Prime Minister Anthony Albanese says he is considering an inquiry into Scott Morrison’s secret self-appointments to cabinet and action to close the loopholes he used to make them.
A review by the Solicitor-General into the legality of Mr Morrison’s assumption of cabinet powers, achieved by secretly appointing himself to five cabinet portfolios, is expected to be handed to the PM’s Office on Monday.
Experts said last week that it was quite possible Mr Morrison had acted within the confines of the law while violating the principles and practices of cabinet government.
Mr Albanese said more information should come to light about how that happened.
“Very clearly there’s a need for proper scrutiny of what occurred here,” he said on Sky News on Sunday.
“What the Solicitor-General will advise on is, of course, the legal issues.
“There’s separate questions about the functioning of our democracy, whether any conventions have been overturned, whether there’s a need for reforms that are required, to ensure something like this will never happen again.”
Coalition MP Bridget Archer said she would also welcome an inquiry into the conduct of the former prime minister.
She said she had an open mind about how an inquiry would be conducted.
“Australians generally agree that we don’t want to see this sort of situation occur into the future, so we need to examine how we got here and how we stop it happening going forward,” she told ABC Radio on Monday.
Options for reform canvassed last week range from laws making it obligatory for any ministerial appointments to be published, to giving legal force to unwritten Westminster conventions and traditions against the concentration of power.
But one of the few ministers who knew of Mr Morrison’s scheme, the former deputy prime minister and Nationals MP Barnaby Joyce, said on Sunday that the media had been overreacting.
“There’s a little bit of hyperventilation coming into this,” he told the ABC.
“The ladies and the blokes at the IGA paying for the groceries will still be arguing about other things.”
Mr Joyce said the Nationals were in a difficult position over Mr Morrison’s covert ministerial power grab.
It was only in a portfolio held by the party, the resources ministry then occupied by Keith Pitt, that Mr Morrison was known to have exercised the covert power he accumulated – to cancel a politically unpopular gas exploration project.
Mr Joyce says he only found out about Mr Morrison’s power after he assumed the deputy prime minister’s position.
He said he felt that speaking out against it would only result in Mr Morrison using his numbers in the cabinet to the same end.
Mr Joyce added that the Nationals would not be able to challenge Mr Morrison without losing the extra position in cabinet he had negotiated upon his assumption of the party’s leadership.
“Is there anything I can do to change back?” he said. “No.
“Has he got the capacity to renegotiate my extra minister that I just dealt into the National Party hand? Yeah.
“[He] could just say: ‘Yeah, I’ll fix the problem, mate; I’ll just take the ministry back; it’s gone now. Problem fixed for you. Problem fixed for me. Bad outcome for the National Party.’”
Mr Joyce said he could not precisely say when he came to find out about Mr Morrison’s undeclared powers other than “over time and obliquely”.
“I probably had other things on my mind, we were negotiating one of the biggest deals in Australian history in supporting regional Australia.”
Ms Archer said while she was reluctant to ask for other MPs to resign, the former prime minister should “reflect” on his behaviour.
“It also is forcing other colleagues to..kind of having to defend themselves and their own records. And I think that that’s unfair,” she said.
“[Mr Morrison] should reflect on that and, and certainly consider whether it’s the best thing for him to do going forward.”
