Royal Commission Into New South Wales Police Service

About this Item
Speakers - Hatton Mr John; Fahey Mr John; Carr Mr Bob; Griffiths The Hon Terence
Business - Suspension of Orders, Consideration of Urgent Motion

ROYAL COMMISSION INTO NEW SOUTH WALES POLICE SERVICE

Suspension of Standing and Sessional Orders

Motion by Mr Hatton agreed to:

That certain standing and sessional orders be suspended to allow consideration forthwith with precedence of all other business of the following motion:

(1) That this House calls upon the Premier, in consultation with the Leader of the Opposition, to establish a Royal Commission, staffed by personnel other than serving or former New South Wales Police, to inquire into the operations of the Police Service, with particular reference to -

(a) Entrenched corruption within the New South Wales Police Service.

(b) The activities of the Professional Responsibility and Internal Affairs Branches of the Police Service in dealing with any problems of corruption and internal investigations generally.

(d) The impartiality of the Service and other agencies in investigating and pursuing prosecutions including, but not limited to, paedophile activity.

(e) The failure of the internal informers policy.

(f) Any other matter appertaining to the aforesaid matters concerning possible criminal activity, neglect or violation of duty, the inquiry into which the Royal Commission shall deem to be in the public interest.

(2) That if such Royal Commission is not appointed by 20 July 1994, the House shall meet for the despatch of business on Tuesday, 26 July 1994 at 2.15 p.m.

With the following time limits applying to the debate:

Other speakers 20 minutes

Mover in reply 20 minutes

Consideration of Urgent Motion

Mr HATTON (South Coast) [3.38]: I move:

(a) Entrenched corruption within the New South Wales Police Service.

(b) The activities of the Professional Responsibility and Internal Affairs Branches of the Police Service in dealing with any problems of corruption and internal investigations generally.

(d) The impartiality of the Service and other agencies in investigating and pursuing prosecutions including, but not limited to, paedophile activity.

(e) The failure of the internal informers policy.

(2) That if such Royal Commission is not appointed by 20 July 1994, the House shall meet for the despatch of business on Tuesday, 26 July 1994 at 2.15 p.m.

This motion strikes an important blow for the vast majority of honest police in the New South Wales Police Service - for those too intimidated to speak out or forced to turn a blind eye. It especially gives hope and speaks out for those with courage who have spoken out, who have been ostracised, who have been vilified, who have been set up, who have been threatened, sometimes assaulted and, in two cases, shot at - of course, I refer to Drury and Katsoulas. Corruption is entrenched in senior levels of the New South Wales Police Service. Internal affairs is corrupt. Senior police officers in New South Wales close ranks to prevent exposure of corrupt activities. Those not part of this culture are spectators too afraid to do anything about the corruption or are whistleblowers who are immediately isolated, vilified and have their career paths curtailed.

The Independent Commission Against Corruption has been ineffectual and the Ombudsman's office is frustrated. The situation is extremely serious. We are faced with a completely ineffectual Minister and the failure of the ICAC and the New South Wales Crime Commission to effectively tackle entrenched corruption within the service. The Minister and Commissioner Lauer have failed to support and safeguard those in the service who are honest and
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brave enough to fight corruption. A royal commission with wide terms of reference could investigate and expose corruption inside the New South Wales Police Service, investigate links between some police officers - I stress some police - particularly at senior levels, criminals, and disgraced and other retired police in a network which allows organised crime to flourish.

Many people on both sides of Parliament were shocked when a bipartisan parliamentary committee unanimously found that Commissioner Lauer had threatened his then Minister, the Hon. E. P. Pickering. I apologise for the words in advance, but the committee accepted that the commissioner had used words to the effect, "If you put shit on me, I'll put shit on you". The committee found that this was a grave threat to the Minister. In my dissenting statement I stressed that this was sinister. One recognised the awesome power of the New South Wales Police Service behind Commissioner Lauer.

I have a signed statement from a former police officer - whose character I personally vouch for - that in the early 1970s, while a member of the CIB observation squad, he was requested to carry out a surveillance operation on the Hon. Frank Walker, who I believe was Attorney General at that time. This occurred on a weekday at noon. This officer is prepared to give evidence to a royal commission, if it were established, that he was given information "that the target was Frank Walker". The statement continues:

On two separate occasions I was requested to conduct surveillance operations on politicians.

It continues:

The first occasion occurred while I was a member of the CIB Observation Squad in the late 70's.

I do not recall who requested the operation but I do recall that the target was Frank Walker. I was given information that he was scheduled to have a clandestine meeting with a person at Butler's Restaurant, Victoria Street, Potts Point. I was requested to go and photograph that meeting and identify the other person with whom he met.

I do not recall who my partner was at the time but I do recall another police officer being with me when we went to the vicinity of the restaurant and took up position to take photographs and observe people entering and leaving the premises. This occurred on a weekday at about noon.

I do not recall who arrived first but I recall Frank Walker meeting with a female person and sitting on the terrace with her.

I became suspicious about the motivation behind the request for the surveillance as no other person joined Mr Walker and the female.

I subsequently returned to the office and reported that I had been unable to identify the second party and I had not been able to obtain photographs as I formed the opinion that this meeting was personal and that there was nothing suspicious or sinister occurring.

The second occasion I was requested to perform surveillance on politicians was during my term as commander of the surveillance unit at IPSU, in late '86 or early '87. The request was made by Assistant Commissioner Eric Strong who was at that time Commander of Internal Security.

Assistant Commissioner Strong called me to his office and told me that he had information of a very sensitive nature and asked me if I would be prepared to conduct surveillance on politicians. I said that I was prepared to do surveillance on any person where there was a need to do so. He then went on to tell me that this surveillance was of such sensitivity that we would not be able to make written record in our duty books or by way official logs as if we were exposed there would be major problems.

I became suspicious of the motivation and questioned who the targets were to be. He told me that Commissioner John Avery had reliable information that the two prominent MPs were "bag men" for the Labor Party. They wanted surveillance to confirm the information.

I told Strong that I was prepared to do the surveillance under those conditions on the proviso that any information gathered which implicated the politicians in illegal activity would be proceeded with and not to be used to compile dossiers or held as "intelligence".

Strong indicated that this would be done and he would get back to me with details. The meeting then terminated and I was never again contacted in relation to the conversation we had had.

I was forcibly transferred from IPSU shortly thereafter.

I interpret that quite clearly as an effort of the Police Service to surveil politicians to try to get something on them for the purposes of using it for intelligence and not for the purpose of law enforcement. The other people with whom I discussed this at the time were my wife and another police officer, whom I can name if required and who, I believe, would remember my discussions. This is chilling evidence that senior police in New South Wales are indeed prepared to put members of Parliament under surveillance for what appears to be no purpose other than to collect intelligence. That the police force is out of control is beyond question when one considers that a police Minister must resign for misleading the House and the police commissioner is appointed for a five-year term when it is found that he is presiding over a department suffering gross inefficiency and mismanagement.

Minister Griffiths could not have known, in my view, what I have just revealed to the House. But he did know that his immediate predecessor had been threatened by Commissioner Lauer and that 400 items disappeared off the police commissioner's own computer. I stress that these are items of significant importance to involve or warrant notification of the commissioner. They are documents of the highest importance and of the highest level. These documents simply disappeared - there is no hard copy and no computer disk back-up in existence. This Minister was forewarned and forearmed by the unanimous findings of a bipartisan committee which revealed that when it suited police, senior superintendents, assistant commissioners, and even the commissioner himself lie under oath, and that hundreds of items and files could be made to disappear.

I believe that a royal commission, and in fact this Parliament today, must ensure that files in internal affairs, the fraud squad, gaming and drug squads and in other areas touched upon in this speech are made secure. Temby found in the Milloo inquiry
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that records in large numbers disappeared or were sloppily kept. This has been the experience of the Ombudsman. This Minister knew that his predecessor, Ted Pickering, had been threatened by Commissioner Lauer, yet this Minister recommended Lauer for a five-year term as commissioner. This Minister knew that the police had made hundreds of items disappear and failed to trace witnesses when faced with a parliamentary inquiry. The Minister knew that Commissioner Lauer and senior police had lied to a parliamentary committee. The Minister knew that the Milloo inquiry had revealed gross inefficiency, loss of records and gross maladministration. All of these were exposed earlier by the parliamentary committee.

As this speech will reveal in graphic detail, there has never been a police Minister in a better position, armed as he is with the detailed findings of a parliamentary committee and the Milloo report. But, more than this, the Minister had been thoroughly briefed by his predecessor the Hon. E. P. Pickering on operations to do with entrenched corruption within the service. He knew that these operations had been severely compromised, I believe, possibly by Mr Lauer, as head of internal affairs before he became commissioner. This Minister was given the files by Mr Pickering - a once only opportunity to do something dramatic, to set up an in-depth inquiry, to at least establish independent lines of communication, to use the knowledge given. This Minister had been given an insight into the force which has taken me, Ted Pickering, Gary Sturgess and others over a decade to acquire.

Information has been given to confidential sessions of the parliamentary committee. This information should have been a red alert, but in the briefing given to the Minister by Ted Pickering - and if he had accessed the reports - he would have then uncovered the bombshell. If he has assessed those reports, why is he saying there is no entrenched corruption in the New South Wales Police Service? If he has not, why not? Incredible as it seems, this Minister handed it all over to Commissioner Lauer saying that he wanted to make a new start, and saying he wanted to leave it in the hands of the commissioner. He then incredibly hands over all of the files, paperwork and records obtained from Mr Pickering to the police commissioner and retires to his soundproof room. This information should have alarmed him, for it was about entrenched corruption within the force, as I shall reveal. That is something which the Minister has denied repeatedly in this House.

This is some of what Ted Pickering told the parliamentary committee of inquiry about Operation Asset on three separate occasions, "It was just blown straight out of the water almost overnight and the whole thing was a joke". This was an operation which had its genesis in surveillance, in intelligence, on up to 50 police officers with questionable associations, in some cases with criminals, information that was compiled by New South Wales police and the Australian Bureau of Criminal Intelligence. A second quote from Mr Pickering, "Their operation was compromised from the word go. It was unbelievably compromised. It was so bad that we just closed it up". Another quote from Mr Pickering, "It was at that time I realised New South Wales police could not be employed to investigate serious organised crime activities within the ranks of the Police Service". He is also on record on another occasion as saying that you cannot trust police officers within the Drug Enforcement Agency to inform on other police officers in the Drug Enforcement Agency.

Let us think about that in terms of whether we need a royal commission and why we need investigators who have no connections with the New South Wales police, remembering that the briefing given to Minister Griffiths by Ted Pickering contained evidence additional to that before the parliamentary committee. I will return to the findings of the parliamentary committee and put the findings of that committee into context with the work of the ICAC and other events. One section of evidence given to the committee, and most of it in confidential session, referred to Operation Asset. I now turn to this session and verify from an independent source a chilling situation. I have two signed statements from an ex-police officer involved in intelligence gathering. I have had the details checked by a second officer. I stress that Minister Griffiths either knows about this operation in depth or simply did not bother to follow up the red alert that he was given in evidence by his predecessor to the parliamentary committee. It involves a number of operations which were in part the subject of the "7.30 Report" this week. It is the story of operations Casper, Buckshot, Seeker and Asset. It is a story of intelligence on links between up to 50 serving and former New South Wales police in matters to do with illegal gambling, gaming machines, drugs, murder, prostitution, money laundering and fixing of cases. How bad can it get?

Operation Casper started initially in January 1987 and ended on 11 January 1989. It was overlapped with Casper 2, which in turn ended on 18 May 1989. New South Wales internal police security unit and Australian Bureau of Criminal Intelligence documents show that Casper 1 was initially directed at a former disgraced police officer, Keith John Kelly, directly linked to 16 then police officers and 15 former New South Wales police officers and with indirect links to eight former police officers with links to senior police exposed in the Fitzgerald inquiry, including one assistant commissioner. The Australian Bureau of Criminal Intelligence, which I shall refer to as ABCI, is a national intelligence gathering network on organised crime. The Casper operations were handed over to a joint task force involving the New South Wales and Federal police. These were made up of Mick Howe, Paul Wright, Margaret Wade - who was an analyst - and Bob Clarke. This joint task force was short lived; the operation was taken over by the New South Wales Crime Commission. The operation was renamed Asset.

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Operation Casper and Casper 2 were those of the New South Wales police. Evidence that Casper operations were leaking is in a statement given to me and recorded elsewhere. The belief is that the only police outside the operation proper who could have known these details was then Chief Superintendent Norman Maroney, then commander of the State investigative group which oversaw the unit conducting the operation. He is now Assistant Commissioner Maroney. I will be referring to some other officers named in the statement in other context, especially those still serving or who have retired. The statements I detail about concerns about leaks and their source were voiced to then Detective Superintendent Merv Schoeffel and Detective Superintendent Alan West of the offices of the internal police security unit at Regent Street, Ultimo and on another occasion to Commissioner John Avery; Assistant Commissioner Tony Lauer, Chief Superintendent Col Cole were present at a briefing at New South Wales Police Headquarters. I am told that this leak was not further investigated in spite of the obvious breach of the integrity of the operation and the serious nature of the allegation against the very senior officers of the New South Wales force.

I understand the nature of this allegation was never provided to the New South Wales Ombudsman as required by law under the Police Regulation (Allegations of Misconduct) Act. We should not be surprised at that when we see the track record of Cole in the matter of not informing about the drug-related circumstances surrounding the stabbing and then shooting of a police officer at Frenchs Forest police station in recent times - matters that should have been drawn to the attention of the parliamentary committee and were not. There is reference in statements to circumstantial evidence which points to Maroney as the leak. Project Buckshot was a highly sensitive intelligence probe into the importation and distribution of heroin in Australia, with the involvement of organised crime figures and the links between those figures and other criminals engaged in motor vehicle theft, gaming, prostitution, money laundering, and violent crime, including murder. Project Buckshot was also concerned with an inquiry into direct involvement of members and former members of the New South Wales police in these activities.

We must remember that in a 6 June letter - what became the famous 6 June letter - the former Minister for police, the honourable Ted Pickering made statements in no uncertain terms about police involvement in drugs, car stealing and other crime. Buckshot embraced re-examination of a number of law enforcement operations from different jurisdictions, along with proactive gathering of current intelligence by ABC officers. Included amongst the operations were Operation Stinger, Northern Territory police; Operation Flintstone, New South Wales police; Operation Hobby Horse, New South Wales Crime Commission; Operation Triangle, Queensland police; and Operation Chaff, New South Wales and Australian Federal Police. When you have access to that sort of intelligence across the States of Australia and you cannot trust the officers concerned or if you can trust the officers concerned but there are senior police who compromise those operations - shrink them to the extent of being meaningless and close them up - it is time that we had a royal commission. The following persons were amongst those members and former members who came under adverse notice as part of Operation Buckshot: Keith John Kelly, former detective sergeant; Brendan John Whelan, about whom I will have a lot to say later.

