, issues would have been referred to the ICAC that relate to the Attorney-General.

The most obvious of all relates to the issue of the Atkinson/Ashbourne/Clarke inquiries. The allegations in relation to that, after a secret whitewash inquiry by the Premier, were eventually flushed out and forced to be considered by bodies other than the Premier and the head of the Premier's Department at the time. I will not go over the whole sordid history of that attempted cover-up by Mr Rann, but both the Premier and the Attorney-General would have been dragged kicking and screaming before a South Australian ICAC to defend their actions in relation to that issue.

I will respond briefly to a comment which, if made publicly by the Hon. Mr Finnigan (it has been made on a number of occasions by the Hon. Mr Atkinson), would be defamatory. The Hon. Mr Finnigan repeated the claims that have been made by the Hon. Mr Atkinson in another chamber that moneys paid in relation to a defamation action that involved me and the former Hon. Mr Xenophon—if he is a former 'honourable'; I am not sure whether he retains that title—

The Hon. R.P. Wortley: He got his 10 years today.

The Hon. R.I. LUCAS: He got his 10 years, but I think you still have to apply. I do not know whether he is Mr Xenophon or the former Hon. Mr Xenophon. The claim has been made and repeated by the Hon. Mr Finnigan this evening that in essence a criminal or illegal act was committed by me or by the former government, that is, that personal debts were paid for by the taxpayers. That is an allegation of a criminal offence made against another member and it has been made on a number of occasions by the Attorney-General. But because I am not a litigious fellow, when he has made it publicly thus far, I have not pursued legal action against him.

However, this is the first occasion on which anyone, obviously under instruction from the Attorney-General, has stood up and made the claim in this chamber that, in essence, I was involved in a criminal action, that is, that the former government paid a personal debt in relation to a legal action involving myself and Mr Xenophon. I will not go through all the history of this, as it was considered by the former Auditor-General, who is, as a number of members have indicated, no close friend of mine. However, he, having considered the issue, could find no evidence of any criminal act and reported, as was the fact, that the former Attorney-General and the former cabinet followed all the appropriate processes. It was considered by the Auditor-General and there was no evidence to sustain the sort of claim the Hon. Mr Finnigan has made in relation to this issue.

I had not intended speaking, but when I heard the ill-considered contribution parroted by the Hon. Mr Finnigan, inspired and drafted by the Attorney-General and his fellow travellers, I felt compelled at least to place on the public record the facts as opposed to the musings or smearings from the Attorney-General and the Hon. Mr Finnigan.

Members interjecting:

The ACTING PRESIDENT: Order! Honourable members will show the Hon. Ms Kanck due respect in her summing up of the debate.

The Hon. SANDRA KANCK (21:05): In summing up and responding to the comments on this bill, most of which I have only heard this evening, I thank members for their contributions, particularly those who have indicated support for the bill. The Hon. Ann Bressington indicated a few weeks ago that she wants the bill amended, and I indicate that it is my intention also to amend the bill when we get to the committee stage on the basis of the feedback that I have received from the public.

Many members of the public who contacted me have felt that, when they have been to the Police Complaints Authority or the Ombudsman, for instance, justice has not been done. Yet, those are the sorts of organisations that the Hon. Mr Finnigan, the Attorney-General, the Premier and so on cite as being reasons for us not to have an ICACC. They talk about the Ombudsman, the Auditor-General, the Police Complaints Authority and so on. But I remind members and the government, in particular, that, when the current Acting Ombudsman and the former auditor-general left his job earlier this year, he called for an ICACC and, according to The Advertiser on 24 August, he criticised the secrecy surrounding the Police Complaints Authority. So, one of the people who has held one of the positions that the government uses as justification for not having an ICAC himself says that an ICACC is necessary.

The Hon. Mr Finnigan says that I am proposing a $30 million ICACC. I am not proposing a $30 million ICACC; I am not sure where he has got that figure from. If he actually examined my speech, he would see that I said that I have based this bill on the New South Wales model for ICAC but I also said that, on a population basis, we would not need to spend the same amount of money nor have the same amount of staff. There would not be a call to spend money on 120 staff. They would be twiddling their thumbs.

I also noted the comment from the Hon. Mr Finnigan that basically there were only 50 complaints of substance in New South Wales. I am not quite sure of that figure because Jerrold Cripps, the Commissioner of the New South Wales ICAC, addressed the attendees at a breakfast where he said that there were 2,500 complaints received per annum but only 500 were sustained. Perhaps the 50 complaints referred to might be those complaints (of those 500) that are forwarded to the DPP for action. But if it is only 50, I invite the Hon. Mr Finnigan and the members of the government to consider that that is one a week which is a very good result. It shows that the ICAC is worth its money.

The Hon. Mr Parnell referred to the comments that Mr Cripps made at that breakfast in regard to local government and planning issues. One of the comments that he also made was that the mining boom in South Australia was ripe for corruption, and I am sure he had not read the speech that I had made in this parliament a month earlier. He came up with that of his own volition.

I suppose that the government's contribution was to be expected but, despite its unwillingness to accept the need, I think the fact that this bill today will pass at the second reading vote must be a message to the government that this is inevitable. It might not come this year or next year, but it is inevitable. Ninety per cent of South Australians believe that we need an ICACC and all political parties, except the ALP, believe we need an ICACC.

The Hon. P. Holloway: What about Canberra?

The Hon. SANDRA KANCK: I think Canberra is a good idea. I have no problem with that. When I look at some of what went on with the Haneef affair earlier this year, I think that there is a very good case for an ICACC at the federal level, but that does not mean we do not have it here.

I can understand why the government holds out against an ICACC because wherever such a commission has been set up it does uncover corruption. Regardless of which government is in power, it tends to reflect upon that government of the day. I remind members of what I said in my second reading explanation, that a lot of the work of the ICACC in New South Wales is involved in ensuring that parliaments, governments and government agencies do things the right way, so that things are done properly and are seen to be done properly. It gives advice on the wording of legislation and by-laws and so on, so that there cannot be mistakes.

The Hon. M. Parnell interjecting:

The Hon. SANDRA KANCK: As the Hon. Mark Parnell has said, it prevents corruption. The government is claiming expense as an excuse for not supporting ICACC, but there would be savings in the removal of other bodies, such as the Police Complaints Authority. Michael Kelledy, a partner in the local law firm Wallmans Lawyers, pointed out in an Advertiser opinion piece of 4 September this year that the Anti-corruption Branch reports to the state government not the parliament, so it is not independent.

The Anti-corruption Branch is another body that could go if an ICACC were to be established. So, it is not as if we have to keep all these other bodies going as well as the ICACC. What is important is the 'independent' in that title 'Independent Commission Against Crime and Corruption'. The public is always suspicious, for instance, of the police investigating the police and when the Anti-corruption Branch reports to government it is very clear that it is not independent.

This is the fourth time that the Democrats have moved for the setting up of an ICACC. Today is going to be different because, for the first time, we will get this passed at second reading. It is an important step—it is not the final step, of course—and I look forward to more constructive comment and amendments in the committee stage next year.

Bill read a second time.