by Philip Dorling

 

A new nuclear arms race is accelerating, but Australia won’t be doing much about this threat to global survival. This week’s budget confirms the death of Labor’s nuclear disarmament diplomacy. Former diplomat Philip Dorling explains.

At his AUKUS submarine announcement on 14 March 2023, Prime Minister Anthony Albanese spoke of Australia’s “proud record of leadership” in nuclear non-proliferation. On 17 April Foreign Minister Penny Wong trumpeted Labor’s “proud history” of championing practical disarmament efforts”.

Labor does have a history of disarmament and non-proliferation leadership. In the 1990s Foreign Minister Gareth Evans was an outstanding diplomatic activist with Australia playing important roles in negotiation of the Chemical Weapons Convention, extension of the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty, and the Comprehensive Nuclear Test Ban Treaty. Evans argued before the International Court of Justice that the use and threat of nuclear weapons is illegal. The Canberra Commission produced a landmark report charting steps to achieve the elimination of nuclear arsenals.

 Dollars for diplomacy

Foreign Minister Wong is the latest custodian of Labor’s tradition of middle power disarmament diplomacy. But what are Labor’s priorities now? Well, at the end of the day, money talks and in Tuesday’s Federal Budget the Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade (DFAT) picked up an extra $74.6m for nuclear diplomacy.

Of that, $52.7m is for DFAT to provide “international policy advice and diplomatic support for the nuclear-powered submarine program.” Another $21.9m will go to the Australian Safeguards and Non-Proliferation Office (ASNO) to support the establishment of safeguard arrangements with the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) for the AUKUS project.

All the new money is to support AUKUS.

 AUKUS safeguards

For the AUKUS project to proceed within the framework of Australia’s non-proliferation obligations, Australia must negotiate a special arrangement with the IAEA to allow the use of highly enriched uranium in submarine reactors. We already have a Comprehensive Safeguards Agreement (CSA) with the IAEA that covers civilian nuclear activities. Article 14 of the CSA allows for negotiation of an arrangement with the IAEA to oversee the use of nuclear material for non-explosive military purposes, i.e. nuclear naval propulsion.

It’s challenging to combine the safeguards transparency with the secret world of nuclear submarines; but the Australian Government and IAEA Director General Rafael Grossi appear confident an arrangement can be agreed to enable the IAEA to provide credible assurances that submarine fuel is not being used to manufacture nuclear weapons.

The Government has already affirmed that Australia will be provided with complete, sealed reactor units from which the removal of any nuclear material would be extremely difficult. The reactor fuel will “not be in a form that can be directly used in nuclear weapons without further chemical reprocessing, requiring facilities that Australia does not have and will not seek”. Australia’s wider non-proliferation obligations, including acceptance of IAEA inspections anywhere, anytime will remain in place.

A few days before the 14 March AUKUS announcement, Albanese and Wong wrote to Grossi to open formal negotiations. ASNO Director General Geoff Shaw also forwarded “preliminary design information” to the IAEA.

 Diplomatic dogfight

However despite what DFAT describes as Australia’s “impeccable non-proliferation credentials”, the negotiations are already politically contentious with China claiming AUKUS “poses serious nuclear proliferation risks”. Beijing alleges Australia is “coercing the IAEA Secretariat into endorsement on the safeguards issue”. Chinese diplomats are demanding an “intergovernmental process” involving all IAEA members with any new arrangement “jointly discussed and decided by the international community”.

Australia’s government doesn’t want AUKUS derailed. We’re relying on advice from the IAEA in 1978 that states an Article 14 arrangement can be negotiated with the IAEA Secretariat before being provided to the IAEA Board of Governors for “appropriate action”. Australia would like Grossi to simply submit the negotiated arrangement to the Board as information. However the Board may insist on subjecting the arrangement to its approval. China and Russia will demand that, and they’ll likely vote against any arrangement regardless of its terms. IAEA Board approval is by no means assured. Even if the Board does approve, China won’t leave the matter there. A fractious dispute could drag on for years.

That’s why $74.6m has been committed to AUKUS diplomacy. This large and complex campaign will involve negotiation with the IAEA Secretariat and engagement with the 35 countries on the IAEA Board, indeed with all 176 members. Australia will be funding plenty of IAEA projects, seminars and workshops. In terms of diplomatic effort it’s equivalent to running for election to a seat on the United Nations Security Council, only more controversial and already actively opposed by China and Russia.
All this comes with big opportunity costs.

 A new nuclear arms race

The international situation is deeply worrying. Tension between China and the United States over Taiwan continues to rise. There’s already a naval arms race of which AUKUS is a small part, but the bigger strategic shift is manifest with China’s expansion of its nuclear forces. Construction of hundreds of new silos for a greatly expanded strategic missile force raises the prospect that Beijing is seeking an arsenal much closer to parity with the US.