Mr Whelan: No relation.

Mr HATTON: No relation. He, frighteningly enough, was the chief investigator to the Woodward Royal Commission after the death of Donald Mackay and his job was to assist the Royal Commissioner with investigations into the mafia in the Riverina area. Others included John Openshaw, former detective sergeant; Nelson Rowatt Chad, former detective inspector; Bill McDonnell, former detective inspector; Kenneth Selwyn, former detective senior sergeant; Baden Brown, former detective sergeant; John James, former superintendent; Colin John Perrin, former deputy commissioner; Tracey Perrin, believed to be a current serving senior constable; John William Duff, former detective sergeant; Roger Caleb Rogerson, former detective sergeant; Norman Maroney, current serving assistant commissioner; Russell Cook, current serving assistant commissioner; Glen Johns, then serving, now former senior constable; Reginald Mahoney, believed to be a current serving superintendent; Daryl Wilson, believed to be a current serving chief inspector; Trevor Gore, believed to be a current serving inspector; William Hooke, former senior constable; Wilfred "Billy" Tunstall, then serving, now former senior sergeant; Tony Murphy, former Queensland police assistant commissioner; Alan Smith, then serving, now former sergeant; John Haeta, former New South Wales detective sergeant and former Northern Territory police detective.

Honourable members who know anything about corruption in the New South Wales Police Service will recognise the names of those who have since been charged, some convicted, some discharged from the service, and those who left the service under suspicious circumstances or whilst under investigation. All information concerning suspicious circumstances surrounding these officers was conveyed to the New South Wales police commissioner on more than one occasion. Project Buckshot examined the activities of and the links between a significant number of well and lesser known criminals and persons of criminal repute in New South Wales and elsewhere, one of which was Abe Gilbert Saffron and another Bruce Hardin. People who have been in this Parliament for a long time will remember Bruce Hardin, as will former Attorney General John Dowd, because he received a crime intelligence unit report on the antecedents of George Freeman, which was leaked by Tony Lauer when he was in the crime intelligence unit and tabled in part in this Parliament.

Whilst Project Buckshot was originally a wholly Australian Bureau of Criminal Intelligence conducted probe, regular briefings were given to Police Commissioner John Avery; the then Assistant
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Commissioner, Professional Responsibility, Tony Lauer; and Chief Superintendent Cole. ABCI officers, whom I could name, briefed senior New South Wales police on more than one occasion on operations that had been conducted by elements of that unit under the specific direction of Chief Superintendent Cole, who was then Staff Officer to police commissioner John Avery. I understand that the ABCI in Canberra has much of this information on file. Arrangements were made in 1990 for ABCI officers to attend Commissioner Avery's office. Present were Commissioner Avery, Assistant Commissioner Lauer, Chief Superintendent Cole, ABCI officers, Australian Federal police and Northern Territory and New South Wales police. An analysis and overview were given, with recommendations.

A special unit of four officers was set up under Operation Seca. In early 1991 New South Wales police Minister Pickering was briefed over a period of days with others, including Barry Thorley, who was then a member of the board of the State Crime Commission and later to become chairman of the Police Board. The House should remember that former Judge Thorley, as chairman of that board, was also in a position to vet officers who were given promotion. Operation Seca came to an end and was taken over by the New South Wales Crime Commission, led by Detective Inspector Schuberg. Schuberg, I believe, later worked for the Independent Commission Against Corruption. This operation was then to be called Operation Asset. The Hon. Ted Pickering had every faith in Schuberg, who later worked for the ICAC. Schuberg and Lauer had, as arranged by Sturgess, briefed Pickering when Pickering was in Opposition. Even then Lauer was the politician. Minister Pickering's faith in Schuberg may well have been misplaced: his faith in Lauer certainly was.

Pickering as Minister briefed the press in closed session. Members of the press will remember this - it was dramatic. Minister Pickering was seeking their co-operation. He had every faith in this high level operation that was going to expose a network of corrupt police in New South Wales. As part of Operation Asset, Diane Elphinstone and Mr Lionel Radom, civilian analysts attached to the commission, were provided to access all the holdings from Project Buckshot and briefed thoroughly by Detective Sergeant Smith. After Schuberg, Elphinstone and Radom had gained access to ABCI holdings, the relationship between the ABCI and the New South Wales Crime Commission cooled, I am reliably informed. The ABCI felt that it was being obstructed from free access to current information. Surveillance operations on what were large and corrupt networks of police were scaled down. The heady days when the press were called together and given secret briefings came to nought.

Pickering was duped and misled. Operation Asset was white-anted by senior New South Wales police. It was progressively narrowed to become a skeleton of its former self. Operation Asset was structured from the outset to establish one issue only: the existence of links between Keith John Charles Kelly and narcotics trafficking. This was to the almost exclusion of other persons - and the House should remember that the corruption was widespread and that there were a number of tainted New South Wales police officers. I believe the number of officers was so great that this operation simply had to be curtailed. The enormity of the curtailment and the final closure of Operation Asset can be seen when, for the sake of brevity, I refer to some of the information shared between the law enforcement agencies.

ABCI officers prepared a report into a series of allegations against Wilfred "Bill" Tunstall, then a serving senior sergeant attached to Parramatta police station. These allegations, received from a number of sources, alleged involvement by Tunstall and other police officers in a number of suspicious deaths, including the murder of a prostitute at Strathfield in the early 1980s and the apparent suicide, but alleged murder, in 1990 of Noel Patrick Hogan, a former police officer turned private investigator. We are not talking about remote periods of time, we are not talking about history; we are talking about the graduation of officers into the senior ranks of the New South Wales Police Service. We are talking about what they know, what they did not tell the parliamentary committee, what they did tell their Minister and the way in which they duped Minister Pickering. I do not say that Tunstall is one of the officers who graduated, however.

The allegations further claim involvement by Tunstall, Roger Rogerson and John Haeta in the supply of heroin to prostitutes and that those men had been actively involved in facilitating the importation of heroin through Darwin and its distribution throughout Australia. Additional allegation surrounded Tunstall's involvement in the disappearance of a used car salesman-cum-heroin dealer named Harvey Francois Jones. These allegations included that Jones was lured into a meeting with Rogerson and John Openshaw - two notorious names now - in order to pay a bribe to have a firearms offence dropped and that he was abducted and thrown from a light aircraft somewhere off the coast. The allegations included that Tunstall had been involved in the cover-up of the facts.

The report raised points of concern over Tunstall's involvement in each incident, such as to warrant additional inquiry by the New South Wales Police Service in order to either substantiate the allegations or clear Tunstall once and for all. Director Askew, who had then taken over, I think from Mr Chalker, as the director of the ABCI, had hand delivered the report, code named Probe Viscount, to Commissioner Tony Lauer personally. Some several months later Director Askew received a visit from Detective Chief Superintendent Merv Schloeffel, Detective Superintendent Bob Myatt - now becoming well known to members of this Parliament, both through the Frenchs Forest incident and through the ICAC - and another detective inspector. All those officers were from the New South Wales Internal Police Security Unit. They attended the ABCI to
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discuss the report, and the unnamed detective and Myatt were quite negative about the matters raised by the report. They seemed more comfortable trying to discredit the allegations and the analysis of them than trying to conduct an investigation into the matters raised, I am reliably informed.

Director Askew challenged them by pointing out that instead of attacking the report they should go and conduct the proper investigation. Honourable members should remember that this is Myatt - Myatt who said, "Tear up that report that names police officers"; Myatt, against whom Temby recommended charges. It should also be remembered that Cook was the person who was supported in the findings of the ICAC. It was Myatt who said that he did not tell Lauer about the drug related circumstances surrounding the stabbing of Constable Bourke, 12 months later the shooting of Constable Bourke - and 12 months later the police commissioner said he did know about that because he had not been informed by Myatt. That is something for the House to think about. There are many more matters to do with Myatt further down the track. It is my understanding that Tunstall was allowed to resign or retire from the New South Wales Police Service without ever having undergone any form of inquiry into the allegations or the other matters raised in the report.

This is consistent with the approach that it was easier for all involved if the apparently corrupt officers were forced to resign or facilitated to retire. It obviated the necessity of pursuing expensive investigations and having the name of the New South Wales Police Service dragged through the press. Minister Griffiths had the benefit of the committee's work but, more important, he had the benefit of his predecessor's experience, a thorough briefing on assent and corruption and access to documents. One must ask: what does it take to alert a Minister for Police and spur him into action? This Minister, because of his ineptitude and inaction in these overwhelmingly important matters, should, in my view, resign. The corruption, the culture and the system let down and undermined the honest police officer, particularly the young officers who want to be police, who want to do the job honestly, fairly and properly, and those remaining in senior positions who are overwhelmed by the culture of cover-up around them.

Today I detailed the cases and the links and the failure of the ICAC, the New South Wales Crime Commission and the circumstances that cry out for the establishment of a royal commission. Following the murder of Donald Mackay, I had been warned by retired Detective Sergeant Les Lundi that Brendan John Whelan - who was, I believe, an inspector at that time - could not be trusted. At the time I simply did not believe Lundi. Incidentally, Lundi also told me that Trimboli was behind the death of Mackay - and that was long before the matter ever came out in subsequent trials. He was acting as a private investigator in that area. While speaking of Mackay, Whelan and Trimboli, I mention that, at the request of the police Minister Griffiths' office, my research officer, Arthur King, undertook some research on Chief Superintendent Gilligan, who was up for promotion.

The research listed a number of public cases in which Gilligan had been involved, and directed the commissioner's office where to look. The Minister's staff was directed to a report into race fixing by Bob Trimboli and others that was written by Gilligan. This report had its origin in information that came from the Federal agency to New South Wales police and was a matter of some controversy at the time. Yet, incredibly, the New South Wales police were unable to find that report, saying that it had been lost when police files were culled in the 1980s - another example of vital intelligence and investigation implicating New South Wales police that mysteriously disappeared.

My interest in the case of retired Constable First-class Anthony Katsoulas has led me down a track that has revealed how Brendan John Whelan escaped from the force. I refer to information contained in statements from Katsoulas and retired police sergeant Kim Cook. Later I will reveal that Brendan John Whelan was charged, paid a $2,000 fine and left the police force on full superannuation benefits. The background of the Katsoulas affair is that he is a whistleblower on crime connections in New South Wales police. Katsoulas was shot at. At 5.30 on the morning of 25 November 1986 Constable First-class Katsoulas, a highway patrol officer driving a marked police highway patrol vehicle, was fired upon by, he believes, New South Wales detectives. The shotgun blast penetrated a door and the pellets entered the rear of the driver's seat. Whilst attempting to escape the attackers at high speed, Katsoulas crashed, hitting two telegraph poles, which later had to be replaced, and came to rest against a third pole. Think about those circumstances, because later I will mention that the police say Katsoulas staged the accident.

The accident caused physical and emotional injuries to Katsoulas. Katsoulas was a whistleblower. He believes the offenders were detectives. He is now a cripple, is obese and suffers from a nervous disorder causing migraine headaches, long periods without sleep, constant pain, and is on permanent medication. I followed this case for some years. I have statutory declarations and other documents. Katsoulas had observed a criminal called Duros - it is interesting how paths have crossed with recent events - an underworld figure known to police and involved in drugs and illegal gambling. He had observed Duros pass a large amount of money to Brendan John Whelan. Duros, a well-known leading underworld figure, has since been murdered in a gangland style killing. Katsoulas says in his statements that he contacted Deputy Commissioner Barney Ross and was told not to worry about the issues. On 23 October Katsoulas spoke to Sergeant Colnan of the Special Branch and then to Inspector Thoms of Internal Affairs on 25 and 27 November 1985.

By arrangement Katsoulas met Chief Inspector Len Topping, Internal Security - who I will mention later - and Sergeant Matchett in a room in the Ashfield Motor Inn at 63 Hume Highway, Ashfield.
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Katsoulas made a lengthy statement to the internal security unit officers. The officer in charge of the New South Wales police intelligence branch at that time was the person who is now Commissioner Lauer. Katsoulas received threatening phone calls. He became aware of a leak from Internal Affairs in April 1986. My experience and records show that Internal Affairs leaks like a sieve. Katsoulas advised Topping and reported on heroin dealing in Strathfield. In July he was threatened that he would meet with an accident. This accident occurred on 25 November 1986.

Incredibly, police fabricated the story that Katsoulas had shot at the car, got into it and caused the accident himself. When Katsoulas went before the Victims Compensation Tribunal on 21 September 1993 he was granted the maximum amount of $50,000. The Chairman of the tribunal placed no credence whatsoever on the police case. Police charged Katsoulas with malicious damage to a motor vehicle. He was acquitted. They charged him with damage to the door of a motor vehicle and causing public mischief. Those charges did not proceed. The charge of negligent driving was dismissed, with costs being awarded. Most unusual, so the magistrate said at the time.

Who are these police who viciously pursued Katsoulas? The principal investigating officer was Detective Sergeant Peter Coe. Coe made a submission to the then Chief Superintendent of the Criminal Investigation Bureau, now Commissioner Lauer. Coe's job was to charge and discredit Katsoulas. He tried, but he failed. But he has destroyed Katsoulas physically and emotionally. Coe, as a detective sergeant in 1986, three years after commencing the investigation into the Katsoulas matter, was made a superintendent - another recommendation by Lauer.

Although Duros was known to police as a drug dealer and to be involved in illegal gambling, he was the subject of a surveillance operation by Penrith Task Force Two Police in the early eighties. He was under surveillance by the New South Wales police internal affairs because of his links with the then serving police Superintendent Brendan John Whelan and Detective Nelson Chad, who left the force disgraced and in recent times reappeared in matters to do with the fraud squad. Duros was also known to the police security unit because of information provided by Katsoulas. Yet I am advised that there was no satisfactory follow-up of the Duros connection with police. So, on 30 April 1993, I wrote to Mr Griffiths, the Minister for Police, and asked:

Prior to the death of Angelo Duros, were Police in possession of information that alleged Duros was paying Police for protection associated with his activities?

Did the Internal Police Security Unit or Internal Affairs investigate those allegations?

Minister Griffiths in his reply dated 28 June 1993, RML-23294, said:

There is no information which indicates Mr Duros was paying police for protection associated with his alleged activities . . . There is no record of either the Professional Integrity Branch or the Police Internal Affairs Branch having commenced any investigations into allegations that Mr Duros was paying police for protection associated with his alleged activities.

