The Malevolent Morrison Muppet Goverment

[watt price tully]

Chickens are coming home to roost.

This is another example of the corruption, nods and winks, indeed an example of the lack of due process and disrespect for decency that characterised the Liberal Morrison Government.

Basically some land owned by a company owned by Angus Taylor (how TF is he still allowed in parliament?) and his brother (they were part owners) removed native grasses illegally. They went to their mate Josh from Environment who said no worries guys; do your worst. So they did. Got found out and now the federal court has upheld an earlier decision to say re-sow what you have destroyed.

https://www.theguardian.com/science/202 ... grasslands

[David]

Interesting to see that the Labor line has switched from railing against Morrison keeping ministerial appointments from the public to Morrison not keeping enough from the public:

https://www.theguardian.com/australia-n ... ey-general

Happy to hear arguments to the contrary as to why cabinet discussions should be kept top-secret (even though cabinet leaks are, of course, far from uncommon and routinely weaponised by all parties). But for me I see little reason to not have this information out in the open, particularly in hindsight.

I understand that the primary (ostensible) concern is foreign governments catching wind of what's going on behind the scenes, but it's pretty naive to think that a country like China doesn't already know everything they need to know. And otherwise there's really no reason the Australian public shouldn't be able to see how the omelette is cooked.

[nomadjack]

That's not actually the primary reason. Historically, the main reason has been to encourage free and robust discussions around the cabinet table without ministers looking stupid and weak for changing positions as a result of debate and to protect cabinet from the public perception of division and disunity. I've been a supporter of the concept generally, but am increasingly coming around to the idea that transparency in decision-making is more important. The problem is that if you make the discussions open, the meansingful conversations will simply shift to another forum.

[David]

^ That's a good point. And probably, one suspects, already happening to a large degree (through private communication methods like WhatsApp).

[stui magpie]

Cabinet documents usually kept secret for 10 years would be made public within 30 days under sweeping transparency reforms sought by some minor parties that hope to dominate the upper house after this month’s state election.

https://www.theage.com.au/politics/vict ... 5bumk.html

Apparently it's all the go at the moment, interstate and overseas.

Theoretically a good move but as Nomad said it will likely just result in avoiding documenting the real decision making conversations.

[David]

[eddiesmith]

Cabinet documents usually kept secret for 10 years would be made public within 30 days under sweeping transparency reforms sought by some minor parties that hope to dominate the upper house after this month’s state election.

https://www.theage.com.au/politics/vict ... 5bumk.html

Apparently it's all the go at the moment, interstate and overseas.

Theoretically a good move but as Nomad said it will likely just result in avoiding documenting the real decision making conversations.

Which already occurs in Victoria with all the documentation relating to important decisions going 'missing' before the sham HQ inquiry.

[Pies4shaw]

What constitutional issues?

The Governer general approved it and has said "nothing to see here"

All of the commentary says it would have been fine, but he should have told people.

I haven't seen a single piece pointing out a constitutional issue, just a breach of custom and practice.

If you believe there is a constitutional issue, please explain.

Time for you to read Stephen's advice, I think. It's not too bad - but then, he did learn from the best. Because he had it in his 1992 Con & Admin lecture notes, he didn't need to read about the question on Nick's before he advised that

To the extent that the public and the parliament are not informed of appointments that have been made under s 64 of the constitution, the principles of responsible government are fundamentally undermined.

From the moment of his appointment he was both legally and politically responsible for the administration of that department, and yet he could not be held accountable for the way that he performed (or did not perform) that role.

Thus, Stephen concluded that the appointments were:

inconsistent with the conventions and practices that form an essential part of the system of responsible government.

Only someone who had failed "Introduction to Public Law" - or, perhaps, never studied it - would fail to grasp the basic concept that a breach of constitutional convention just is a constitutional issue.

Of course, the gist of Stephen's advice can be reduced to one sentence for the peanut gallery - and, indeed it was:

It's assuming responsibility as Minister without telling anyone that's the problem.

