Some of the most senior ministers in the Andrews government have been heavily criticised for their role in Labor's misuse of taxpayers money for election campaigning four years ago, in a report by parliament's powerful privileges committee.
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Attorney-General Martin Pakula, Energy and Environment Minister Lily D'Ambrosio, Special Minister of State Gavin Jennings, Minister for Families and Children Jenny Mikakos and Minister for Sport and Veterans John Eren all failed to properly question Labor's so-called red shirts rorting strategy, the privileges committee found.
It said their failure to seek more details about the scheme brought discredit upon the parliament.
Butthe committee reserved its heaviest criticism for former Brumby government treasurer John Lenders, who it said wilfully breached parliament's code of conduct and in so doing damaged the reputation of the Victorian parliament.
Mr Lenders was identified as the architect of the 2014 scheme – described by Victoria's Ombudsman as an artifice that crossed the line – in which about $388,000 of taxpayers' money was misused by Labor to pay casual electorate officers to campaign in marginal seats.
Victoria Police's fraud and extortion squad is conducting a criminal investigation into the scheme and earlier this month arrested numerous former junior Labor operatives in a series of early morning raids.
The privileges committee made five findings:
- that current and former Labor MPs involved in the scheme, particularly those in leadership positions, should have sought more details from Mr Lenders, from the Department of Parliamentary Services and from parliament's presiding officers, before signing timesheets for their staff;
- with the exception of Mr Lenders, MPs did not wilfully breach the code of conduct and so were not in contempt of parliament;
- that Mr Lenders acted with deliberate disregard for parliament's members' guide, acted contrary to the standard expected of an MP and adversely affected the reputation of the parliament;
- although Mr Lenders' breach was probably deliberate, there was no proof to a high civil standard that his actions were wilful, so he cannot be found in contempt of parliament, and;
- there is no evidence that MPs involved in the scheme breached parliamentary privilege, meaning their actions do not satisfy the criteria for being found in contempt of parliament.
Chairman of the committee, independent MP James Purcell, said he and his colleagues did have enough evidence to find members’ conduct amounted to contempt of parliament.
“Contempt is a high bar to jump and that was the reason we didn’t go to contempt,” Mr Purcell said on Thursday.
“We agreed that there was a lot of ‘should have known better’ but contempt is where you need evidence and you need to be totally convinced that there was wrongdoing and the committee as a whole believed there was no contempt of parliament.”
Mr Purcell said better behaviour by MPs, not more rules and regulations, was the key to higher parliamentary standards.
“It needs to be the members that ensure that they don’t do anything that would be regarded as unacceptable,” he said.
Under the scheme, electorate officers were paid to work full-time in participating MPs' offices, while also working part-time campaigning in the field.
MPs signed timesheets for their casual electorate officers, who were paid a salary out of the parliamentary budget.
It is a breach of parliament's guidelines to pay staff to do party political work out of the parliamentary budget.
Other sitting Labor MPs found by the privileges committee to have brought discredit on the parliament were lower house MPs Anthony Carbines, Marsha Thomson and upper house MPs Nazih Elasmar, Shaun Leane and Adem Somyurek.
Mr Somyurek told the privileges committee during its inquiry that he raised doubts about the scheme with Mr Lenders at the time, but eventually signed on to avoid being ostracised by his colleagues.
He also said he raised his concerns in a brief and informal conversation with Premier Daniel Andrews, who was then opposition leader, but Mr Andrews told him to take it up with Mr Lenders.
The eight-member privileges committee is comprised of eight upper-house MPs: three Labor, two Liberal, one National, one Green and one independent.