I wonder what else the Minister has told me and this House that is not true. What has the Minister not told us? Prior to the Katsoulas murder attempt Detective Sergeant Cook was commander of the Internal Police Security Surveillance Unit. His surveillance put Superintendent Whelan and former Detective Inspector Chad together in the vicinity of Duros's warehouse. He reported to Chief Inspector Snape that he had suspicions of connections and that "we ought to follow them up". Cook was in charge of the team that carried out surveillance on Chad's office in Neutral Bay. Chad later became a private investigator. Chad later set up connections with the fraud squad - I am talking now of about a year ago - when the fraud squad was carrying out investigations for Chad's private organisation.

Whelan's office at Dee Why and residence at Gladesville, and Duros's residences at Summer Hill and Dulwich Hill were under surveillance. Chad may have been on suspension at that time from the New South Wales police force. After putting Whelan and Chad together, observations were concentrated on Satinvale - Chad's company at that time at Neutral Bay. This is the company to which I referred when I spoke about the relationship between Chad and the drug squad. More will be said about Satinvale and its relationship with the fraud squad. Surveillance continued on Whelan. Then, out of the blue, Chief Superintendent Snape called for all of the logs and photographs concerning Whelan, and Cook was given a new assignment.

Cook complained to Snape that he believed that the team was very close to obtaining conclusive evidence of serious corrupt dealings with Chad, Whelan, Duros and possibly one or more politicians. Obviously the Minister was not told that. I want to put on the record that I do not, under any circumstances, question the integrity or honesty of the Minister for Police, Mr Griffiths. I am attempting to demonstrate that he was in a position where he was told facts that any police Minister would give his arm to know. He was in a position to follow up these matters, to develop his own independent line of communications, to be suspicious, and to do something.

I want to put that on the record. Snape informed Cook that he was acting on instructions but was unable to do anything about it. Sergeant Cook later discovered that Whelan had been departmentally charged in relation to minor departmental breaches. Chief Superintendent Snape told Detective Sergeant Cook that there had been political interference and that a deal had been done with Whelan. Whelan was charged departmentally, fined a total of $2,000, and exited the police force with full police superannuation entitlements. Had the police investigation proceeded with integrity, a major network of police corruption might have been exposed. Superintendent Whelan was allowed to retire. Why? Has Snape ever been asked? Where are the records?

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The operation was deliberately aborted. It screams out for a full inquiry; it screams out for a royal commission. This man Snape, at the centre of a surveillance operation on suspected activity between police and criminals - a key criminal was later murdered - does the classic thing. From my own experience of 20 years following the New South Wales police force I know about the classic way: call the police officer in, lay it before him, tell that police officer what you have got on him, come to a sort of arrangement, and, perhaps, if he is lucky, the police officer is charged with relatively minor offences and sent on his way.

I want to mention briefly a case while it is in my mind. It is the case of a woman police officer whom several police officers attempted to rape. At this time she cannot give evidence to me, but will definitely give evidence after her confinement and the birth of her child. I believe those officers would not have been charged at all except for Avery's insistence. But a way was found to charge them, not with the criminal offence of attempted rape, but with departmental offences. They were, therefore, able to retire from the force. Can anyone imagine anything more horrific?

Mr Fahey: You said she is expecting a child.

Mr HATTON: Thank you, Mr Premier, for asking me to make that clear. At the time she reported this matter, it was fully investigated. She would not say no: she kept pushing it and kept putting reports up. They did not want to know. Finally, with Mr Avery's support, the officers were charged. A way was found to charge them departmentally and get them out of the force. That was several years ago and the person concerned is still suffering stress. She is expecting a child and is due to be confined, and will not come forward at this time. I have had discussions with her and she is quite happy to come forward. A lot of this is on record, and she will detail her experience.

Chief Superintendent Snape aborted this operation. I believe that operation was deliberately aborted, using the classic technique. These are the type of concerns that I believe the honourable member for Heffron has about paedophilia and extremely sensitive matters that scream out for investigation. Brendan John Whelan, to whom I referred earlier, was obviously a crook, yet he was the chief investigator for the Woodward royal commission inquiring into the mafia in Griffith following the death of Donald Mackay. Whelan was involved with Duros, a heavy underworld figure who was later killed. Whelan was charged with minor offences of misconduct, and left the force. The opportunity to reveal a possibly major corrupt network was aborted. I am in possession of signed statements and documents.

The link between Duros, Whelan and Katsoulas was well known, at least to Chief Inspector Len Topping of the Internal Police Security Unit, former Assistant Commissioner Eric Strong, Executive Chief Superintendent Bob Snape, and others. Commissioner Lauer, as officer in charge of the Criminal Investigation Branch, appointed Coe to head the investigation. Commissioner Lauer - remember, this is the Coe I referred to in the Katsoulas matter - after reviewing the investigation supported Superintendent Coe's findings. Then Commissioner Lauer recommended that Katsoulas be charged. Meanwhile, Minister Griffith is still in his soundproof room.

To enable an investigation of entrenched corruption within the New South Wales Police Service, it is obvious why the investigative arm of the royal commission must be comprised of other than serving police officers. I know that this will be a matter of concern to the Minister, and quite properly to the Premier, because - if there is agreement on this motion - there is no intent to do what will be widely interpreted as a slight on the whole force. But, when you are faced with such massive intelligence, when you are faced with such enormity, what option do you have to guarantee the integrity of an investigation other than a royal commission? I have demonstrated that Brendan John Whelan, a crook, was the chief investigator into investigations into the mafia advising the Woodward royal commission. It just boggles the imagination. So a commission can be nobbled.

The attempted murder of Constable First-class Katsoulas occurred on 25 November 1986. Chief Superintendent Snape aborted the surveillance operation on Duros and Brendan John Whelan by calling in Whelan and appraising him of the situation, in the same year, prior to Katsoulas's accident. I want to put these events together because it was Chief Superintendent Snape who charged Kimbal Cook with departmental charges on 25 May 1987, the following year. Now we know why Cook had to be charged. He had to be charged because he knew about the situation with Brendan John Whelan and how that operation was aborted. Or was it that he had to be charged because he was asked some time earlier to surveil politicians? In any event, he had to be charged. We have another link in the chain as to why Commissioner Lauer had to put Cook in the frame before the Independent Commission Against Corruption.

Remember also that Sergeant Cook refused to gather dossiers which could be used illegally against three Ministers - Attorney General Walker, sports Minister Cleary, and his own police Minister Paciullo. How chilling is that when a parliamentary committee, on a bipartisan basis, finds that Commissioner Lauer threatened his police Minister? Like Katsoulas and Cook, Detective Senior Constable Deborah Lee Locke had to be isolated. She was a whistleblower. She was persecuted and threatened with charges because she blew the whistle on illegal and improper activities in the fraud squad, the gaming squad and Parramatta detectives.

Detective Senior Constable Locke is a talented police officer with an associate diploma in criminal justice from the Charles Sturt University. She worked in general duties, Kings Cross drug squad and gaming squad areas. She learned that members of the
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surveillance unit of the gaming squad worked greatly reduced shifts, as little as eight hours in a whole week. She reported this to the head of the squad, Detective Sergeant Cook, who disciplined the officers and supported her.

Once she moved to Parramatta, the situation changed. She was assigned to Detective Constable First Class Rick Sitkiewicz. She became aware of illegal activities of Sitkiewicz's brother. Rick Sitkiewicz was associated with Louie Bayeh, Roger Rogerson, Billy Bayeh and Len McPherson. When she expressed her disapproval, she was assigned to another partner. She had suspicions about a break and enter, and took them to Cook. In April 1989 Locke gave information on these activities and on a threat on Cook's life to Chief Superintendent Schloeffel and Superintendent Bob Myatt, a name we have come to know. Locke noticed that no notes were taken. Within a week Parramatta detectives made her realise that internal security leaked like a sieve. For her own safety she was transferred to the commissioner's policy unit, an administrative post, and sidelined. In about 11 statements from Locke she details her treatment. I quote from one of those statements:

At the Commissioner's Policy Unit, I was informed that Tony Lauer would speak to me, as he was going to be the next Commissioner. We discussed what sections I could go to and he said, "Police don't like whistleblowers". I said, "What's a whistleblower?" He said, "Police who dob in other police".

She said that later, when she told Lauer that a Parramatta detective had been given an expensive leather jacket by Louie Bayeh, Mr Lauer replied, "You don't understand what it is all about being a detective. It is going to be a problem where to put you. We will put you with Mick Drury. You are both outcasts". Honourable members will remember that Mick Drury was subjected to a shooting. Detective Locke goes on in her statement:

On several occasions I had reason to attend Chief Superintendent Col Cole's office in relation to the Task Force WAVE. On every occasion he was hostile towards me because I was a whistleblower. He even said on one occasion words to the effect, "Police don't do that sort of thing, we all have to stick together. This job is family and we all have to rely on each other. You let us down and caused us a lot of problems with what you have done".

He was referring to Parramatta detectives. This is Cole, who caught the psychiatric express out of the police force. This is Cole, who did not tell Commissioner Lauer about the drug-related circumstances of a police officer being stabbed and then shot 12 months later. This is Assistant Commissioner Cole, who lived down the corridor from Lauer. This is an assistant commissioner in charge of internal affairs. Yet I am being told the game is not crooked. Locke was granted a transfer to the fraud squad in May 1990. Her reputation preceded her, and she got heavy treatment from a number of the officers there, particularly Detective Senior Sergeant George McTaggart. The head of the fraud squad, Detective Chief Inspector Jamison, dismissed her concerns about Rick Sitkiewicz, who had joined the squad.

Honourable members will remember he was the officer the detective complained about at Parramatta. Not until December 1991, three years after the Parramatta allegations were made to Myatt and Schloeffel, did the police bother to interview Deborah Locke and obtain a statement about the matter. Sitkiewicz has since resigned from the New South Wales Police Service. Detective Locke's statements point to colleagues asking her whether she had her gun with her for her own safety, to leaks from internal affairs, and to an incident similar to that involving Cook where Chief Superintendent Bob Myatt - and it is important to note the timing - at 2.30 p.m. on Wednesday, 30 June 1993, at the professional integrity branch at North Sydney, directed Detective Sergeant Noonan to leave the room and rip up a briefing note about the Locke matters.

This was at the same time - I believe on the same day - that the ICAC commenced its hearings into the allegation against Myatt that he had directed Cook to tear up statements that mentioned police officers' names. According to the statement, on that same day or at about that time he directed another officer to do precisely the same thing. Complaints about McTaggart and Nelson Chad made it back to the fraud squad faster than Detective Sergeant Locke, McTaggart saying that the charges against him were only departmental and that he could talk his way out of them. I remind honourable members that I am not talking about historic events; these events happened last year.

Locke had reported that disgraced former police officer Nelson Chad was running a private investigation agency called Satinvale and that the fraud squad was doing work for Chad's company at public expense. Detective Chief Inspector Jamison was doing referrals to Chad; he was his agent. Detective Sergeant McTaggart was involved with others. The fraud squad was doing illegal motor vehicle licence and possible criminal checks for Nelson Chad. These are the sorts of things I have in statements. The fraud squad is about to be restructured with the same officers. The answer that keeps coming back is, "We have this restructure, we have this new policy, we have a new beaut way of doing things." And the machine goes on like it always has. Honourable members will remember that the present head of internal affairs is Assistant Commissioner Jeff Jarratt, a person of whom I had the highest opinion.

[Interruption]

He is in charge of professional responsibility, I believe. He supported Myatt against Cook at the ICAC. I have raised serious concerns about the honesty and or competence of Commissioner Lauer, former Assistant Commissioner Norm Maroney, former Assistant Commissioner Cole, Superintendent Myatt, Chief Superintendent Gilligan, former Superintendent Brendan John Whelan, Superintendent Coe and others. It is strange how public cases have come back to haunt the present Minister and Police Service. I have referred to Brendan John Whelan,
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who was chief investigator with the Woodward royal commission, and to Nelson Chad and his links with the fraud squad, and I now refer to Assistant Commissioner Norm Maroney, who was charged over the Frenchs Forest police station drug affair and counselled.

Maroney's track record goes back a long way. It goes back to the Juanita Nielsen case, which surfaced again recently in a report tabled by the Joint Committee on the National Crime Authority in Canberra in relation to the authority's use of the underworld figure James McCartney Anderson as a protected witness. This report is but a few weeks old. The senior investigator in charge of the Nielsen case - I believe he was a detective sergeant at the time - is in line for the job of commissioner. I refer to Assistant Commissioner Maroney. If honourable members do not take notice of what I am saying, I ask them to take notice of what the Deputy-President of the Senate, Senator Crighton-Browne of the Liberal Party, and Mr Stephen Loosley from the Labor Party side of politics said about the necessity to re-open the inquiry into how the investigation into the disappearance of Juanita Nielsen was conducted.

I note the questions asked by the honourable member for Eastwood as to the favourable treatment and favourable cross-examination of Mr Lauer by the ICAC. I refer also to what the police committee was told about the extraordinarily favourable cross- examination of Lauer by the then chairman of the State Drug Crime Commission, Judge Thorley, in relation to the Frenchs Forest drug-related matters. I ask honourable members to listen to their colleagues in Canberra. The comments of Senator Crighton-Browne and Stephen Loosely amount to a bipartisan call for a reinvestigation of the Nielsen case. Yet when I put a question on notice to the Minister for Police recently, he responded that there was no need for a reinvestigation. Once again the Minister is in his sound-proof room. Does he not investigate public cases? Does he not listen to what is happening in Canberra at the National Crime Authority? Does he access any of this information? Does he take any notice? I need to remind the House briefly of the circumstances of the Nielsen case. Assistant Commissioner Maroney was a detective sergeant, and, with Detective Sergeant Karl Arkins, botched the investigation into the murder of Juanita Nielsen, which remains unsolved today.

Mr Fahey: What was the date of that?

Mr HATTON: I do not have the date here, but I may have it in some document. It would certainly be in the 1970s. I am fortunate that, as well as official sources, I have quite good information from my research officer, Arthur King, who was involved in the Victoria Street, Kings Cross, protests against development by Abe Saffron and who was kidnapped, he believes by arrangement through police officers, taken away in the boot of a car and kept overnight in fear for his life. He first came to me together with a journalist, Peter Rees, who at that time was working for the West-Australian. They were writing a book on the disappearance of Juanita Nielsen. The documents and the solid nature of the evidence in this case cannot be denied.

Mrs Nielsen was last seen alive in a club owned by Abe Saffron and run by Jim Anderson, a friend of the developer of Victoria Street, Mr Frank Theeman. When staff member Eddie Trigg, later convicted of a conspiracy to abduct Mrs Nielsen, was interviewed by then Detective Sergeant Maroney, he gave a version of his meeting with Mrs Nielsen that contradicted a version he had given to duty police a day earlier. In the course of the next few weeks of investigation the following facts came to light: the property developer had paid Jim Anderson $25,000 six weeks before Mrs Nielsen's disappearance; the property developer's son worked for Jim Anderson in the same club; the resident action group opposed to the development of the street told police of the developer's son's job at the club; and Mrs Nielson's vocal opposition to development via her newspaper.

