MEMBER for Mildura Jade Benham is serving on a major parliamentary committee that this week began an inquiry into the performance of Victoria’s integrity agencies during 2021/22.
She is one of seven MPs on the Victorian Parliament’s Integrity and Oversight Committee, which held two hearings on Monday.
The committee had “a very important role in reviewing and monitoring the performance of these agencies,” Ms Benham told Sunraysia Daily.
“These public hearings are a really good opportunity to question the people involved in integrity agencies from the committee and doing it in a really public and transparent way.”
They spoke to members of the Office of the Victorian Information Commissioner (OVIC) and former Independent Broad-based Anti-Corruption (IBAC) Commissioner Robert Redlich.
Four OVIC members were present at the hearing, and revealed that Victoria receives more Freedom of Information requests than any other jurisdiction in Australia.
Mr Redlich spoke to the IBAC 2021/22 report and his role as the Commissioner at the time.
Ms Benham asked how he had successfully sought a 30 per cent increase in IBAC funding during the 2021/22 year, and also questioned whether he believed the government or its agencies were working to undermine the work of IBAC.
“I was actually surprised that I could get that question out, I thought there would be a little bit of pushback from the government members of the committee,” Ms Benham said of the second question.
Mr Redlich’s response to the funding increase query was that it was in part reliant on the government policy of the day.
“If we are looking at the question whether all serious public sector misconduct should be investigated by the Commissioner, then the commission’s budget is wholly inadequate,” Mr Redlich said.
“It starts and ends with a policy decision by the government in how much they want to fund the commission for.”
In response to the question about being potentially undermined, he replied “only via the conduct of this committee in the last year of its operation”.
In 2022, former committee chair Harriet Shing requested the live feed of a hearing be cut, when Mr Redlich was asked about why the premier was interviewed twice in private IBAC hearings.
Ms Benham said she felt Mr Redlich may have been “a little bit guarded” in some of his answers during Monday’s hearing, and noted that he wanted to share five legislation recommendations to give IBAC more teeth, but was able to raise one during the allotted time.
Several government members of the committee fired questions at Mr Redlich about bullying allegations, staff survey results and termination payments.
Ms Benham described the line and tone of their questioning during the hearing as “highly disrespectful”.
“Some of the questions weren’t even relevant to the role of IBAC Commissioner, they were much more relevant to their CEO… we will hear from them in the coming weeks in our next public hearing,” she said.
Ms Benham said she hopes to clarify recommended legislative changes in the upcoming hearings.
“Obviously integrity is absolutely paramount to the operation of Victorian parliament and we see words such as grey corruption and being undermined by government and government agencies, we really need to get to the bottom of it and ask the questions that really need to be asked for transparency for Victorian people,” she said.
