Page 2637 - Week 08 - Tuesday, 23 June 2009
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for any political advertising, as per the caretaker conventions … It is the department’s view that we would have not given permission, because we would believe it is a potential conflict of interest …
I think Ms Davy acted honourably. She was not aware—because this had happened before her time; certainly before her time as acting chief executive—that permission actually had been granted, and she came back and corrected the record, to her credit, after the lunch break. But once again, it is a very important statement of principle from a senior public servant that it would not have been appropriate because it was a potential conflict of interest. So we have the minister for education saying it would have been improper for him to use his office. We have the Acting Chief Executive of the Department of Education and Training saying it would have been a potential conflict of interest. But we then saw that the education department actually did approve it.
It is worth noting that the education department’s approval was at the request of the minister for education’s chief of staff. The minister for education’s chief of staff made the request. So it would have been improper for him to get on the phone but it was okay, obviously, for the chief of staff to do so. I suppose that is one step removed from what Ms Gallagher did, and I suppose that is where Mr Barr is trying to distinguish between his behaviour and the behaviour of the health minister on this matter. At least the education department put something in writing. We do have a record, and some limiting in that letter, of the use of the school site for ALP advertising. Nonetheless, we again saw a politicisation.
In fact, with respect to the first time that we were alerted to this, we asked a question on notice well before estimates and the answer we got from the education minister was actually a non-answer; it was an avoiding answer. It left it in doubt, and we can see why. We then got a misleading answer and then we finally got to the truth. So we saw an attempt by the minister to not be full and frank, but at the same time to have a real dig at the health minister regarding her use of government resources and her politicisation of the public service.
It is pretty damning when you have not just a minister saying it would have been improper, even though his chief of staff did it, but also you have the acting chief executive, to her credit, saying they would not have given permission because “we would believe it is a potential conflict of interest”. It is an important statement of principle. It is a principle that I think the health minister should take note of. It is a principle that I think the education minister should take note of.
Indeed, we saw, in a slightly different way, the executive politicising our police force. I think this is particularly concerning. The ALP, in announcing the extension of hours for the Gungahlin police station, essentially put the Chief Police Officer in a very difficult position. They arranged it as an ALP event, as an election event. They invited along all the ALP candidates, they had the photo op with the ALP candidates, the police car, the chief of police and the minister.
This is no reflection on Mr Phelan because he made it clear in the hearings that he actually did not know. He did not know that his minister was going to politicise this
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