Another club employee, Loretta Crawford, was present on the morning that Mrs Nielsen disappeared, but was not spoken to by police until 11 days later, and a record of interview was not taken at that time. When a record of interview was eventually taken, more than a year later, Ms Crawford revealed vital pieces of information. Maroney ignored all of these leads until the trail was cold, pursuing instead a report by an associate of Jim Anderson that he had seen Mrs Nielsen enter a yellow car and leave the area. Of course, the yellow car and Mrs Nielsen's murderers have never been found.

Honourable members are aware of the work of what was an unprecedented parliamentary committee. I stress that it did not go into matters of corruption, but what it uncovered, and the evidence it received, screamed out for follow-up action. The silence was deafening. All the blame does not go to the Minister, by any means. I want to know what the Independent Commission Against Corruption has done about the enormous amount of intelligence that was passed on to it. I want to know why Temby has not investigated these matters and why we have not heard anything from him. Add to that the enormous number of files given to him by the head of the Cabinet Office, Mr Sturgess, and by the Minister. I want to know why the ICAC has failed to perform and why there is a deafening silence about widespread corruption within the ICAC.

The Milloo inquiry inquired into some members of the gaming squad and, I believe, charged nearly all of the members it looked at. It did not go any further. The unanimous findings of the bipartisan committee revealed that: when it suited, police, senior superintendents, the assistant commissioner and even Commissioner Lauer would lie under oath; hundreds of items and files could be made to disappear; and 412 items were lost from the commissioner's computer. The parliamentary committee revealed that police were prepared to involve themselves in a conspiracy against the truth; there was collusion in statements; inability to find essential witnesses who
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were publicly listed; and inability to trace some records when the tracing of those records proved no problem for the committee - and these were the honest police trotted out before the parliamentary committee! These are the police who are supposed to clean up the force!

The committee found that the drug exhibit room at Central police station, which at any one time held up to $200 million worth of drug exhibits, remained insecure for 15 months, despite demands by Commissioner Avery, Minister Pickering and Premier Greiner to make it secure. Only corrupt and naked power at the highest level can resist such demands and get away with it for so long. Finally, the police produced a deficient specification to ensure that surveillance cameras could be switched off from the inside. That is when Ted Pickering blew his stack; that is when Ted Pickering said to the officer, "Take away that specification if you want to keep your job". Honourable members should think about that.

This room held kilos of heroin with no test for purity. Heroin of, perhaps, 80 per cent or 100 per cent purity could be replaced by a powder of 10 per cent or 20 per cent purity. People could walk away with hundreds of thousands of dollars worth of drugs, secure in the knowledge that no system was in place to detect such a theft. To this day we do not have purity testing legislation, but I understand that it is foreshadowed by this Government. Honourable members of this House are only too aware that drugs are freely available in the streets of western Sydney, Kings Cross, and other suburbs and cities in our State. It is a public market - but a public market cannot operate without police involvement or knowledge. The police commissioner felt so secure that the parliamentary committee unanimously found that he acted against the advice of the head of the Premier's Department.

I believe that the evidence before the committee, properly analysed, shows that senior officers were prepared to lie under oath time after time in support of their commissioner. It took the Sydney Morning Herald to reveal the loss of marijuana exhibits at the Frenchs Forest police station and the replacement of those exhibits by police going to nearby forest land and harvesting it. There were allegations of cocaine trafficking associated with that police station. One officer was not questioned prior to going to South America. He was put on customs alert, yet upon his return he was not questioned for six weeks. Finally, he was allowed to resign while under investigation.

Some officers have been charged, but what was really going on at Frenchs Forest police station, and for how many years? What was happening at other police stations? In the New South Wales Police Service, drugs and the shooting of an officer are not matters of which Commissioner Lauer is appraised. Believe that, if you will! What was really behind the Frenchs Forest stabbing, then shooting; the smoking of marijuana by officers in the station; the stealing of marijuana exhibits; either the growing of marijuana by police or the harvesting of it by police? Were none of these circumstances known to Commissioner Lauer? I, for one, in my minority report in the police committee, make it quite clear that that is not possible. If it is possible, Commissioner Lauer should not be there, because the force is out of control. Neither was the force in the control of Minister Pickering if the police commissioner could threaten him.

Minister Pickering resigned for misleading Parliament, but the commissioner was re-appointed for five years. I believe that the force is not in the control of the present Minister and I believe that we need a royal commission. Commissioner Lauer expects us to believe that he knew about the shooting but not about the criminal drug offences that had been going on for two years. He said he was not told. Chief Inspector Myatt of internal affairs did not tell him; the head of the shooting team did not tell him; Commissioner Cole, the head of internal affairs, did not tell him. He did not ask Commissioner Cole, who lived just down the corridor, why a police officer was stabbed and then shot. Lauer maintained that drugs and shooting are an internal affairs matter under Commissioner Cole. He neither informed his Commissioner nor obeyed the law.

When I asked the present Minister questions on notice, what answers did I get back? "Do you normally visit a police officer when he is shot?" - "Yes, I do". "Why did not Commissioner Lauer visit this police officer?" - "Because his story was inconsistent at the time." That was at the time of the shooting, yet it was 12 months before it was revealed, 12 months in which the parliamentary committee was not told, 12 months when Commissioner Lauer did not ask about the inconsistencies in the stories or know about drugs at Frenchs Forest. He has to be joking!

Cole and Myatt gave Lauer his alibi for not telling the parliamentary committee about drugs at Frenchs Forest, when specific questions were being asked about drug security at police stations. Cole caught the psychiatric express out of the service. Commissioner Lauer is a former head of internal affairs; the person who was the key, who was at the crossroads of information, as I have shown the House today - documented in operations Casper, Casper 2, Buckshot, Asset and Seca. He is the man who is supposed to know. He became commissioner and knew nothing when it suited him.

The Cook affair reveals that Lauer supported Myatt, as did the present head of internal affairs. He praised Myatt: "I likewise find him an officer of the highest integrity; one that has been prepared by the acceptance of his duties to challenge corruption. He is a competent professional, knowledgeable and of the highest integrity". What a wonderful reference. It is now clear that Lauer had to support Myatt and rubbish Cook before the ICAC because Cook was a whistleblower. As I have revealed today, Cook has a lot to tell, Cook has a lot of knowledge, Cook is a brave man, Cook has stood up, Cook has been vilified, Cook has been threatened - but he got no support. He was vindicated by the Independent Commission Against Corruption.

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This Minister talks endlessly about reports of initiatives and new programs, such as the internal informants' policy, but the corruption, vilification and sidelining of honest officers goes on. I say this with full confidence. I know that people have been in touch with me and people have been in touch with them. There are dozens of police officers who will come forward; but they will not come forward without a royal commission. They know that the ICAC leaks; and I can produce evidence of that if the House wants me to. Police officers know that the ICAC leaks, that they are vilified, that the internal informants' policy does not work.

For example, Detective Senior Constable Locke was not assigned a mentor under that program. It would take too long to tell the House what a sham that was. She received no protection under this new informants policy. Who was responsible for the internal informants policy? Chief Superintendent Myatt. You would have to be joking! Those honest police want to speak out; they want to tell the story. A royal commission with interstate investigators will enable them to tell their story. It is quite obvious that what we have is totally ineffectual.

All of the matters I have detailed today are known to this Minister or are easily accessible, many of them clearly flagged by reports and by the parliamentary committee. I emphasise that all the information I have comes from police sources, either from serving police officers or retired police officers. I have in my possession signed statements and documents, statutory declarations, sworn evidence before the ICAC and the Milloo inquiry, sworn evidence before the parliamentary inquiry, records of interview, letters and expert evidence.

Does the police Minister accept that his responsibility ends when he hands this stuff over to the ICAC? Does he know what is really happening in the ICAC? Does he care what is happening in the ICAC? Did he ask for regular reports? Does he get regular feedback? Does he know what stage the investigations are up to? Does he look at Milloo and see how limited it is? Does he ask what is going on with the allegations in all of the operations involving interstate criminal intelligence agencies and New South Wales criminal intelligence agencies which impinge on the integrity, to use the Minister's words, of "my officers"? Does he ever ask?

I have seen no evidence in this Parliament of this sort of follow-up that one would expect to be the key responsibility of a Minister for Police. When matters are raised in the Parliament the Minister's response is to pompously strut the stage and, on at least one occasion, to arrange for the gallery to be stacked with senior officers - and to play to the gallery - and shoot the messenger. The Minister constantly talks about "my officers" and "my commissioner". He talks about corruption in terms of the rotten apple theory. This is a man who has access to all of that information. He struts the stage, saying that those who are corrupt will not be tolerated.

Yet the Minister does not give support to honest police who speak out - Katsoulas, Jurotte, Locke, Cook and another officer I have not named who is under particular stress. I am reliably informed that that person's parents went to see the Minister for Police. The Minister for Police and Minister for Emergency Services is either too naive, lacks the courage, lacks the commitment or lacks the insight - I do not believe that he is dishonest - or he is so obsessed with his own importance as not to understand or listen to what the former Minister, the parliamentary committee, the Milloo inquiry, the whistleblowers, the Australian Bureau of Criminal Intelligence, the National Crime Authority and reports tell him. A wide-ranging royal commission simply has to be established.

Mr FAHEY (Southern Highlands - Premier, and Minister for Economic Development) [4.56]: For the past hour and a half or thereabouts I have listened with particular attention to the matters that have been raised by the honourable member for South Coast. This motion is one of great seriousness; it is one of significant consequence for public administration in this State. By bringing this motion forward, the honourable member for South Coast has effectively indicated that, in his view - and he is asking the Parliament to support his view - the police force in this State is out of control. On numerous occasions throughout his address he used those very words.

The honourable member has indicated through this motion that he trusts no other means to get to the bottom of problems which canvass many views, stretching from the mid-1970s, when Juanita Nielsen disappeared; to the late 1970s when a former State Labor Minister, Mr Walker, was under surveillance by the police; through to various operations in the 1980s that were named by the honourable member. There was not much mention of the 1990s, other than reference to various officers who are still serving, a number of whom are facing departmental charges at this very moment. That is a damning indictment of the police force. In putting together hundreds of names, and dozens, if not hundreds, of events, allegations and accusations, the honourable member for South Coast indicated that it may well be taken that a motion of this nature is an attempt to destabilise the police force, or that may well be the defence that is used against the motion.

At the outset I shall say a couple of things. First, I have not the slightest hesitation in taking any steps, no matter what they might be, that will address any evidence of corruption, root out that corruption, and deal with those who are associated with that corruption. I will never walk away from that; I will walk away from this Parliament before I walk away from that. I believe that that is a view shared by all members on this side of the House. Second, when it comes to taking steps with the consequences that have been foreshadowed in this motion - for which the honourable member for South Coast seeks the support of the House - there is a responsibility bestowed on all of our shoulders to act appropriately, to act responsibly and to act in the best interests of the
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people of New South Wales. We cannot take such steps lightly. I am no expert on the facts that have been put before the House. They were very confusing to me as I endeavoured to listen - I am not saying that as a criticism; it is because of the sheer weight of the facts and the linkages that were drawn by the honourable member for South Coast.

I make no comment other than to say this: many of those facts, many of those circumstances and many of those names have been the subject of many inquiries before. That is not to say that, when the inquiries occurred before, the outcome was always the correct one. It may not have been. But the Government members have to deal in facts. We have to deal in hard evidence. We cannot deal in hearsay. We cannot simply take hold of what might be the rumour of today or statements that are made by anybody, in whatever circumstances, or even the conclusions drawn. I might say that I draw conclusions on many of these matters and I might share a few of my conclusions before I am finished, but I will do it in a qualified fashion because I have no right as the Premier of this State and a responsible member of the community and of this Parliament to make accusations that I cannot substantiate with evidence. Whatever I might feel, I have to deliver.

That is the difference among members in this Parliament. The honourable member for South Coast can make accusations such as have been made today, very serious accusations against the current Commissioner of Police, and allegations against the current Minister for Police. At one stage I thought of raising a point of order but believed it was important for the flow of what the honourable member for South Coast wanted to say not to interrupt him. The point of order I considered was that some of the allegations and imputations of the statements made against the current Minister for Police warranted a substantive motion. One cannot make the accusations in the manner they were made unless one is prepared to go on with them. I regret that the accusations were made. In the early stage of the remarks of the honourable member for South Coast this afternoon he stated unequivocally and clearly that he had not the slightest doubt about the integrity of the current Minister for Police. He then proceeded to make all sorts of allegations about neglect of duty, failure to act and information that was or could be in his grasp which should have been followed through by the current Minister.

Over the past 18 months the New South Wales Police Service has been under enormous scrutiny. In many instances it was warranted - not in all. I will not walk away from the fact that it has occurred or seek to hide that the scrutiny was warranted. I again state in this House, as I have on a number of occasions, that when former Commissioner of the Independent Commission Against Corruption, Mr Temby, spoke to me on the last occasion prior to his retirement he expressed the view, which I fully concur with, that the Police Service in this State ought to be allowed to get on with the job. The destabilisation and debilitating accusations, the manner in which they have been placed before the public of this State, the ridicule in many instances and the manner in which the police have been painted by many people - frequently using the coward's castle, the House of Parliament, to suggest that we have an inferior police force, to put it at its kindest, or to suggest as we have heard today endemic corruption in the police force - have not been in the interests of this State.

If there is hard fact, let us see that hard fact. I have noted with interest that over the past week a report released by the news service Australian Associated Press of allegations made by Mr Black - an anonymous name - covered the entire gamut of crimes from fraud through to murder and everything in between. It was indicated that this information was given to AAP. It has also been a fairly badly kept secret that that information has been in the hands of the honourable member for South Coast for some time. I do not argue about a member of Parliament having the right to be approached by anybody. I note that that report is what has been used to substantiate, in 1994, allegations of endemic corruption in the police force. I will not attempt to argue about what has occurred in the past. I am not in a position to do so. I have not been here for 22 years as the honourable member for South Coast has; I have been here for only 10 years, and I certainly was not in a position to access much of the information or participate in the debates going back to the mid-1980s or debates about the behaviour of Ministers in the late 1970s or early 1980s, which have been referred to today.

Perhaps the most serious of all the allegations which have been made today was the honourable member for South Coast throwing out the challenge that the people of this State can no longer have confidence in the man that heads the police force, particularly in respect of operational matters. I thought the honourable member for South Coast lost sight of the role of the Minister in operational matters as against his responsibilities, broadly speaking, on behalf of the people of the State for the proper administration of the police force. The most serious allegation is that we have been told that the Commissioner for Police is not a fit and proper person to continue in his position with the thread of accusations that have been made throughout the statements made by the honourable member for South Coast. I think the Minister for Police could probably go into more detail, but I have taken copious notes of a number of things that have been said. I want to go back to some of the matters which I think are of substance in the debate.