Virgina has handed down her report: https://www.theguardian.com/australia-n ... port-finds

It will suffice to observe that she got this more or less right.

Here's the bit that matters, taken from her executive summary:

19. Given that the Parliament was not informed of any of the appointments, it was unable to hold Mr Morrison to account in his capacity as minister administering any of these five departments. As the Solicitor-General concluded, the principles of responsible government were “fundamentally undermined” because Mr Morrison was not “responsible” to the Parliament, and through the Parliament to the electors, for the departments he was appointed to administer.

20. Finally, the lack of disclosure of the appointments to the public was apt to undermine public confidence in government. Once the appointments became known, the secrecy with which they had been surrounded was corrosive of trust in government.

https://www.ministriesinquiry.gov.au/pu ... rt-inquiry

[Pies4shaw]

https://www.abc.net.au/news/2022-11-26/ ... /101698708

The report shreds any last remnants of credibility the former prime minister might have in regards to his disdain for proper process and in the way he treated his colleagues and the public.

Justice Bell doesn't call the prime minister a liar, but dances splendidly through a range of creative terminology which doubts the reliability of what he said, in writing, through his lawyers, in response to her questions about the circumstances of him appointing himself to no less than six of 14 government departments (not including the one he considered adding to the collection, but subsequently did not act upon).

It further documents what can only appear to be an exceptionally sneaky way of going about running a government.

[watt price tully]

https://www.theage.com.au/politics/fede ... 5c269.html

Scotty the Malevolent Mendacious religious nutter is about to be censured in Parliament after the findings of a former high court judge: not the alleged sexual predator Dyson Haydon. What a disgraceful pm he was not just to his own colleagues but to the rest of Australia. The decent Archer of Tasmania is going to cross the floor. So should the rest of her party.

[Pies4shaw]

https://www.abc.net.au/news/2022-12-01/ ... /101719936

Nine newspapers have reported that consulting firm Synergy360, whose shareholders are close friends of Mr Robert, claimed in leaked emails that the then-NDIS minister had allegedly met with them several times over a multimillion-dollar Centrelink contract, which was ultimately won by a client of the firm.

The files detail how Synergy360 consultant and Mr Robert's close friend David Milo allegedly provided repeated access to Mr Robert for one of the company's clients, Infosys, which Mr Robert announced in 2019 had won a multimillion-dollar open tender to deliver welfare calculation technology to Centrelink.

[watt price tully]

^ He’s such a scumbag Stuart Robert. How he and Angus Taylor are still in parliament let alone Fletcher is mystifying. Stuart Robert enriches his mates (allegedly) due to his power of being a backbencher and having been a minister.
Firstly accepting the Rolex and not declaring it from the Chinese;
Secondly calming over a $100,000 on his internet usage;
Thirdly the responsible minister for the implementation of Robodebt; and,
Fourthly, not being responsible with information to the private gain of mates and interests.

Tar and feathering is in order. Scumbag.

[David]

First, second and fourth of those are all standard political corruption, but the third is in a different league entirely. Generally speaking, if the thing you personally implemented is the subject of a royal commission, it's probably a good time to start asking yourself whether you're better suited to a different career.

[watt price tully]

First, second and fourth of those are all standard political corruption, but the third is in a different league entirely. Generally speaking, if the thing you personally implemented is the subject of a royal commission, it's probably a good time to start asking yourself whether you're better suited to a different career.

Disagree. Even though I think Howard was one of the worst PM’s Australia has had due to his policies and implementation he would never have accepted the hubris and lack of ministerial accountability that was a hallmark under Scotty from Marketing exemplified through the above, Taylor’s deliberate lying about the Mayor of Sidanee and the sale of the land for 3 million $ rather than $30 million to Liberal supporters. State level different story.

[watt price tully]

Scott Morrison is named Time magazine people of the year”

https://www.theshovel.com.au/2022/12/08 ... -the-year/