Rockliff Must Correct the Record

On Tuesday, Premier Rockliff told the House:

“Mr Turner did not tell the adviser the intention was to distribute the words as a general message to industry.”

The Caretaker Committee has now released evidence that directly contradicts this statement. It shows that the message drafted by CorComms was sent to the Minister’s adviser with the subject line “Message to industry“.

This email confirms beyond any doubt that the Minister’s office was aware of the plan for this message to be publicly communicated. That was the sworn testimony of CorComms, and that testimony has now been supported in black and white by documentary evidence.

This is no longer one person’s word against another. On one side we have fact supported by proof. On the other we have a desperate and political attempt to cover up the truth.

The facts are these:

• The public relations person for Tasracing provided the Minister’s office with the message before it was sent out
• The PR person said in sworn testimony that this statement was provided to the Minister’s office in line with the process he always followed when issuing public communications
• The PR person said in sworn testimony that the Minister’s office were aware of the plan for public communications
• The email to the Minister’s adviser has the subject line “Message to industry” – making clear it was intended for public communication

Based on these facts, it is absolutely clear that the former Minister’s answers to Parliament and the statutory declaration she tabled and endorsed were false, and that the adviser was aware of the intention for public communication. Those statements still require correction, but they’re not the only issue. Unfortunately we also heard the Premier clumsily make the same false statement on Tuesday, saying:

“The minister’s adviser did not have the knowledge of Tasracing’s intended plan to issue public communications.”

We remind Premier Rockliff of the Greens’ question to him just yesterday, where we warned him that statements he had made on Tuesday seemed on face-value to be misleading. He scoffed at us at the time, but now it has been confirmed those statements were indeed not correct.

Now, perhaps the Premier believed these statements to be true when he made them. We certainly hope that is the case, and it appears likely given how carelessly he’s handled other matters. But regardless, both the Parliamentary Code of Conduct and Code of Conduct for Ministers say that even if a misleading statement is unintentional, the record must be corrected at the earliest opportunity.

As Michael Ferguson said yesterday:

“I have made mistakes as a minister and as a non-minister in this House and if you do it without the intent to deceive, then what you do is you correct the record and if you’re very well-mannered, you’ll also apologise for any inconvenience.”

That is exactly what Premier Rockliff needs to do today.