At the same time, Russia has suspended the New START nuclear arms treaty which will expire in 2026. Moscow’s development of new and potentially destabilising delivery systems makes the future strategic calculus more uncertain. In turn, the prospect of three way nuclear arms competition with China and Russia has led to calls in the US Congress for an expansion of US nuclear forces.

Australian diplomats express concern about “the opaque nuclear arsenal build up in our region”. Others are less coy about the nuclear danger. Veteran foreign policy analyst Professor Joseph Siracusa recently warned that “We are literally on the eve of destruction …

 

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The royal commission into Robodebt, one of the nation’s most shameful episodes of public administration, will be handed down today. No matter what it says, one of the key bureaucrats involved must lose her job, if nothing else, writes Rex Patrick

Even for someone enjoying a $890K a year advisory role inside the Federal government, Kathryn Campbell is unlikely to have been sleeping easy of late. With the findings of the RoboDebt Royal Commission out today, we’ll shortly find out what’s been causing all the tossing and turning for the former bureaucrat in charge of the scheme. There is virtually no chance she will escape unscathed. 

But first, a recap.

Ruined lives 

On 18 August 2022, the Governor-General sent former Queensland Supreme Court Chief Justice, Catherine Ena Holmes AC SC, letters patent establishing a Royal Commission into RoboDebt — one of the most shameful episodes in public administration in recent decades. 

The scheme, which ran from late 2015 to 2019, involved the unlawful debt recovery of Centrelink benefits from hundreds of thousands of the nation’s most in-need. 

Numerous victims of RoboDebt and their families told the commission their stories, bringing home the terrible human cost of an ill-conceived, poorly administered and immoral program.

Commissioner Holmes took evidence over nine weeks from October 2022 to March 2023, hearing from over 100 witnesses, including two former prime ministers, Scott Morrison and Malcolm Turnbull.  

Robodebt was very much a Morrison idea. The then social services minister announced the need for a “strong welfare cop” in 2015. He said the scheme would target  “would-be dole bludgers, disability support pension rorters and terrorists who want to wage war while on government benefits”.

Tens of thousands of thousands of documents have been pried from the hands of reluctant bureaucrats.  As the truth was laid bare, many of those involved claimed it was someone else’s doing. “Not me, them!” One of the tasks of the commission will be to properly attribute responsibility. 

 It is anticipated that the report will be promptly be made public.

Some already know they’re in the gun

Some key players already know what’s coming. That includes a select few senior leaders inside the Federal government.

Under its own practice guidelines, the royal commission will have already issued those in the firing line with a ‘notice of potential adverse finding’ or a “notice of potential referral” (in circumstances where the civil or criminal laws may have been breached) so that they were given the opportunity to make submissions-in-response.

Where the person issued with a notice is a current or former public servant or statutory appointee, the Commonwealth will also have been informed. 

 The Burden of Command

 “In each ship there is one man who, in the hour of emergency or peril at sea, can turn to no other man. There is one who alone is ultimately responsible for the safe navigation, engineering performance, accurate gunfire and morale of the ship. He is the Commanding Officer. He is the ship.” 

 – Joseph Conrad (1857 – 1924).

Morrison may have conceived the politics of “stopping the rorts”.  But as secretary of the Department of Human Services from 2011 to 2017 and then the Department of Social Services until 2021, Kathryn Campbell was the captain of the RoboDebt ship. She was ultimately responsible for its conduct and performance. And the ship ran aground.

She must surely be in possession of a notice from the commission. Given the evidence that was presented to it, it’s impossible that she will be unscathed.  One imagines that her new office in the Australian Submarine Agency, which formally came into operation on 1 July, is packed ready for a quick departure, at a salary saving to the taxpayer of $17,000 per week.

 It Started with A Secret Brief

It’s also wrong that she was given the near $900k a year role as the government’s advisor on AUKUS. Under Section 59 of the Public Service Act Prime Minister Anthony Albanese could have retired Campbell, who by then was secretary of the Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade, without recourse. He had the power to do so, but that didn’t happen.

The story of how Campbell ended up in an exceptionally well-paid and cushy berth in the defence department has been partly uncovered through FOIs and questions asked at estimates by Senators Barbara Pocock and Jacqui Lambie, but getting the unabridged version has been frustrated by Freedom of Information (FOI) obstruction inside government.

https://michaelwest.com.au/whatever-the-robodebt-royal-commission-finds-it-is-perfectly-clear-kathryn-campbell-must-go/

 

 

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The federal opposition leader Peter Dutton has apologised to Robodebt victims (01:18) but has criticised "the glee" of the prime minister, accusing him of politicising the royal commission's report release.

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Read more here: https://www.abc.net.au/news/2023-07-0...

 

Commissioner Catherine Holmes delivered a nearly 1,000-page final report on Friday labelling the Robodebt scheme an "extraordinary saga" that was "crude and cruel" and stemmed from "venality, incompetence and cowardice". In a sealed section, she referred unnamed individuals for civil and criminal prosecution to four Commonwealth agencies, including the Australian Federal Police and the new national anti-corruption commission.

A non-publication order means their identities will remain hidden.

