Federal ICAC's 'restrictive' bar for public hearings a worry as parliamentary scrutiny begins
Canberra Times, October 18 2022 - 5:30am
The federal government's proposed anti-corruption watchdog would be subject to one of the country's most restrictive public hearing tests, transparency experts warn.
It comes as a parliamentary committee begins its hearings on Tuesday into the National Anti-Corruption Commission bill with department and expert witnesses appearing across three full days until Thursday.
Transparency International Australia chief executive Clancy Moore is expected to criticise the proposed model's high bar for public hearings when he appears before the committee on Tuesday afternoon.
Under the proposed legislation, public hearings can only be held in "exceptional circumstances" and when it's in the public interest.
"The requirement that public hearings may only be held where the commissioner is satisfied that exceptional circumstances exist, is not an accurate or useful threshold for this purpose," he will say.
"It poses dangers for the effective operation of the commission - whether through tactical litigation or inaccurate political expectations or both."
According to research undertaken by the transparency body, Mr Moore said it would become the most restrictive model in the country with the exception of South Australia, which doesn't hold public hearings at all.
Since the bill's release, independents and transparency experts have argued the "exceptional circumstances" threshold is overly stringent, and likely to allow witnesses to delay proceedings by launching legal challenges.
Attorney-General Mark Dreyfus has said he is willing to listen to criticism over Labor's anti-corruption model, despite insisting it strikes the right balance between transparency and privacy.
During a press club appearance last week, he stressed the proposal was "in sharp contrast" to one put forward by the former Coalition government, which ruled out public hearings altogether.
"There will be times when the commission's investigations will be done in public, and other times investigations will benefit from being done in private," he said.
"Let me be clear: the National Anti-Corruption Commission is not a court, it is an investigative body. Its primary work is rooting out and exposing corruption.
"At the conclusion of an investigation, the commissioner will be able to publish a detailed report."
Mr Dreyfus added he doesn't believe legal challenges to the interpretation of "exceptional circumstances" would tie up the commission's investigations in court but would not explain why.
Further committee hearings scrutinising the bill will be held next week.