Labor MPs not in contempt for rorts

VICTORIAN Labor MPs were not in contempt of parliament for taking part in the party’s $388,000 rorts-for-votes scheme, a majority report by the powerful privileges committee has found.

The committee released its report yesterday into the Government’s misuse of taxpayer dollars to partially fund campaign staff at the 2014 election.

“We find that the conduct of the members in question does not constitute a contempt of parliament, even though in some cases the conduct was not up to the standard expected from members of parliament,” committee chair, independent James Purcell told State Parliament.

The inquiry came after Ombudsman Deborah Glass released her own report in March, finding Labor systematically misused parliamentary allowances to pay for campaign staff who were hired on electorate officer time sheets.

Ms Glass described the scheme as an “artifice” but also acknowledged the MPs involved did not set out to deliberately deceive.

However, the committee did find all members named in paragraphs 45 to 50 of Ms Glass’ report, especially those in leadership positions, should have got further advice from parliament about whether the scheme was within the rules.

It also found scheme architect and then leader of the opposition in the Legislative Council at the time, John Lenders, acted with deliberate disregard for the members’ guide and his actions were contrary to the standard expected of a member of parliament.

“However, the committee was not satisfied to the requisite standard that his conduct amounts to a contempt,” Mr Purcell said in a statement.

The Liberal and Nationals members of committee have done a minority report, which found “the lack of a contempt finding against members of parliament involved in the scheme does not indicate that there was no wrongdoing.”