The Senate committee investigating consulting industry practices finally issued its report after delaying it on four separate occasions.
After 18 months, thousands of notice questions that required endless, productivity-sapping time to answer them all, and literally dozens of hearings that cost only God knows how much money, what were the committee’s key recommendations?
That the kangaroo court it quickly became can hold more such hearings, and that organizations that have appeared before it should promise to continue appearing every year in the future. Forced to participate in the painful and meaningless process over and over again.
You wouldn’t wish it on your worst enemy.
It is an exercise in futility, sweetening the nest of senators who are paid more to run committees like this. Is it a coincidence that there are now more than 100 parliamentary committees operating at the same time? More than ever since the Federation.
Greens senator Barbara Pocock (pictured) wants greater transparency from government consultants but is silent on the lack of transparency within her own political party.
In any case, these committees are almost always ignored by governments. They are like a play object for MPs and cross MPs, to give them something to occupy their time.
This particular Senate committee has allowed countless erroneous claims to be aired under parliamentary privilege, and rarely corrects the record when errors are made.
The Greens, of course, broke away from the majority report that both major parties signed, demanding stronger measures that they, as a party, do not abide by on their own.
Hypocrisy is the name given to Australia’s minor left-wing party, and the Greens could soon control the balance of power in both the upper and lower houses.
Greens senator and committee member Barbara Pocock, who had teamed up with Labor’s Deb O’Neill to badmouth Australian businesses during the hearings, parted ways with her Senate colleague in denouncing the committee’s recommendations.
At least Senator O’Neill finally saw the light.
But what about the Greens? If they want to demand greater transparency, why don’t they practice what they preach?
Readers may not know this, but the Greens don’t even allow public access to their party conferences like the main parties do. They keep them secret, in a closed place and away from the public eye.
Political parties are private organizations, meaning they are essentially just companies whose goal is to get their members elected to public office. However, they are not subject to privacy laws like other companies are.
They combine their operations with all kinds of taxpayer-funded assistance: staffing, electoral financing, and massive allocations of publicly funded administrative resources.
And there is a profound lack of oversight to ensure they do not misuse taxpayer-funded entitlements.
Labor senator Deb O’Neill (pictured) has parted ways with her Greens committee colleague, a sign she was leaving the former performance art behind.
However, despite all this secrecy and combining public funding with a privately run political party like the Greens, Senator Pocock is targeting consultants working for the government by using her platform to suggest all sorts of adverse developments.
The evidence supporting the accusations being made is a “take it or leave it” option. Allegations are treated as facts. Silence is the only response when the hypocrisy of the (mis)conduct committed by political parties is raised.
It is no surprise that the public has little time for those who represent us in Canberra.
The Greens recently called for an end to unpaid volunteer work, just as leader Adam Bandt was advertising volunteers to work in his office.
You couldn’t make this up if you tried.
Hypocrisy and the Greens is not a new phenomenon. After many years of protesting big money donations in politics, in 2011 the Greens secured the largest political donation from a private donor in Australian history: $1.6 million from the founder of the travel website Wotif, Graeme Wood.
Suddenly the Greens had no problem with large donations. Then frontman Bob Brown said he was “forever grateful” for it. Yet they still complain every time major party donors are revealed.
Values only matter when they are reflected in each person’s actions and when they are applied universally, not just when it is convenient to do so. Unfortunately, that’s not a creed the Greens follow.