SPEAKER’S RULING – ALLEGED DELIBERATELY MISLEADING THE HOUSE MR SPEAKER Honourable Members, On 12 April 2021, the Minister for Tourism Industry Development and Innovation and Minister for Sport wrote to me alleging that the Leader of the Opposition deliberately misled the House on 25 March 2021. The matter relates to a statement made by the Leader of the Opposition during the JobKeeper motion debate. Specifically, ‘Since March each level of government has implemented some form of an assistance package. In the case of the federal government, it works out to be nearly $50 per Australian. Even as we heard this morning with $2 million for financial counselling, it is $1.16 per Queenslander for this House.’ The Minister argued that this is misleading because the statement asserts that the Palaszczuk Government has only provided $1.16 per Queenslander of support for the tourism industry since the onset of COVID- 19. The Leader of the Opposition in his response has argued it is clear that his comment related to funding support for the tourism industry for the period of March 2021, as prefaced by the beginning of the statement. This is reflected in the letter to the Premier concerning COVID-19 funding that he referenced and tabled when making his statement in the House. In considering the referral I had regard to the purpose of Standing Order 269, being that it should be reserved for serious, unresolved matters and not matters that are of a trivial or technical nature. I have decided that at best the matter is trivial or technical in nature and does certainly not warrant the further attention of the House via the Ethics Committee and I will not be referring the matter. I remind all members that allegations of breach of privilege should be confined to significant and important matters. I table the correspondence in relation to this matter. The Honourable Curtis Pitt MP Speaker of the Legislative Assembly 51 Alice Street BRISBANE QLD 4000 Via email: [email protected] Dear Mr Speaker I wish to draw to Mr Speaker’s attention a matter of privilege concerning comments made in the House by the Leader of the Opposition, David Crisafulli MP, during the JobKeeper motion debate on Thursday 25 March 2021. These comments are recorded in the Official Record of Proceedings (Hansard) on page 862. There are three elements to be proven in order to establish that a member has committed the contempt of deliberately misleading the House: 1. The statement must have been misleading; 2. The Member making the statement must have known, at the time the statement was made, that it was incorrect; and 3. In making the statement, the Member intended to mislead the House. 1. The statement must have been misleading During the motion debate the Leader of the Opposition stated: “Since March each level of government has implemented some form of an assistance package. In the case of the federal government, it works out to be nearly $50 per Australian. Even as we heard this morning with $2 million for financial counselling, it is $1.16 per Queenslander for this House.” The statement made by the Leader of the Opposition asserts that the Palaszczuk Government has only provided $1.16 per Queenslander of support for the tourism industry since the onset of COVID-19. It is generally understood that the population of Queensland is about 5 million people. If the Leader of the Oppositions statement is correct that equates to about $5.8 million in support provided by the Palaszczuk Government to the tourism industry. In fact, since the onset of COVID-19, the Palaszczuk Government has committed over $790 million in delivered and planned economic recovery and support for the tourism and events sector. Attached is a spreadsheet with a comprehensive breakdown of the $790 million in support provided. Some of the significant COVID-19 support and recovery measures helping tourism on the ground includes: - $25 million Queensland Tourism Icons Program; - $25 million Growing Tourism Infrastructure Fund 2020; - $15 million to support key regional airports as well as negotiate new or reopen pre-COVID routes; - $5 million COVID-19 International Tourism Adaptation Grant program; - $174 million for tourism related businesses offered through the Industry Support Program; - $137 million in approved loans for 952 tourism businesses under the Small Business COVID-19 Job Support Loans Scheme supporting over 11,600 jobs; - Over $77.9 million in Small Business COVID-19 Adaptation Grants; - $3 million Cairns Holiday Dollar Program - $2 million COVID-19 Marine Tourism Rebate program; and - $6.8 million rebates on marina charges and passenger levies through Ports North, extended until mid-2022. These figures show that the statement made by the Leader of the Opposition is manifestly untrue and clearly misleading. I now turn to the second element. 