We have a standing royal commission in this State. It is called the ICAC. If this motion is carried - I ask all honourable members to listen to these words and take them seriously - that is the end of the ICAC. If we walk away from the ICAC, the standing royal commission with all the powers and all the functions of any royal commission, its structure and resources, then we are saying today as a Parliament that the ICAC is no longer relevant in this State. At some stage there was an accusation of corruption within the ICAC. Before sitting in this
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Chamber this afternoon I had never heard that. I would sincerely like the honourable member for South Coast in his response to elaborate on that matter. He referred to the deafening findings of the corruption within the ICAC itself. In that regard I am simply amazed that this body that has earned the respect of all that abhor corruption, all that abhor what is wrong with public administration - or has been wrong in this State with it - should now be regarded as a lame duck incapable of proceeding with an inquiry in respect of many of these matters.

We had an inquiry set up by this House, with the urgings of the honourable member for South Coast, into the relationship between the former Minister for Police and the current commissioner. I recall conversations leading up to that matter. I do not intend to repeat those conversations. Mr Pickering and I genuinely wanted, and I know the honourable member for South Coast wanted, to get to the bottom of what had occurred. There were matters that emanated from that inquiry which disturbed me but I had to deal in hard fact and hard evidence. I cannot go on intuition. I cannot go on gut feelings and I cannot go on rumour. That is what we have seen in many of the accusations today.

That inquiry ultimately delivered, with the exception of the honourable member for South Coast, findings that had bipartisan support - I am sorry because I think the Hon. Elisabeth Kirkby, who is a member of the Australian Democrats, may have disagreed as well. The Labor and Liberal members used their judgment and, on the balance of probability on the evidence placed before them, they delivered the best findings they could, which I believe have led to a better police force. The action of the Government afterwards - an action that was foreshadowed by me the very day after the former Minister for Police left his position - was what I believe was necessary. I might say that I was given a great deal of advice and counsel on what was necessary at that time in September 1992 by former Minister for Police Pickering. What came to pass after an expensive inquiry - and an opportunity for all committee members to examine, cross-examine and continue examining and cross-examining as and when they saw fit to come to a conclusion - was a majority report supported by coalition members and Labor Party members.

I shall share a few of the feelings that I do not like. We are told - and one must deal in hard facts - that despite there having been a report in the Sydney Morning Herald in February 1993 concerning drug involvement at Frenchs Forest police station, despite there having been an incident there in the previous July and despite there being senior officers such as Assistant Commissioner Myatt and Assistant Commissioner Cole - who is no longer able to be questioned - that the commissioner did not know of that drug involvement. Whatever my views might be, I cannot deal in other than fact. It is my sincere hope that somehow, somewhere and some time very soon a way will be found to get people off the psychiatric express referred to by the honourable member for South Coast.

That psychiatric express is the biggest blight on the New South Wales Police Service today - that when in trouble, get to a psychiatrist and then get out. I am not skilled enough to find an answer as to how I as a member of a Parliament or how any other person who is unskilled can argue against an independent psychiatrist who is prepared to put forward a report - as has frequently occurred. A committee is being established at this very point in time by the Minister for Police to find ways around the practice by which some people get a free run out of the police force and as a result thereof are not required to give evidence or be dealt with in terms of departmental exercises first and thereafter - which is of much more consequence - be dealt with within the law. That is the biggest blight on the service today.

I cannot call any of the assistant commissioners or any other witness to the Gay inquiry, as it was called, chaired by Duncan Gay, a liar. Those people gave their evidence. I was not a committee member. I did not have a chance to examine them. I did not even have a chance to observe their demeanour. However, I do find it extraordinarily difficult to believe that people can work on the same floor of the same building month after month and not give information, as was alleged by those officers before the committee. There is no hard evidence to the contrary that allows me to refute that evidence with fact. I cannot do that until such time as Assistant Commissioner Cole ultimately becomes available for some form of evidence. It is now known that he is no longer in the police force, because of the psychiatric express that is available to members of the police force. That disturbs me. As I have said, I sincerely hope we find a way of ensuring justice but nevertheless allowing the safety net that is currently there to stay there.

I now return to the substance of the motion. We are finished with the Independent Commission Against Corruption here and now, this day, if this motion is carried. It is my intention to move amendments to the motion of the honourable member for South Coast and to give some assurances with those amendments. I ask the honourable member for South Coast to give serious consideration to the amendments in what will probably be a fairly long debate. I want a proper examination. Members of this Parliament cannot undertake a proper examination of many of the facts that have been collated in some fashion by or on behalf of the honourable member for South Coast, which facts, because of their nature and because of the sheer volume of them, will occupy many pages of Hansard.

I know that many of those accusations have been examined many times before. I have no idea how one could reopen the Neilsen inquiry. I also know that any of the evidence available from the parliamentary committee, the Gay inquiry, was provided for the ICAC. I say again that it is not within the power of the Minister for Police or, so far as I can see, anyone to do more than simply ask what is happening and whether investigations are being continued in respect of evidence made available. From time to time I
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might have a discussion with the ICAC commissioners such as, "How is that going?". I do not believe that I have any right to tell those commissioners how they should conduct their investigations or what resources should be applied to particular investigations. I sincerely hope that a proper investigation will be carried out there; there should be and the resources will be available.

In moving an amendment to the motion of the honourable member for South Coast I intend to seek to get the inquiry into the ICAC as the standing royal commission in this State to investigate all matters of corruption. To do otherwise would be to say that we no longer want the ICAC, and that would be a very sad day. I say that despite the fact that many of my colleagues on this side of the House have not exactly had a very comfortable time because of the existence of the ICAC - we know the substance of many of the accusations, of course, and the motivation behind them. They have gone through the ICAC investigations and they will stand by the need to have an effective anti-corruption body such as the ICAC.

In addition to moving an amendment to the motion, I shall give an undertaking that if there is a necessity for resources, those resources will be provided. If there are concerns about the existing personnel in the ICAC - and accusations were made - I assure the honourable member for South Coast and all honourable members that I would not seek to have current or former serving police officers assist in such an inquiry before the ICAC. I would seek to get additional resources, resources that would ensure that there be no suspicion about the manner of the investigation into the multitude of facts placed before the Parliament this afternoon by the honourable member for South Coast. That would clearly require the services of a person acting as a commissioner for a fairly lengthy period. I assure the honourable member for South Coast that I would be happy to confer with both him and the Leader of the Opposition as to who the acting commissioner of the ICAC might be in such circumstances.

I come to the conclusion of my remarks and shall leave it to the Minister for Police to go into some of the details of all of those operations and all of the connections. This Government will not stand idly by and allow any accusation to go untested. I do not want to see any corruption in the New South Wales Police Service. In my view, no one in this Parliament wants that. Whatever might have been the position of former parliaments - parliaments before most of us came to this place - it is my belief that no member of this Parliament would want corruption to go undetected. I simply ask that the information be provided to the correct body for investigation, that body be the ICAC itself, that we allow - with resources - an independent process to occur and perhaps even put in place a mechanism under which a report would come back to this Parliament for further examination. It is possible that a timeframe might be sought, but I feel that most investigations would go beyond the restriction of a timeframe. One investigation leads so quickly to another investigation that it would probably be impossible to impose a timeframe.

We have to believe in our institutions. At times it may be hard to believe in our institutions. But if we continue to undermine our institutions - whether they be the Police Service, the Independent Commission Against Corruption, or any other arm of government - as a State we run into some difficulty and have little future in terms of the democracy that parliaments are all about. Today I reiterate my belief that the overwhelming majority of serving police officers in this State do a magnificent job and serve the community in a way that few police forces in the world could hope to emulate. That is not to rule out that all officers are acting in a proper and responsible manner, or even that all officers are acting within the law. We want to find those officers who are not, and my full support and the full support of this Government will be given on the occasions any accusations are made.

It is wrong to use Parliament to bandy about wild accusations. It is clear that honourable members have to address these matters in relation to the current commission, and in relation to the powers, and the access to information by the current Minister. In saying that New South Wales has a very good Police Service, I have to say that I am embarrassed and I apologise to certain people who were named as having been treated in a shabby fashion. I name two of those people: Sergeant Kim Cook and Senior Constable Locke - although I am not entirely certain of the latter's rank. All members of Parliament would recognise that those people were not treated properly by the Police Service and, as best one can say it on an occasion such as this, I apologise to both of them. The way in which they were treated was not good enough. Irrespective of what occurred in so many instances of complaints they made, those two people did not get the right treatment.

Assistant Commissioner Myatt is before the police tribunal in respect of charges that emanated from the Milloo inquiry. That procedure must be allowed to take its course. I have said to the Minister for Police and many other colleagues that I am particularly interested in that case because of material that emanated from the Gay inquiry about that officer. I also know what Mr Temby said. I regret that accusations have been made against Mr Temby suggesting that he did not do his job correctly. Mr Temby did his utmost to get to the bottom of matters related to corruption. If he failed to do that as well as some people might wish, so be it.

No one in this Parliament could hope to comprehend the series of accusations that have been made. The honourable member for South Coast struggled with his words in many instances, because of the sheer volume of the material, as he identified the links in the material and how they might relate. All the material has been examined, whether it relates to paedophiles or to any other inquiry. Information of this nature should be examined by the appropriate body set up by this Parliament. If that is not allowed to occur, the ICAC is finished. If that is what Labor
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wants, that may well result. I do not believe that is what the honourable member for South Coast wants. I move:

That the motion be amended by omitting all words after the word "That" and inserting instead the following words:

this House requests the Independent Commission Against Corruption to investigate with personnel other than serving or former New South Wales police and report into the operations of the Police Service, with particular reference to -

(a) Entrenched corruption within the New South Wales Police Service.

(b) The activities of the Professional Responsibility and Internal Affairs Branches of the Police Service in dealing with any problems of corruption and internal investigations generally.

(d) The impartiality of the Service and other agencies in investigating and pursuing prosecutions including, but not limited to paedophile activity.

(e) The failure of the internal informers policy.

(f) Any other matter appertaining to the aforesaid matters concerning possible criminal activity, neglect or violation of duty the Independent Commission Against Corruption deems to be in the public interest.

The amendment encapsulates the motion of the honourable member for South Coast, but rules out an independent royal commission. I am happy to confer on the appointment of a suitable person in an acting capacity. The motion states that current or former police officers should not be part of the investigation. I am also happy to make a commitment to provide appropriate resources. I say to the members of this House: do not turn your back on the ICAC. If we bypass it for a special purpose, as it were - a royal commission - the ICAC will be finished. A royal commission has no more powers than an ICAC; and an ICAC has no more powers than a royal commission.

The ICAC has resources but also it has expertise despite that it may have been denigrated today. This information should be put before a body such as the ICAC and in due course that body will make available a public report, which should be available for discussion in this House. Accusations must be carefully looked at and supported with fact. Many of these accusations have been around for a long time and there have never been facts to support them. I do not know that any further inquiry will bring those facts forward.

Mr CARR (Maroubra - Leader of the Opposition) [5.24]: Police have been unjustly accused on some occasions. In some cases good police have been unjustly accused by bad police. The Opposition has been involved in fighting for justice for such police. It is our view that the vast majority of police in this State are honest. The Premier's inactivity has forced this House to contemplate a royal commission into substantial and serious allegations of police corruption. The Premier's inactivity has brought this matter to a head. The Premier's failure to respond to matters raised in this Parliament has led to a situation where the Parliament must look at the last resort - a royal commission. I will detail five substantial reasons as to why the Opposition believes this royal commission is justified. Police matters were last debated in this Parliament in March. In concluding a no confidence motion directed at the Minister for Police I said:

I rather suspect that, if this motion is not carried and if this Minister survives for the time being, we will . . .find ourselves reopening this debate.

If the Minister's record is any indication, we will be doing so sooner rather than later. Within two months we now revisit the subject of this Minister's incompetence and the danger that that creates for the Police Service and the men and women of the State. I also said on that occasion:

The honourable member for South Coast has maintained an urgent need for a royal commission into policing in New South Wales. That is one response to the persistence of problems with the New South Wales Police Service.

During this debate my various colleagues will present material that leads them to believe a royal commission is the only way forward. The honourable member for Charlestown, a former serving officer in the New South Wales police, will present material to the House about police links with brothels and the inactivity of police in responding to serious and legitimate complaints. The honourable member for Heffron will talk about the material that led her to champion successfully in this Parliament in November a motion calling for a judicial inquiry into paedophilia and police involvement in covering up paedophilia. Surely there is no more serious, extreme and grotesque example of police corruption. Other Opposition members will detail a range of matters of concern.

The honourable member for South Coast has presented a damning case to this Parliament. He has detailed material given to this Minister by his predecessor that points to a network of police corruption in this State that this Minister has failed to follow up. Some of that material deals with the scandal of drug exhibits and kilos of heroin; it deals with allegations of new material pointing to substantial corruption in the fraud squad. If what the honourable member for South Coast says is true, the fraud squad is engaged in a ludicrous example of privatisation and contracting out of its work, with pay-offs to a disgraced former police officer operating as a private detective.

The honourable member for South Coast rehashed the question of the former police Minister's evidence about police in drug work trapped in a culture that prevents them informing on other police. If ever there is any suggestion of police corruption spanning paedophilia and drugs, I suggest that there is an urgent requirement on this House and every member to take notice. The fundamental question is: will any of us be happy walking out of this Chamber
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tonight knowing in the face of this evidence that we voted against a full and open inquiry in the form of a royal commission?

Do honourable members want to have that on their conscience, as elected members of the New South Wales Parliament? Evidence suggests there is a case for believing that the problem of corruption in dealing with drugs and of police involvement with paedophilia - this most grotesque form of police corruption - have been left unresolved. When we are presented with evidence like this do we go for the bold course of a full and powerful inquiry to have the matters resolved to the satisfaction of the public, or do we live with the Premier's half measures? In view of the persistence of the evidence, I say we go for a full and open inquiry, that we have a royal commission.

Here is a Premier who, in his previous role as Minister for Industrial Relations, without any agonising, without any hand wringing, without any debate, established an inquiry into the building industry to rub out the building unions. The inquiry continued for how long? The inquiry soaked up how many millions of dollars of public money? Not one officer of a building union is behind bars. There has been no result. The lawyers walked away with millions of dollars but, in terms of priority, what counts more? Does not the possibility of police corruption involving sexual assault on children and the possibility of police corruption in the retailing of drugs count more? Would this not justify a royal commission more easily, more readily? If honourable members had to take their chances, would they opt for it in this case, rather than an inquiry into industrial relations in the building industry?