Speaking from the LNP state convention in Brisbane, Peter Dutton was asked whether the Coalition took responsibility for the failure of the scheme. "When the problems were brought to the attention of the government at the time, the program was stopped," Mr Dutton said. "I'm sorry to those people that have been adversely affected, I truly am."

ABC News provides around the clock coverage of news events as they break in Australia and abroad, including the latest coronavirus pandemic updates. It's news when you want it, from Australia's most trusted news organisation.

 

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First senior bureaucrat suspended after Robodebt royal commission | ABC News

 

Kathryn Campbell, the senior bureaucrat who oversaw the rollout of the illegal Robodebt scheme, has been suspended without pay following the damning findings of the royal commission.

Subscribe: http://ab.co/1svxLVE Read more here: https://www.abc.net.au/news/2023-07-2...

Kathryn Campbell was the secretary of the Department of Human Services between 2011 to 2017 and was in the top job during Robodebt's inception in 2014. In 2022 the Labor government quietly appointed Ms Campbell as a special adviser on the AUKUS nuclear submarine project with a salary package of nearly $900,000 a year.

This morning Prime Minister Anthony Albanese told ABC Sydney Ms Campbell had been suspended from that role without pay. He said the "failings with bureaucracy" and "human tragedy" caused by the scheme meant action had to be taken.

"This was a decision made by the Department of Prime Minister and Cabinet (DPC) and appropriate bodies. It's not appropriate given the potential legal matters that are involved to go through all of the detail there," he later told ABC Melbourne.

Two weeks ago the Robodebt royal commission handed down its findings into the debt collection scheme which was scathing of Ms Campbell. The report has a sealed section which recommends individuals for civil and criminal prosecution and the DPC is one of three government agencies who have access to that section.

Commissioner Catherine Holmes said it had to be kept sealed so as not to prejudice any future prosecutions. The royal commission found Ms Campbell "did nothing of substance" when exposed to information about the illegality of the program and gave the federal cabinet misleading advice about Robodebt at a 2015 Expenditure Review Committee.

"Ms Campbell had been responsible for a department that had established, implemented and maintained an unlawful program," the royal commission report said. "When exposed to information that brought to light the illegality of income averaging, she did nothing of substance. When presented with opportunities to obtain advice on the lawfulness of that practice, she failed to act."

ABC News provides around the clock coverage of news events as they break in Australia and abroad, including the latest coronavirus pandemic updates. It's news when you want it, from Australia's most trusted news organisation.

 

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Jobs for mates

When someone is parachuted into a well-paid bureaucratic position without an open and merit based process, the public service loses and the taxpayer loses.

Whether the job is as a New York based trade commissioner for the Americas, like that awarded to former NSW Deputy Premier John Barilaro, or an ambassador, or a government board appointment, or a Tribunal Member, or an AUKUS advisor, it’s wrong when appointments are made principally because of who the appointee knows, who they are allied to, or who they have served in the past.

Merit is the only proper test. And that test should always, except in a public emergency (as opposed to a private emergency), be a test by way of open competition. That’s when you get people who are the best at policy development, good decision making and ensuring good outcomes area achieved.

The focus is too often exclusively directed at the appointee, and not at the appointers.

The Secretaries Club at work

Australia’s top public servants are an elite that looks after their own. Many of the top bureaucrats know each other well, having encountered, befriended and helped each other as their climbed the greasy bureaucratic pole.  

Enjoying six and seven figure salaries and exercising power over tens of thousands of public servants, they form a tight knit group with a keen sense of their privileges and prerogatives.  

They sit next to each other at interdepartmental committees and task forces. They lunch at the exclusive Commonwealth Club. On reaching retirement they often nominate each other to sit on various government boards and advisory bodies, continuing to enjoy feeding from the taxpayers’ teat.

Fire and hire

As Albanese was settling in to his newly elected role, the head of Prime Minister and Cabinet, Professor Glyn Davis, called for a meeting with the then Australian Public Service Commissioner, Peter Woolcott, to discuss recommendations to the Prime Minister on Secretary appointments.

They met at 430 pm on the June 8 at the Office of the Department of Prime Minister and Cabinet, a stone’s throw from Parliament House. The meeting lasted about an hour.

Although the fact of the meeting has been revealed by FOI, no record of the discussion has been released. It’s likely no notes were kept.  

In the days that followed, a brief was sent to the Prime Minister and the wheels were set in motion for Campbell’s termination as Secretary of the Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade. 

A few days later, Davis confided in the Secretary of Defence, Greg Moriarty, that Campbell was going and planted the seed that a new position might be found for her somewhere in the public service.

On June 14, Moriarty received a call from Davis to water the seed. Moriarty came through with a yet-to-be-created role of AUKUS advisor in the nuclear submarine task force. How he determined Campbell was the best person for an as yet undefined role is something Moriarty, alone, will have to explain.

https://michaelwest.com.au/yes-to-kathryn-campbells-plum-job-prime-minister-but-why/

 

 

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