2. The Member making the statement must have known, at the time the statement was made, that it was incorrect Mr Speaker, I have established that the statements made by the Leader of the Opposition were misleading. It is now necessary to establish that the Member knew that his statement was misleading. In making the statement the Leader of the Opposition refers to a $2 million Financial Counselling support package announced by the Premier that morning. The Leader of the Opposition has also made comments in the media about the $3 million Cairns Holiday Dollars program and the $1 million Great Barrier Reef Education Experience Program, when he said in response to questions asked about the programs on Channel 9 on March 18, 2021: “The Premier headed to the far north at ground zero and failed to open her wallet”. Page | 2 of 4 Another misleading statement, but it establishes the fact the member was aware of the programs, a week before he made the misleading comments in the House. It has been established that the Leader of the Opposition was aware of at least $6 million in support offered by the Palaszczuk Government in just the last few weeks. On December 7, 2020 during the Estimates Committee hearing, the Leader of the Opposition heard numerous statements made during my hearing about the support provided to the tourism industry, including in my opening statement on page 97 of Hansard where I stated: “On top of this, the Palaszczuk government also committed an additional $74 million in new funding under the Rebuilding Queensland Tourism election commitment to ensure a rapid and enduring recovery for the tourism industry, including: $4 million to deliver business capability training for industry; $15 million for Tourism and Events Queensland for a marketing blitz to encourage travellers to experience Queensland; $20 million in events boost to secure more events for Queensland, including $14 million for major events and $1.5 million a year for business events; a $20 million Tourism Activation Fund to activate Queensland tourist experiences across the state; and a$15 million Regional Tourism Organisation Fund to provide a special one-off funding injection into our regional tourism organisations.” On December 7, 2020 during the Estimates Committee hearing, the Leader of the Opposition also asked about $7.7 million in support for cancelled events. The members questions are contained on pages 114 and 155 of Hansard. The Leader of the Opposition has been Shadow Minister for Tourism for more than three years and it is evident that the member is well informed about the hundreds of millions of dollars of support the Palaszczuk Government has provided to the tourism industry since the onset of COVID-19. On this basis I am satisfied, Mr Speaker, that I have established the second element, that the Leader of the Opposition was very aware the statement he was making was misleading. I turn then to the third element. 3. In making the statement, the Member intended to mislead the House Mr Speaker, having established that the statement made by the Member was misleading, and the member knew the statement to be incorrect, it must now be established that the Member intended to mislead the House. In report 129 of the Ethics Committee, it was noted that previous ethics committees and David McGee (McGee), have noted that the standard of proof demanded in cases of deliberately misleading Parliament is a civil standard of proof on the balance of probabilities, but requiring proof of a very high order having regard to the serious nature of the allegations. Page | 3 of 4 McGee further notes that remarks made off the cuff in debate can rarely fall into the category of deliberate mislead, nor can matters about which the member can only be aware of in an official capacity. This cannot be considered such a matter. The statements made by the Leader of the Opposition were a deliberate and calculated attack on the Palaszczuk Government which is evident by the Leader of the Opposition providing similar comments to the Courier Mail for the page 9 story on April 9, 2021, “Voucher scheme doesn’t stack up,” where it is quoted: “Queensland Opposition Leader and tourism spokesman David Crisafulli said the state government had spent more time criticising the federal government over the end of JobKeeper and the controversial aviation recovery package than in addressing the issues affecting tourism operators. “While the Queensland government has been fixated on throwing stones at Canberra, other state leaders have rolled up their sleeves and done some heavy lifting,” he said. “Many businesses in those regions heavily reliant on tourism are doing it incredibly tough, and they need every level of government helping. “A little more state support and a little less crying at Canberra would show they put business survival over politics.” The Leader of the Oppositions comments are a calculated and deliberate attack to mislead the House and the people of Queensland about the level of support being provided to Queensland’s tourism industry during their darkest hour.