If one-quarter of what the honourable member for South Coast said turns out to be true, Opposition members would have it on their consciences if they did not opt for a royal commission. The reasons the Opposition believes a royal commission is justified are: first, the case for a judicial inquiry into the failure of police to resolve the matter of the Blue Mountains bombing. The Minister would not answer four questions in this Parliament on that issue, which leaves the Opposition with no alternative but to seek a judicial inquiry. If there is to be a judicial inquiry on that matter, why should the Government not wrap it up with a royal commission on the range of matters that the honourable member for South Coast has also presented?

Second, in November this Parliament passed a very considered resolution requiring a judicial inquiry into allegations of paedophilia - the involvement of public officials, including police, in covering up this most obnoxious of crimes. That resolution is on the books. The Government expressed a preference for an inquiry by the Independent Commission Against Corruption, and I listened to the Attorney General put his case on that. When all is said and done, however, the case for a royal commission into police involvement in paedophilia and other matters of policing, is overwhelming. This is the position. The Parliament, I would think, is ready to listen sympathetically to debate on a motion calling for a judicial inquiry into the failure of police to investigate the Blue Mountains bombing and the Parliament has already carried a motion seeking a judicial inquiry into paedophilia. With those two resolutions, we are three-quarters of the way towards a royal commission on police matters in general.

Third, the batch of new allegations about the presence of racism within the Police Service justifies a royal commission. The honourable member for South Coast presented evidence that, on its face, leads one to believe that there is horrendous prejudice against an Aboriginal police officer. That comes on top of evidence presented earlier in this Parliament concerning the Vo matter, which suggested obnoxious police behaviour towards an Australian of Asian descent. I believe this Parliament ought to be sending an unambiguous message to the community that racism in our institutions - least of all in the police force - is not to be tolerated. Let us put an end to that. The Minister for Multicultural and Ethnic Affairs is prepared to preen himself whenever he thinks he can get some good publicity, saying the politically correct and appropriate things, but the Government is prepared to delay an open and honest inquiry that is needed to put an end to any hint of racism in the Police Service.

I come to another matter that has greatly concerned me for the past six months. The Jewish community in this State has been appalled by fire bombings of synagogues and community centres. If a similar attack had occurred on the Christian community, it would be equivalent, perhaps, to the fire bombing of 10,000 churches in this State. That is the proportionate measure of this crime. Can we really live with a situation where the police are unable to solve that crime; are unable to come up with an answer to a crime of hate and violence directed against one of the ethno-religious groups that make up our multicultural society?

The Jewish community has been quiet about this matter. Police investigations have continued for years and no conclusion has been reached. My patience on this matter, given my contacts with the community, is at an end. I want to know why the Police Service cannot resolve these crimes of hate. Why can there not be effective police measures that guarantee one part of the Australian community protection from these crimes of hate and violence. If it cannot be done, if it is beyond the capacity of the Police Service to resolve such a crime - to get National Action, or whoever else is responsible - I want to know why, because the community is not being given the level of protection it deserves.

Another reason which demonstrates a royal commission is unavoidable relates, of course, to the weighty matters raised by the honourable member for South Coast. At the top of the list of my concerns in respect of the material the honourable member has brought to the attention of this House, is the evidence of entrenched and systematic corruption in the fraud
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squad. The final reason for the Opposition's justification for supporting a royal commission is all the evidence, climaxing today in statements by Mr Mant, about the Government's determination to wind down the ICAC. The Premier ended his defensive speech to the House this afternoon by saying that this would be a vote of no confidence in the ICAC.

Let me table 24 statements by Ministers in this Government, attacking the ICAC. Honourable members will remember the famous statements by the honourable member for Barwon and all the madcap boyos in the National Party - someone called Mr Moppett complaining of trial by innuendo in November 1989; saying that it was no longer possible to await the ICAC's final report before questioning whether the commission was serving the public interest. The attacks by this Government continue for page after page. On 29 May 1990, the honourable member for Barwon said there would need to be changes to the ICAC, "things to be put in and things to be taken out". The mind boggles. The sooner the honourable member retires to shoot pheasants at Moree, the better.

It was not so long ago that the former Deputy Premier suggested the ICAC was dealing in methods "more appropriate to the Spanish Inquisition than to Australia in 1990". There are pages of attacks on the ICAC, reaching the position today where the acting commissioner had to accuse the Government of behaving either corruptly or incompetently in its dedication to winding down the ICAC. The Government should not, least of all today, push the ridiculous line that somehow this motion, supported by the Opposition, is an attack on the ICAC. Let me deal with one of those concerns in particular, and that is the question of the Blue Mountains bombing. I want to make this point. I am not talking about the allegations that have been made involving the honourable member for Blue Mountains; I am talking about the bombing of the Blue Mountains City Council chambers in 1992. The Opposition has given this Government every opportunity to provide an explanation for this most serious question of why police investigations into that bombing came to nothing. I will give honourable members an account of it. In this Chamber on 12 April I asked the Minister for Police and Minister for Emergency Services:

Have police still not found the person responsible for the bombing of Blue Mountains City Council chambers in March 1992?

That was the question. What was the reply? The Minister said:

After a break of a few weeks we could not have had a more bumbling question than that. I will look at the specific questions and advise the Leader of the Opposition in due course.

Dismissed out of hand! Not to be deterred, on 14 April I asked the Premier - why question the monkey when you can question the organ grinder:

Has the Premier sought an explanation for the complete failure of the police to find the person responsible for the bombing of the Blue Mountains City Council in March 1992? Have the police offered any reason why, in two years, the matter has not been resolved?

That was a genuine inquiry. A building was bombed. By sheer chance no one was killed, because one minute before the bomb went off someone walked through the door to which the bomb was attached and entered the council chamber. He saw the device and assumed it was a practical joke. Some joke! Council chambers were bombed. All sorts of promises were made by the local constabulary that there would be a proper inquiry. That bombing occurred in March, and we were told in the Sydney Morning Herald on 16 March 1992 that the police investigation was headed by Detective Sergeant Bill Herron of the northwest major crime squad. The next day, according to the police reports, they had 40 suspects; a fortnight later, they had only one. Within days there were reports to police in the Blue Mountains of bomb threats being made against constituents.

In mid-August a Katoomba detective sergeant, Phil Gaspert, appealed for the public to come forward with information. He said investigations had come to a halt. That is just about the last we heard about it, until the Opposition raised in this Chamber the matter of the bomb threats and the 1992 bombing. We have done that, as I said, on these several occasions. In fact on 14 April I asked two questions directed to the Government about whether there was any available explanation - just out of interest, just in passing - why the police investigation into this serious crime had come to absolutely nothing. On 5 May the Deputy Leader of the Opposition asked a question directed to the Premier:

Have police yet offered an explanation for the failure of the first inquiry into the Blue Mountains bombing? Will the Premier order an inquiry into the failure of the investigation?

That was the fourth question the Opposition asked in a couple of weeks about what I would think by any test is a serious concern: whether the bombing of a public building, the Blue Mountains City Council chambers, had been properly investigated and whether there was any explanation for the fact that the bomber had not been apprehended. Again the Premier said, "There is an investigation taking place now". But as on the previous occasion that was not the question. The Opposition wanted to know why the original inquiry had failed, why there had never been an explanation for its failure, why this most serious crime was just allowed to slip away, and why interest in it was allowed to peter out. That was the question. It has never been answered, and the Minister wonders why the Opposition is supporting a move for a royal commission. I do not think it is good enough for you to say, "We can live with a bombing of council chambers. Investigations will come to nothing. How dare you get up in the Parliament and ask about it!"

I have copies of four questions in Hansard, including: "Give us an explanation. Will there be an inquiry? Will there be a proper investigation?" "No", says the Minister, "We are just going to let this one peter out". No explanation, no answers. Then, of course, we were forced to raise in the Parliament the condemnation of the detective sergeant who was
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involved in this matter. Detective Sergeant Gaspert, who was in charge of this investigation, was condemned. We read the letter of 27 April, in which the Ombudsman told the honourable member for Heffron that he had found that Detective Sergeant Gaspert had failed to properly and competently investigate a complaint made in relation to a sexual assault upon a child. There is the condemnation.

The same police officer was in charge of the investigation into the Blue Mountains bombing. The Minister is telling us and, through us, the people of this State, that we have to live with that level of incompetence and lack of integrity in New South Wales policing. The message he is sending out to the men and women in the New South Wales Police Service is that he will allow that to take place, that he regards that as standard and acceptable behaviour. Does he not have any inkling, stupid as he is, of the way he is devaluing the work of the men and women in the New South Wales Police Service? Does he have any idea what a betrayal his approach is of those honest men and women who are struggling to do a good job in the New South Wales Police Service?

Mr ACTING-SPEAKER (Mr Hazzard): Order! The Leader of the Opposition has the call.

Mr CARR: The approach of the Government to the allegations made - the package of material presented by the honourable member for South Coast, the approach by this Minister to the matters the Opposition has raised four times in the Parliament about the Blue Mountains bombing - represents a betrayal of those men and women in the Police Service, but it also represents a huge lost opportunity to do better with policing in New South Wales. The people the Labor Party represents have never paid more in State taxes and charges and they have never received less in terms of a government commitment to give them a safer community and effective policing. The men and women in the front line of the New South Wales Police Service are risking their lives. They have never been called on to do more, and the Minister cannot even effectively resolve their current industrial campaign. Such is his support for them that he is leaving them the lowest paid police in Australia. That is his support for them! That is the level of his commitment to them.

Let me summarise the Opposition's case for a royal commission. It is a case that will be elaborated on by my colleagues with specific interests and concerns. Our patience with this Government has run out. This Minister is not reacting to legitimate public concern. I said, when we concluded the debate in March, that this matter would be revisited and, knowing the inadequacies of this Minister, that it would be sooner rather than later. And here we are! A judicial inquiry into the Blue Mountains bombing, for which I believe majority support exists in this Parliament, and a judicial inquiry into paedophilia, which is already the subject of a resolution of this Parliament, take us already three-quarters of the way towards a royal commission and into a broader range of matters of police integrity.

In addition to that, the allegations of racism in the service mean that all of us, aware as we are of representing a multicultural society, are obliged to speak out and call for effective action. All the allegations raised by the honourable member for South Coast must be explored rather than left unexplored, especially those most serious allegations about the fraud squad. In the context of this Government's commitment to wind down the ICAC, it is incumbent upon this House to carefully weigh the arguments for a royal commission as opposed to an ICAC investigation.

There is no reason that a royal commission cannot work closely with the existing apparatus of the ICAC, but a royal commission has that additional focus. If there were any reservations about the stand the Opposition would take, the Premier's trepidation this afternoon, his defensiveness when faced with the prospect of a royal commission, would, I am afraid, tip the balance. Let police whistleblowers come forward with the full range of protection being offered by the royal commission. Do not let it be on our consciences that we walked out of this Parliament tonight not having provided for the fullest investigation of the matters that have been placed before this Parliament.

Ultimately, the argument for a royal commission is this: it is the Government's inactivity that has left the Opposition with no alternative. If the Opposition did not want a royal commission, if it were seeking arguments against having a royal commission, the Government's inactivity on all these fronts - the evidence of racism in the force, the matters raised by the honourable member for South Coast on drug exhibits, the fraud squad, the failure of this Minister to act on matters put before him by his predecessor, the question of paedophilia, the Blue Mountains bombing above all, the strange inactivity, the reluctance to answer questions put to the Minister on that score - would make the difference.

A royal commission provides a focus, some guarantee to the community that these matters will be exhaustively explored. The Government's readiness to hold a royal commission when it thinks it can bully the building unions stands in stark contrast to its fear of a royal commission on this front. I believe the case is overwhelming. I believe the balance of probabilities pushes towards the inevitability of this full, comprehensive and powerful public inquiry into the matters before the House today.

Mr GRIFFITHS (Georges River - Minister for Police, and Minister for Emergency Services) [5.51]: I support the Premier's and the Government's opposition to the motion. Two things are significant. For the past 30 minutes I have listened to the drama queen. Then he scurried out of the House. He is not interested in the debate. He has walked out. Where is the honourable member for South Coast? Where has he been for 45 minutes? He has been giving a press conference. He is not interested in this debate. What do we have? Carr's chaos; absolute chaos.

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This motion is nothing less than a vote of no confidence in the Independent Commission Against Corruption, and that is what one gets from Carr's chaos. We have listened to the drama queen - part of a deliberate campaign to undermine public confidence in the great institutions of this State. The aim is to destroy the confidence in the New South Wales Police Service. I have said it is the best in the world: it is. Yet honourable members have to sit and listen to the garbage trawled out by the drama queen and by the little corruption fighter from the South Coast.

I remember saying last year that the Government sent people far and wide to find out what evidence he has ever provided, what corruption he has found, but they all came back with a blank sheet of paper. The result, I believe, will be to destroy the confidence in this Parliament if we continue down this track. Those who support the motion should take a long hard look at the motives of Carr's chaos. Do they honestly wish to achieve something of value in the area of police corruption or are they only interested in their personal and political agendas or tomorrow's headlines? It makes one wonder.

Does the Opposition have evidence or does it have vague rumour, speculation and personal prejudice, which are the hallmarks of the honourable member for South Coast? If this motion is to be judged on the facts, it will fail. If we look back in history - and hell, we have been taken back 20 years tonight; I do not have a clue who the Minister was 20 years ago - there are many examples of police conduct of which we would all be ashamed. The scale of corruption in New South Wales, up until 1988 -

[Interruption]

I will get to Wran soon. The scale of corruption was so extensive, so all-pervading that it was acknowledged by everyone, except perhaps the governments of the day.

[Interruption]

The ICAC should investigate many things. On many occasions in the recent past the Parliament has debated political issues. The honourable member for Waratah said he did not know the difference between the left-wing and the right-wing of his own party. That is why he has been consigned to the backbenches and that is where he will stay until he departs. He has no interest whatsoever in the discussion. On many occasions in this House we have reflected on the shameful era when the Australian Labor Party presided over a corrupt police service and gave the green light to Neddy Smith and to Roger Rogerson. What about Bill Allen? The Opposition can pin medals on its chest for that.

[Interruption]

Members of the Opposition do not like it, do they? The truth is hurting. Benny is trying to get his numbers to roll Bob, because after the drama queen's performance tonight, Benny is a shoo-in. He has to take him.

Mr ACTING-SPEAKER (Mr Hazzard): Order! I call the honourable member for Ashfield to order.

Mr GRIFFITHS: The honourable member for Ashfield will certainly lose, and he has the numbers, but I know that the honourable member for Ashfield is not telling the Leader of the Opposition. He is trying to keep it confidential. He does not have an electorate, but he might get the leadership.

[Interruption]

I have an electorate. Does the honourable member for Ashfield have an electorate? Carr's chaos!

Mr ACTING-SPEAKER (Mr Hazzard): Order! I call the honourable member for Cronulla to order. I call the honourable member for Ashfield to order for the second time.

