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Bill Shorten says he does not have the power to unseal a restricted section of the robodebt royal commission report but vowed to continue to use his “powers of persuasion”, more than a year after the damning document was released.
At the Press Club on Tuesday, Shorten was asked whether he still believed the sealed section should remain confidential.
In July 2023, the commissioner, Catherine Holmes, wrote a cover letter for the report that was addressed to the governor general. It explained that the sealed chapter “recommends the referral of individuals for civil action or criminal prosecution”.
Holmes wrote that the chapter should “remain sealed and not be tabled with the rest of the report so as not to prejudice the conduct of any future civil action or criminal prosecution”.
It meant while criticisms of Coalition ministers and bureaucrats were public, any legal consequences were unclear.
Shorten has said keeping the chapter secret was not a “sustainable position” and that the letter did not suggest it stay secret “for ever”.
“[Australians] want not just an explanation of how it can happen, which we’ve now got, but they want to know that the people who made these callous, unlawful decisions face consequences,” Shorten told ABC radio at the time.
Anthony Albanese agreed, saying shortly after it was “pretty clear” from the letter “it’s not about … the sealed section remaining sealed for ever”.
But more than 13 months after the report was handed down, Shorten said he had been unsuccessful in making the case.
“I haven’t won that argument yet,” he said, before adding he did not “have the power” but would try to use his “powers of persuasion”.
Shorten referred to new laws introduced this week to ensure former public service agency heads can be investigated for code of conduct breaches relating to their actions during the creation and implementation of the illegal scheme in the same manner as bureaucrats.
It comes as the finance minister, Katy Gallagher, revealed on Tuesday morning the Australian Public Service Commission’s (APSC) investigations into public servants referred by the royal commission had yet to conclude after some former heads argued they could not be investigated under the existing laws.
The APSC is due to reveal the outcomes of its year-long investigation into 15 former and current public servants accused of breaching the code of conduct during the robodebt scheme.
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“This legislation will ensure that senior public servants are clearly accountable for their actions as public service leaders, even after leaving their roles,” Gallagher said.
“The robodebt scheme was a shameful chapter of public administration. It pursued debt recovery against Australians who in many cases had no debt to pay. Where appropriate, those involved from the public service must be held to account. We want to make sure a scheme like this can never happen again.”
The Anti-Corruption Commission (Nacc) announced in June it would not pursue an investigation into six people referred by the robodebt royal commission, due to separate public service investigations being carried out against five of them.
The Nacc said it was “unlikely it would obtain significant new evidence” and had concluded it was “undesirable for a number of reasons to conduct multiple investigations into the same matter”.
That decision was under review after the Nacc’s oversight body, the independent Nacc inspector, said it had received about 900 complaints.
A separate investigation by the Australian federal police into allegations a witness provided misleading evidence at the royal commission hearings was also finalised in July. The AFP said it did not “identify sufficient admissible evidence” that the alleged offender had intended to mislead.
The attorney general’s office has been contacted for a response.
