Page 557 - Week 03 - Tuesday, 12 April 1994
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I think, Madam Speaker, that had Mr Berry made certain statements some weeks ago in this place correcting earlier statements about, for example, the directorship of VITAB, or the potential offering of inducements by VITAB, or even the expulsion of ACTTAB from the VicTAB superpool, this motion that Mrs Carnell has put before us today would have been somewhat less capable and less likely to succeed. But the fact is that the many opportunities which Mr Berry has had to correct inadvertent misleading of this place have passed. The opportunities he had before him have been lost. In fact, it is clear from Mr Berry's statements on radio this morning that Mr Berry regrets not one jot of what he has done and does not retract one word of what he has said in this place or outside it. Mr Deputy Speaker, in the face of clear evidence that what he has said is untrue, and repeated opportunities for him to acknowledge that what he has said is untrue, he should take the consequence, accept this motion and, I would submit, resign as a Minister.
I want to touch on one of only a very few examples that we have been able to find of this principle of ministerial responsibility being sheeted home when Ministers mislead parliament. That was in 1984 in the Senate where a motion of censure was moved against the then Minister for Resources and Energy, Senator Peter Walsh. A successful censure motion still is a fairly rare occurrence in the Australian Parliament. In fact, it has not occurred in the lower house, I think, with one exception, for at least half a century, and in the upper house it is still a quite rare occasion. On this occasion, in 1984, it was alleged that Senator Walsh had tabled three cheque butts and the reverse of two of those cheque butts. It was alleged that his failure to table the reverse of the third cheque butt, which it was alleged had information highly pertinent to certain activities of another senator in that place, was a selective tabling of that information designed to mislead the Senate. Obviously, the Government opposed that motion, but the Senate supported it.
I want to quote from Senator Don Chipp on that occasion. He was the leader of the Australian Democrats at that time. He supported the motion and he said:
I think three or four times this morning Senator Walsh was asked directly by members of the Opposition: "Did you have that third stub and on the back of the third stub was there a reference as was alleged?". Three or four times he refused to answer that question. During his speech he did not even refer to it. I thought it quite extraordinary that a Minister who was defending himself against a charge did not even refer to the charge. So one comes to the inescapable conclusion that information as alleged by the Age was in fact there and was deliberately withheld by Senator Walsh. That, to me, is nothing short of deliberately misleading the Senate. It is for that reason that the Democrats and I reluctantly ... will support the motion moved by Senator Chaney.
I will read the motion that was initially moved by Senator Chaney. It was:
That the Senate censures the Minister for Resources and Energy (Senator Walsh) for his deliberate misleading of the Senate by selective tabling of documents and his refusal to explain his actions despite repeated questioning of the Senate.
Senator Walsh would not answer questions.
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