Mr GRIFFITHS: Now we know we are striking a real nerve in the incompetents of Carr's chaos: the corruption over which the ALP prevailed. The police force of the early 1980s was described by Mr Justice Lusher as poorly managed, poorly structured, poorly trained, tolerant of corruption and unresponsive to the community. Any reasonable person knows two significant events changed that sorry picture for ever, and I defy him to disagree with me. The first was the appointment of John Avery as Commissioner of Police in 1984; the second was the establishment by the Government in 1988 of the Independent Commission Against Corruption. It is, perhaps, difficult for those whose lifework has been dedicated to the proposition that all our police are corrupt to accept that New South Wales is a very different place from what it was 20 years ago.

It may be even more difficult to accept that there have been achievements without any personal glory accruing to them. However, those are the facts. New South Wales as a whole, and its Police Service in particular, is a much cleaner place than it was two decades ago, yet we have today the perverse notion that because this Government has brought numerous corrupt officers to book, the Parliament and the community can have no confidence in the work of the standing royal commission on corruption, the ICAC. That is complete and absolute nonsense. Would the honourable member for South Coast be satisfied if no police had been investigated, charged or dismissed from the Police Service since the institution of the ICAC? I think not.

Would he be happy if 100, 1,000 or 10,000 officers were purged from the New South Wales Police Service? Of course not, for he would then say that it was conclusive evidence of a police service riddled with corruption. It is simply a case of heads I win; tails you lose. I take this opportunity to refer the House to Hansard of 26 October last when, in debate concerning the findings of the Chief Magistrate in the Australian Capital Territory in the Winchester case it is recorded that the Coroner said:

Page 2306

I have no doubt that Mr Hatton and others sincerely believe that their theories are correct . . . I gained the clear impression that Mr Hatton held his beliefs and theories on this question so strongly that he appeared unwilling to jeopardise those theories when faced with hard evidence or arguments to the view that was contrary to his own. He seemed to be operating from the perspective that his theories and views on the subject were absolutely correct and that despite evidence forthcoming that might cast some doubt upon his theories, somehow, a wider and deeper inquiry would produce evidence that would verify his theories.

Today the same scenarios were being played out in this House; his paranoia coming through once again. There is no question that the honourable member for South Coast holds the strongest conviction on this matter - I do not doubt that. There is no question that he believes his theories - I do not doubt that. The question is: should this House vote down the most powerful anti-corruption institution ever seen in this State's history on a theory held by one man, no matter how well motivated? The question for this House is whether it will join him in this most cynical of motions. The Government and I are rightly proud that in the past two years at least 57 officers have left the Police Service while under investigation. If it is to be argued that they should, perhaps, have been brought to book, we need to closely examine that contention. I did so as I, like many others, was uneasy that there was an appearance that these people were walking away from the most serious of allegations.

Let me for one moment consider the situation with some rationality, something that is devoid of Carr's chaos. First, no person, whether within or outside the police, is above the law; no person is beyond the reach of the criminal justice system. It matters not whether they remain in a police uniform. In fact, there have been a number of celebrated cases in which former officers have been prosecuted for corruption matters - Roger Rogerson is one such case which readily springs to mind. However, let us be quite open about this. There is a notorious reluctance in the criminal courts to convict police officers accused of corruption. There are a number of reasons for that, including the fact that corruption allegations are a very convenient way for criminals to divert police from their job. Also, the only evidence of such acts often relies on persons of questionable character. Juries rightly find it extremely difficult to accept the credit of such persons without substantial corroboration.

If we are looking solely to the criminal justice system to rid our Police Service of corruption, that may not achieve the results we all desire. Even the Police Association acknowledges that the acquittal rate for police is much higher than the rate for any other class of defendants. One alternative is to use the police discipline process to act against those suspected of corruption. It is at this point that we must be very clear. The most serious penalty that can be imposed on an officer under discipline is dismissal. When during the course of an internal investigation a suspect seeks to resign from the Police Service, a value judgment must be made. Should the resignation be accepted and that person removed from the Police Service immediately, or should it be rejected and the disciplinary process completed in the hope of a dismissal some time in the future?

The decision in New South Wales has been to remove officers under investigation at the first available opportunity. If a resignation is offered, it would as a rule be accepted. In that way the community is protected from corrupt officers immediately. One other point needs to be understood on the matter: that even if an officer is eventually dismissed for misconduct, there is little if any impact on that officer's superannuation or other entitlements. Whilst the same may not always be the case when there is a criminal conviction, dismissal for disciplinary offences currently carries no significant pecuniary penalty.

The other aspect which cannot be lost in the maze of allegations is that before a police officer is discharged from the Police Service on medical grounds he or she must satisfy an independent committee - I stress, an independent committee - that he or she is suffering from a real duty-related injury. It is not a case of people simply slipping out the back door; they must face a committee of the superannuation authority. That is a matter in which the Government has already signalled an interest, and it will no doubt be addressed in the current review of police discipline by the justice committee of the Cabinet. On this issue, when looking at the situation in comparable jurisdictions, I received some reassurance from the memoirs of Sir Robert Mark, a former commissioner of the London metropolitan police. That organisation has faced similar problems in the past 10 years. Sir Robert said:

Perhaps the best evidence of the effectiveness of the discipline system is that during my four years and 11 months as commissioner, 478 men left the force following or in anticipation of criminal or disciplinary proceedings. Only 76 of them have been subjected to the formal proceedings, 50 of them by way of prosecution. 402 had therefore anticipated their likely fate by resignation.

That statement is from a commissioner of police who faced the same problems being tackled in New South Wales today. I, for one, am not prepared to say that he was wrong. Nor will I say that the current approach is wrong. Much has been made of the way in which those officers within the Police Service who have had the courage to come forward in the past 10 years have been treated by their colleagues. All right-minded members of the community share that concern. They are called whistleblowers, but to me they are simply honest police who take seriously their sworn duty to serve the public without fear or favour.

Let us examine what has been done to deal with these most serious issues. In response to the difficulties uncovered by the recent Independent Commission Against Corruption inquiry, the Police Service implemented an internal informers policy. I will in no way move away from the position that there have been internal informers in the New South Wales Police Service treated in a manner that I consider quite shameful. The Premier nominated two of those officers tonight. I will not mention names. I have
Page 2307
always made it a habit not to name officers in any way. I have seen too many officers' careers destroyed and their families devastated by the irresponsible actions of members opposite in naming officers - and we have seen it happen in the last few days.

Those people have not been treated well in the past. That will change, and we will make sure that it does. The service was endorsed by the ICAC; it was not as a result of any royal commission or any legislation from this place. There has been considerable interest from around Australia in this scheme. It is acknowledged that New South Wales leads the country in providing the protection and encouragement so desperately needed for such individuals, to protect them from harassment or worse. The scheme will continue to be developed. One cannot walk away from the past and deny how shamefully some officers have been treated. I was delighted to hear the Premier offer an apology on behalf of the Government in that regard.

The Senate Select Committee on Public Interest Whistleblowing has shown considerable interest in the New South Wales police scheme. Given the long-held interest of the honourable member for South Coast in public sector whistleblowing, I wonder whether he will persist in his condemnation of the Police Service's efforts in this field. I wonder whether his objections are not really based on the fact that the scheme was developed without his direct input. I will not compromise that scheme by publicising its fine detail in this place. The well-being of those individuals is simply too important for them to be used as some type of political cannon-fodder in this debate.

The scheme is in place, it has been endorsed by the Independent Commission Against Corruption and it will be continually reviewed in consultation with the ICAC to ensure that it meets the needs of those who seek its protection. There is no doubt that what we are witnessing is a justifiable outpouring of anger, frustration and resentment from those who had the courage to come forward over the past decade. The Government is doing everything it can for those individuals. But the scars are fresh; they will heal with time. The real test is whether an officer who comes forward today receives the same treatment as those who came forward five years ago. Some may be sceptical; I am more optimistic. I believe that once again the problem needs to be tackled in a systematic way. I believe it will be tackled by people with great resolve.

What we have seen today is nothing more than the latest instalment of the vendetta of the honourable member for South Coast against the Commissioner of Police. Make no mistake about that. This Parliament has had many opportunities in recent times to examine the circumstances which surrounded the resignation of my predecessor. A joint select committee examined the issue for over a year. It produced a sensible and balanced report, a report which was accepted by all responsible members of this Parliament. That report, of course, was rejected out of hand by the honourable member for South Coast. The reason for that rejection was that the facts, the evidence presented, did not fit with his conspiracy theory. If it does not fit with his conspiracy theory, he rejects it. This is the same behaviour that motivated the honourable member's actions in regard to the Winchester inquest and, indeed, this motion.

The honourable member for South Coast is incapable of accepting the umpire's verdict. Since the select committee reported, the honourable member has continued to pursue his own theories, like a poor man's Sherlock Holmes. Let there be no mistake: this is not a motion about police corruption. If it were, new evidence would be presented. I love the way the honourable member for South Coast reels things off, gets confused, gets disjointed, and then says, "I have just given you the evidence". That is why it never goes anywhere. It is fantasy, not fact. This is a motion about the honourable member for South Coast and his attempt to bring down the Commissioner of Police at any cost. It bemuses me that a man who has gone about this town boosting himself as a corruption fighter would pick as his target someone who has stood in the front line of the fight against corruption. As the more sensible members opposite - I grant you that there are not many; I know of one - will attest, the commissioner was the man who exposed the notorious activity of George Freeman.

Mr Gibson: Which one?

Mr GRIFFITHS: The honourable member for Liverpool. He was punished by the police hierarchy for that exposure and sent to the Blue Mountains. He was the man hand-picked by John Avery to break up the corrupt networks in the CIB. The commissioner is a man who has built his career on integrity. He is seen by most dispassionate observers as the epitome of the honest cop. Given these facts, can we honestly entertain the notion that this commissioner would be tolerant of corruption? Of course not. Indeed, in many of the cases trawled before the Parliament today the commissioner was the instigator of action against corruption. I return now to the real effect of this motion, which is to undermine the one institution that can provide us with a real and sustainable cultural change in the New South Wales Police Service - the Independent Commission Against Corruption.

In effect, what the motion says is that the ICAC cannot be trusted to pursue police involved in corruption. I was astounded to hear the honourable member for South Coast say that the ICAC is corrupt. Everyone is corrupt except the member for South Coast. He trivialised not just the work done on major investigations, such as that into the release of confidential government information, which was known as Operation Tambo, and that into the relationship between police and criminals, Operation Milloo, but also its corruption prevention projects. What those whose preoccupation is with scalps fail to realise is that action against corruption needs not just individual vigilance but strict structural guidelines to
Page 2308
minimise opportunities for corruption. That approach recognises the reality that police, particularly in high risk areas such as gaming, vice and drugs, stand at the very edge of corruption. There must be put in place systems which prevent, not just pursue.

That is certainly the case in the areas already addressed by the ICAC, such as the management of criminal records, systems of criminal investigations and the dealing with internal informers. The ICAC was closely involved in the development and monitoring of the Police Service's corruption prevention plan. It is now said that they were worthless exercises. It is now alleged that the comments of the then Commissioner of the ICAC saying that there has been a noticeable turnaround in the willingness of the Police Service to participate in such projects were corrupt. A royal commission must necessarily traverse the same ground already covered by the ICAC. Passing the motion means that the body cannot be trusted to do the work this very Parliament entrusted it to do. What if the royal commission does not produce the results so fervently pursued by the honourable member for South Coast over the past 18 years? Paranoia personified. What if there is no damning indictment of every serving police officer in this State? Will this House then face a motion calling for another inquiry into the royal commission? Will we then be asked again simply to accept that the honourable member for South Coast is the final authority on police corruption matters?

This is an issue fundamental to the peace and good order of the government of New South Wales. This is an attack on the very institutions of our State that have achieved direct results in cleaning up the Police Service. It is a crusade which, if allowed to succeed, may ultimately jeopardise the future of policing in New South Wales. In many ways we have seen the business of government thrown into chaos by the deliberate obstruction of the Opposition, occasionally aided and abetted by the mover of this motion. In my experience that has been no better demonstrated than in the progress of the New South Wales Police Service. A royal commission would serve to do nothing other than distract those very police who are charged with maintaining the momentum built up under this Government to drive corruption out of the New South Wales Police Service. Those efforts would be suspended for who knows how long - six months, a year or two years - while a royal commission lumbered along, consuming millions of taxpayers' dollars to rake over the coals of the fevered imagination of the honourable member for South Coast, to feed his paranoia. As taxpayers, we cannot afford to feed his paranoia.

This is not a prospect that should be tolerated by this House. The Parliament's obligation is first and foremost to the people of this State, not to the member for South Coast. In fulfilling that obligation every member of this House must look closely at the facts. They must be put into proper context. Members must look to their own consciences and decide what is best for the State. In this case the choice is clear: either some self-defeating exercise in political opportunism or, as this motion implies, a destruction of the work already done and the work that is in progress.

No one would seriously suggest that police corruption is not a serious issue. No one would suggest that every one of the 12,000 sworn officers is above suspicion. But no reasonable person could not say that under this Government there has been real progress and an absolute commitment to hounding out those acts that are a stain on the character of every honest and dedicated police officer. The passage of this motion would signal an end to the process of opening up the Police Service to the scrutiny of the watchdogs that were put in place by this Government, or whose powers have been immeasurably strengthened by it. Only one responsible option exists: to send the allegations made today to the standing royal commission on corruption, the Independent Commission Against Corruption. If there is substance, they will be investigated and the findings will be made public.

[Mr Acting-Speaker (Mr Hazzard) left the chair at 6.17 p.m. The House resumed at 7.30 p.m.]

Mr GRIFFITHS (Georges River - Minister for Police, and Minister for Emergency Services) [7.30]: I shall now turn briefly to the other matters raised in the motion. There is no doubt that when I became Minister I was shocked at the lack of professionalism in the Police Service's own integrity watchdog, the professional responsibility command. That command was burdened by a mountain of paperwork. It seemed that it was somewhat caught by the rapid increase in the number of complaints made against police. The Ombudsman's inquiry into the Angus Rigg matter, the findings of the Joint Select Committee upon Police Administration, and the recently completed Milloo inquiry by the Independent Commission Against Corruption provide graphic evidence of the potential consequences of that situation. In the critical area of information records management the Police Service has already commenced the most comprehensive review in its history. The servicewide review was preceded by a review into the internal affairs branch. As a result, a new computer system has been installed. The new system records each complaint and tracks its progress.

The odds of cases falling through cracks are now much lower than they have been at any time in the history of the Police Service. Since my appointment as Minister there has been action, not just words; and that action has spread from the top of the service to the bottom. A new dynamic commander, Assistant Commissioner Jeff Jarratt, has been appointed to the professional responsibility command. Even the honourable member for South Coast says that he has respect for Assistant Commissioner Jeff Jarratt. I am delighted that the honourable member for South Coast has now come into the House. I was under the impression that he was no longer interested in the debate. He showed a shameful reticence to support his own police during the Angus Rigg inquiry.

