Scott Morrison has doubled down on an attempt to blame Labor and the Senate for his own failure to introduce legislation after facing a barrage of questions about his broken election promise to implement a federal integrity commission.
The Labor leader, Anthony Albanese, declared on Thursday that Morrison was dragging his heels on setting up a federal anti-corruption body because he didn’t want his own ministers, or politically charged decision-making in cases like the sports rorts, to face a proper investigatory probe.
Flanked on the hustings on Thursday by Bridget Archer – the Liberal backbencher who crossed the floor last year in an effort to force debate about a federal body – Morrison confirmed he would only proceed to implement an integrity commission if he wins on 21 May if Labor supported the government’s widely panned model, and if the Senate failed to amend it.
Albanese characterised Morrison’s rationale and conditions as “bizarre”. The Labor leader said the truth was “this prime minister just makes promises and walks away from them”.
“This is a prime minister who can’t be trusted to deliver on his commitments next term because he has shown this term that he can’t be trusted,” the Labor leader said.
The Morrison government promised a national integrity commission in December 2018, ahead of the 2019 election, after months of dismissing it as a “fringe issue”.
After missing its self-imposed 2019 deadline for draft legislation, the Coalition finally unveiled its proposed body in November 2020.
The Coalition’s model is a commission that will not conduct public hearings or release reports into alleged corruption by public servants and politicians. The model has been panned by experts for the narrow definition of corruption and high bar for starting investigations. The necessary legislation was never introduced to parliament.
Morrison claimed incorrectly on Thursday he had not broken an election promise. He said the government had developed a model for a national integrity commission that would not operate like a “kangaroo court” – which is how the prime minister characterises the New South Wales Independent Commission Against Corruption (Icac).
“I need bipartisan support to put that in place,” Morrison said. “I am not going to introduce a kangaroo court.
“I put forward a detailed plan, a detailed proposal which the Labor party rejects. I have honoured my proposal. The Labor party don’t support it. That is where the issue rests.”
Despite never introducing his own legislation into parliament, in part because of concern some Liberals might cross the floor to support amendments strengthening it, Morrison said the government’s proposal was “there, clear and detailed”.
“It is there to be supported. It is our policy.”
Archer was asked for her view given the Tasmanian Liberal MP last November crossed the floor to support the independent MP Helen Haines’ bill to establish a federal integrity commission.
At the time Archer accused the government of “inertia” over the issue and said she was “perplexed” at her own government’s failure to release a revised bill almost three years after it was promised.
On Thursday she was asked whether she agreed with Morrison that the NSW Icac was a kangaroo court. She said she’d had limited exposure to the NSW body given she lives in Tasmania.
“What I have said and what I will continue to say is that I would like to see the positive promotion of integrity in public life,” Archer told reporters.
“There are a lot of ways to achieve that, one of those may be through integrity commission legislation, but there are other ways to achieve that.”
She said she would “continue to talk within the government” about advancing that agenda.
Morrison was asked what efforts he had made in the Senate to try to advance the government’s integrity commission legislation.
He said two attorneys general had been in dialogue with other actors in the parliament, but “the problem is, we’re not going to agree to changes which we think are not in the national interest”.
When Albanese’s contention about the government stalling to avoid anti-corruption probes was put to Morrison, he said: “Anthony having a crack at me is not a substitute for not having an economic plan and not knowing what’s going on in the economy.”
While Morrison clearly wants to move on from the issue, he will face renewed pressure from crossbench independents if the coming election is close enough to deliver a hung parliament.
A number of independents running against Liberals in metropolitan seats have made it clear that establishing a credible national integrity commission will be a key demand in the event that any new government – Liberal or Labor – is seeking agreements for confidence and supply.
Haines has blasted Morrison for his comments. “Mr Morrison broke an election promise to introduce an anti-corruption commission and his pathway to creating one is still as vague as it was in the last parliament.”
