There is more to Scott Morrison’s secret ministries than mere “weirdness″. This goes to the heart of proper governance in Australia. | Chris Wallace | OPINION auspol
additional ministries he might have secretly appropriated. Within hours, further revelations emerged of him being secretly sworn in as treasurer and minister for home affairs too – hardly something you would forget.of us all, including Morrison’s former cabinet colleagues: “We don’t think, we know” that Australia’s 30th prime minister hasn’t told the full story.
Scott Morrison assumed joint responsibility for portfolios held by Josh Frydenberg, Karen Andrews, Greg Hunt, Mathias Cormann and Keith Pitt.It would be a mistake to write it off as just Morrison weirdness. This secretive multi-ministerial gambit represents a failure of norms at the heart of Australian government that, in a system that relies on good people doing the right thing, has to be restored.
It’s the heart of the department’s Government Division that advises on the operations of government: proper cabinet processes, caretaker conventions, all the protocols and precedents that maintain the Westminster system. The Morrison government “had no respect for” that system, one top official intimately involved in its operations observed this week.Things worsened exponentially under Morrison. While “sometimes grudging”, Abbott largely accepted “the way things should be done”.The descent accelerated under Turnbull, the official said, “because he was desperate to keep the Nats in the tent, and they have never cared for the niceties”.
The deceptive “not illegal” fig leaf has been used as cover for questionable decisions under Morrison in relation to the grants rorting, job stacking and now the unprecedented appointment of and by him to multiple cabinet portfolios.“As if anyone ever thought we would need a law to prevent a prime minister secretly being appointed to other ministerial portfolios,” the official said.
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