If critics of the anti-corruption watchdog’s powers had their way, confidence in the political process would be the true victim.
For those conservative commentators who claim, following Gladys Berejiklian’s resignation, that ICAC is a bunch of zealots, a law unto themselves, I ask what is worse than ICAC? The answer is no ICAC.
No investigative body is perfect – not the police or military inquiries, not royal commissions, but that doesn’t mean we shouldn’t have them.
Yet critics of ICAC argue that ICAC operates lawlessly and it has ruined three Liberal premiers.
And the Victorian Liberal shadow attorney-general, Tim Smith, tweeted: “The wrong premier resigned today,” an assertion that Berejiklian should not have done so.
Those claiming that by exercising coercive powers ICAC operates above the law might want to refer to the enabling legislation. It was not ICAC that gave itself coercive powers but the NSW parliament.
Indeed, it was a Liberal government, led by Premier Nick Greiner, that introduced the enabling legislation into the parliament. ICAC made an adverse finding against Greiner. A looming vote of no confidence in the state parliament ruined his career. A court subsequently overturned ICAC’s finding.
According to the anti-ICAC brigade, the next premier to fall victim to ICAC was Barry O’Farrell. ICAC had the temerity to conduct an inquiry into the behaviour of Australian Water Holdings and its connection to Labor figures. It made adverse findings against three state Labor MPs.
But during the inquiry, ICAC found evidence that the chief executive of the company gifted a $3,000 bottle of wine to Premier O’Farrell that he didn’t declare.
Asked about this gift and a phone call O’Farrell made to the chief executive’s phone, tallying with evidence the chief executive had given earlier in that day that O’Farrell had called to thank him for the gift and sent a card, O’Farrell said he had no memory of it.
“If I’d received a bottle of 1959 Penfold Grange I’d have known about it”, O’Farrell told ICAC, adding he was “… certain that it was not received.”
Yet in the evening of O’Farrell’s evidence, his handwritten letter came to light, thanking the chief executive for the wine. O’Farrell resigned the next morning.
This, according to ICAC’s critics, was all ICAC’s fault.
In its final report, ICAC made no adverse findings against the chief executive or O’Farrell, having been "satisfied that there was no intention on Mr O'Farrell's part to mislead the Commission."
ICAC did not force O’Farrell to resign.
As to the third premier to fall at the hands of the allegedly lawless ICAC, on 1 October the Commission announced a further public inquiry into whether Gladys Berejiklian exercised public functions that conflicted between her public duties and her private interest arising from her personal relationship with then-MP Daryl Maguire or failed to report suspected corrupt conduct on Maguire’s part.
Oh, the temerity of this “unaccountable lynch mob.”
Glady Berejiklian and Barry O’Farrell are likeable, hard-working and dedicated servants of the public. But that doesn’t mean they are out of bounds from ICAC’s purview.
And for those who complain ICAC’s investigations take too long, here’s a thought: fund it properly.
I am not oblivious to the stress of being investigated by an anti-corruption commission.
As director-general of the Queensland environment department in the mid-1990s, I was accused of corruption in an anonymous letter to the Criminal Justice Commission provided by the National Party’s shadow environment minister, Doug Slack.
The letter claimed I intervened in an incident that occurred in a national park, including directing that no charges be laid against people who had allegedly planned to steal foxtail palm seeds.
The CJC undertook a full investigation, during which Slack and others urged it to widen its scope to include drug and gun running.
Eight months later, the CJC released its final report, which found: “All of the allegations of impropriety contained in the letter have been found to be untrue.”
This was the third referral of me to the CJC by Mr Slack, who followed up each referral by making it public. On each occasion I was exonerated. The CJC’s report on the Cape Melville incident observed: “In view of the other complaints lodged against Dr Emerson by Mr Slack and the publicity afforded them it is easy to understand Dr Emerson’s distress.
Distress, yes; easily the worst time of my professional life.
But I remain a strong supporter of what is now the Queensland Crime and Corruption Commission. And of the NSW ICAC. And of a National Anti-Corruption Commission as promised by Labor. And of a Commonwealth Integrity Commission, promised by the Morrison government almost three years ago but still not delivered.
But a commission with teeth, including a capacity to investigate the practice of ministerial offices dishing out taxpayer-funded grants to target electorates as if it were their political party’s own money.
Calls to emasculate anti-corruption commissions portray politicians as the victims. If the critics got their way, taxpayers and their confidence in the political process would be the true victims.
Craig Emerson is chair of the McKell Institute, a distinguished fellow at the ANU, director of the APEC Study Centre at RMIT and adjunct professor at Victoria University’s College of Business.