Mr Hatton: That's a lie.

Page 2309

Mr GRIFFITHS: The people of Milton know that their local member went missing when the chips were down, when it really counted.

Mr Hatton: That's a lie.

Mr GRIFFITHS: I shall talk about lies in a minute. The professional responsibility command has been reorganised. A new Commander of Internal Affairs, formerly with the ICAC, Chief Superintendent Geoff Schuberg, has also been appointed. For the record, one should disregard 90 per cent of the allusions made by the honourable member for South Coast in relation to people and appointments because 90 per cent of them were wrong. He spoke about internal affairs being corrupt and being off track and then he told us what a great guy Chief Superintendent Geoff Schuberg is. Chief Superintendent Schuberg is a great guy. He is also the commander of internal affairs - another confusion on the part of the honourable member for South Coast.

Even more important, systems have been introduced and a close working relationship with the ICAC and the Ombudsman has been established. These structural and system reforms give real support for the Government's police reform program. The entire thrust of those reforms is to promote police accountability, integrity and management. Since the new arrangements have been put in place an unprecedented agenda of policy reform, in conjunction with the ICAC, has been embarked upon. The reform process has produced real results, as detailed in the Milloo report. Perhaps even more important, the new command team is dedicated to the promotion of a culture of integrity amongst police officers. If we are to build a new culture among police officers, this is perhaps the most important reform of them all.

I shall speak briefly on the integrity of the police promotion system. The claims that have been made form another attack on what has been a very effective watchdog in the most sensitive of areas. In the past the police promotion system was one of patronage, of ensuring that one's mates were promoted. That was clearly evidenced by the promotion of Bill Allen to the position of deputy commissioner when there were real questions about his integrity. What a disgraceful action! Everyone knows that Bill Allen was subsequently demoted to the rank of senior sergeant. Some would say that he should not have been promoted in the first place. If only the former Premier and the Minister of the time, the current but temporary member for Liverpool, had the political will to impose integrity in the promotion system.

As the honourable member for Liverpool knows well, police promotions have always been controversial. The former Labor Government struggled long and hard for a promotion system based on merit. All that was achieved was a promotion system that had the potential for abuse. My predecessor, recognising the abuses under the Labor Government system, established a select committee of the Legislative Council on police promotions. That committee found substantial abuses under the Labor Government scheme. We are constantly reminded of the 12 years of hard Labor to which this State was subjected. The committee's findings were the impetus for substantial reforms that introduced integrity into the promotion system by removing the opportunity for hometown rorts.

At the most senior levels of the Police Service promotions are the responsibility of the Police Board. As a result of amendments passed by this Parliament last year the Police Board comprises five prominent citizens of high integrity. I defy the Opposition and I defy the honourable member for South Coast to cast aspersions on the integrity of those people. The Commissioner of Police and the Director-General of the Ministry of Police are non-voting members of the board, as agreed to by this House. The current members of the board are Mr Don Mackay, Mr George Bennett, Mr John Marsden, Mr Bert Gardner and Ms Cathy Devyre. All current members of the board are persons of the utmost integrity, as were their predecessors - people such as Sir Maurice Byers, Sir Gordon Jackson, Sir James Rowland and, as she is now, Justice Mahla Pearlman. Those people have ensured that senior police promotions are made on the grounds of integrity. Surely even the honourable member for South Coast cannot impugn the integrity of the past and present members of the Police Board. I challenge him to do so if he is so inclined.

Let us stop to examine the recent history of the Police Board. When questions were raised recently concerning the promotion of a certain officer, the board approved the formation of a special internal affairs task force to examine those allegations. Those inquiries extended beyond the New South Wales Police Service and included, for example, the National Crime Authority. Is that the action of an administration under a Minister in a sound-proofed room? What outrageous allegations! The honourable member for South Coast is a disgrace to this House!

Even more telling is the other line of inquiry of the honourable member for South Coast. What was the result of those inquiries? The result was nothing more than a handful of old press clippings and more vague allegations. The honourable member for South Coast goes out to little Arthur and gets his riding instructions. It was little Arthur who gave us all the so-called facts, which are just a series of little notes. I think the problem is that he was locked in that trunk for too long. All that has come forward has been a handful of press clippings and more vague allegations - and, John, you have to admit that. The House is now asked to set up a royal commission to examine police promotions. The history of royal commissions in this State shows that they are successful only if focused on specific incidents. A succession of high-priced lawyers pontificating on a subject about which they know little is not a recipe for good public policymaking.

I now turn to the impartiality of the service and other agencies investigating and pursuing prosecutions, including but not limited to paedophile activity - which is a disgraceful activity, a heinous
Page 2310
crime. I have said on many occasions that there is no more abhorrent crime than the abuse of children, particularly the sexual abuse of children. This is an issue pursued with great vigour by the honourable member for Heffron and one that has been extensively debated in both Houses. The matter has been referred to the ICAC. Once again the honourable member for Heffron scoffs at the ICAC - another member of Carr's chaos casts aspersions on the Independent Commission Against Corruption. The matter is in the hands of the ICAC and again we have a vote of no confidence in the ICAC led by the honourable member for Heffron.

I shall now refer to the investigation of the 1992 bombing of the Blue Mountains City Council, which matter has been raised by the Leader of the Opposition. We saw the drama queen in full flight. The Opposition continually raises this matter for no purpose other than to attract publicity and to divert the Parliament from its important business. There may be cause for concern if there was any question that the police investigation of the attack on the Blue Mountains City Council had not been properly carried out. If that were the case, the Government would support a full inquiry by the most appropriate authority - perhaps the Independent Commission Against Corruption. However, again we have been treated to a paper thin treatment of the allegation by the Leader of the Opposition - another tissue of vague allegations, innuendo and complete lack of facts.

For a change, let us look at the facts. I am advised that at about 11.19 p.m. on 3 March 1992 an explosion occurred at the Blue Mountains City Council following a council meeting. Fortunately, no person was seriously injured, though one person was treated for shock. Katoomba police immediately responded and commenced investigation. Those detectives were assisted by members of the physical evidence unit, which collected samples of the device for scientific analysis. I am informed that since that time more than 50 persons have been interviewed, including everyone who was present at the meeting that evening.

It appears that there are no witnesses to the actual planting of the device. A number of persons were nominated during initial inquiries as potential suspects. I am advised that every one of those leads was pursued by investigating police. I am also advised that each person produced a satisfactory alibi for his or her whereabouts. No doubt in ordinary circumstances this would be a difficult investigation. Let there be no mistake: little or no direct evidence is available. The police report of the investigation has been hampered by what can only be described as factional fights both within the Blue Mountains City Council and within sections of the Blue Mountains community.

These disputes have led to allegations and counter allegations by the pro-development and the anti-development lobby groups. The allegations extend to the point at which anonymous letters have been received by the police seeking to implicate various individuals from either side of the development fence. Of course, those allegations have not been ignored. In fact, each letter was fingerprinted in an attempt to identify its source, but without success. This investigation is open and ongoing; it may only require some genuine co-operation to advance it. I say genuine co-operation because I have in mind the sham that has been perpetrated in this place over the past six weeks by the Opposition.

That investigation is not the only action taken by the Police Service in this matter. Honourable members would recall that following the raising of certain allegations by the Opposition concerning threats allegedly made to a local newspaper an investigation was launched by detectives from the major crime squad at Parramatta. The second phase of that inquiry is about to commence. Again it is worth restating the terms of reference for that investigation:

1. To review the quality of the original investigation carried out into all matters reported to the police on this subject; and

2. To make appropriate recommendations (disciplinary and/or procedural) on the above point.

That is the task that has been given to the major crime squad. Despite the best efforts of the Leader of the Opposition, I assure the House that the police have been proceeding with that inquiry without fear or favour. If the Leader of the Opposition were attempting to deliberately derail that investigation for his own shabby political ends, he could not find a better way than these continual attacks under parliamentary privilege on the integrity of the Police Service. We have been subjected to the drama queen in full flight attacking the Police Service without evidence.

To insist on a judicial inquiry at this stage is an absurdity. Police investigations are proceeding; the case is not closed. This motion is a prank of the honourable member for South Coast, and the Leader of the Opposition is copying it - "Let us get the investigation under way, let us jump in while the Minister for Police and the Commissioner of Police cannot comment as the investigation continues". They come into this House with their shabby accusations. The honourable member for South Coast is a disgrace in the way he carries on. Ron Cahill told us that the honourable member never deals with facts. We know he is paranoid about the whole issue.

When will he deal with facts and not fiction? He is constantly bringing fantasy into this House. We experienced his disjointed presentation today when he lost his place on 11 occasions after preparing the matter for three months and having three staff assisting him. That is a disgrace. If we were to have such an inquiry into every unresolved crime, perhaps the Australian Labor Party would seek to have the bashing of Peter Baldwin as the first inquiry: that has not been solved. Maybe we need to go back to Enmore to find out why Peter Baldwin was bashed. Maybe we need to investigate the cabcharge scandal in Enmore. Maybe a few other things need to be
Page 2311
examined. We can certainly do that. Perhaps the Opposition would like to see a judicial inquiry into the Botany council affair or the rezoning of the Coogee Bay Hotel.

Mrs Grusovin: You are very relaxed about that.

Mr GRIFFITHS: The honourable member for Heffron is awake but not too worried. She will be. Let us be serious for the moment. Would the Opposition support an inquiry into the two tragic cases, the Belanglo State Forest murders or the Wanda Beach murders? Many serious crimes remain unresolved, which saddens me, but it is a reality. This motion is not supported by any evidence. If it succeeds, the Opposition and any member who supports it will be guilty of the most gross political interference in this inquiry. No self-respecting judicial officer would conduct an inquiry while a police investigation was ongoing. It would simply turn into another talkfest for the Labor lawyers who have made their hold on Sussex Street so obvious in recent weeks - jobs for the boys and girls.

Under this Government the legal professional has been overhauled and the fat cat Labor lawyers do not like it; we hear them squealing every day. They now have to compete. They have had their restrictive work practices broken; they have been opened up as never before. It would seem that the last bastion of redundant Labor lawyers is now the judicial inquiry. The drama queen will continually call for judicial inquiries to feed his Labor mates. If there is any evidence to support the motion, it should be laid on the table for the Government to consider. The honourable member for South Coast and Opposition members must do what they have failed to do since 1988 - put up or shut-up. He has had almost seven years and all we get is a blank piece of paper. What a disgrace! This is not facts, not evidence, just fantasy he calls facts. It is disjointed garbage.

The substance of this motion, or its lack thereof, has been splashed around this Chamber with great fanfare. None of these matters is new, but I get angry when I hear officers' names thrown around with gay abandon. He destroys officers' lives and careers and traumatises their families. The honourable member for South Coast does not care one iota about the lives he destroys, and particularly the families. He has no consideration for the morale and welfare of those officers. He glances down at his navel and his notes because he is too disgusted to look when I say that he is a disgrace in this House. He has destroyed lives. I find his presence in this House an obscenity.

In particular, a perusal of the proceedings of the joint select committee of this House shows the repeated raising of issues by the honourable member for South Coast. We go through it all the time. He has also deliberately misconstrued the findings of the Joint Select Committee upon Police Administration. As Ron Cahill says, "He never let the facts get in the way of his paranoia". This man has a problem, and I say with all sincerity I pity him for being so twisted in his concern. The insecurity must be eating into him. However, the honourable member for South Coast has made one direct allegation which is new - strange, but it is new. The new allegation is that I, as the responsible Minister, received evidence from the former Minister of gross and widespread corruption in the New South Wales Police Service and that I did nothing about it.

He further charges that the former Minister provided me with numerous files on this matter and that I failed to act, but merely referred them to the Commissioner of Police. That is a barefaced lie and I declare the honourable member for South Coast a liar. It is an absolute lie. It is true and perfectly natural that an incoming Minister to a sensitive portfolio would discuss the current issues. It is not true that I received any evidence which would have led me to seek a further investigation on these matters, particularly on what the honourable member has referred to as Operation Asset. He got confused as he went through names, places, dates and all the rest. As I understand it, that was a matter raised by the former Minister in closed session of the joint select committee. The honourable member for South Coast forgets where he hears some of this rumour and innuendo.

Following the leaking of sensitive information from this closed session to a journalist - yes, a joint parliamentary select committee - which information was the subject of consideration by the Privileges Committee of this Parliament - I wrote to the joint select committee seeking access to those transcripts. I never received them. Similarly, the Commissioner of Police wrote to the committee seeking access to that information. The parliamentary committee refused access to those documents. I am not privy to the deliberations of the joint select committee on this matter, nor should I have been. However, the honourable member for South Coast was a member of that committee and must have participated in its deliberations. He knows that no confidential transcripts were ever supplied to me. He has deliberately lied to this House on this issue - a disgrace.

Those lies cannot go unchallenged. To suggest that I received large numbers of files from the former Minister is again incorrect and a blatant lie. When I assumed office I inherited a clean floor on level 20 of the Avery Building. I am advised that it was some months later, after conclusion of the joint select committee, that I received a number of papers at my Parliament House office. I am also advised that those documents were checked and they contained nothing of any real substance. They, as with the honourable member's allegations, are a tissue of lies and half-truths.

Some two months ago we sat here and endured one of the most cynical exercises ever seen in this place. The Leader of the Opposition moved a motion of no confidence in me that was so patently without substance that the shadow minister hung his head in embarrassment - one could see it. The Leader of the Opposition said then that there were no grounds for a
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royal commission into the Police Service. His thesis was that the ICAC, the Ombudsman and the Police Board provided sufficient independent review of the New South Wales Police Service, and for the first time in my experience he was right. It is rare for the drama queen to be right, but on this occasion he was.

Following the preselection problems at Liverpool, ones that he engineered in the Liverpool south branch, and the ones that are coming like a freight train at Ashfield, he has done a backflip and supports the fevered rantings of the honourable member for South Coast - his continued paranoia. There is no one around who is not aware of the paranoia. Members of the Labor Party have no respect for him but they will follow him to hell because it suits their political ends. When one has a leading member of Carr's chaos who is rarely awake, one can understand why they are going nowhere and will go nowhere.

The Leader of the Opposition has absolutely no shame. He will use and abuse not just the processes of the Parliament but any member when it suits his purposes. He will knife them in the back when he is ready. The honourable member for Liverpool knows it and the honourable member for Ashfield is lining up. We all know that there are problems in the New South Wales Police Service; make no mistake about that. The only way they will be fixed is to support the honest cops now in place, to support the ICAC in its work, and to oppose this motion. What we cannot do tonight is allow cynical politics and obsessed egos to triumph over common sense and effective ongoing reforms. If we bow to the paranoia of the honourable member for South Coast, I will be ashamed to be in this House.

[Debate interrupted.]

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