With the Liberals’ timesheet saga getting worse we’ve got a copy of John Hargreaves’ motion passed by the Assembly this morning. It’s not happy reading for the Liberals, even less so because it requires them to answer an unholy series of questions by COB Thursday:
(a) why did the Leader of the Opposition fail to observe his responsibilities under the Members Code of Conduct, paragraph 8 to ensure, in relation to the acquittal of work hours by staff employed by him under the LAMS Act 1989, by allowing periods of up to 22 months to elapse without staff in his office submitting appropriate documentation in relation to attendance, TOIL and overtime;
(b) how did the Leader of the Opposition satisfy himself that recollections of attendance up to 22 months earlier were the correct recollection of attendance when he certified those records to be correct;
(c) what documentary evidence has been relied upon for the retrospective approvals for unpaid leave and attendance at work during the extensive periods in question?
(d) does the Director of Electorate Services in the office of the Leader of the Opposition work in the Leader’s Legislative Assembly office in a full-time capacity;
(e) if so, does the Director of Electorate Services have written approval to work off-site away from the office of the Leader of the Opposition in accordance with clause E8 of the Enterprise Agreement;
(f) has there been consultation with Corporate Services in accordance with clause E8.2 of the Enterprise Agreement and if so, when was that consultation and with whom;
(g) does the Director of Electorate Services in the office of the Leader of the Opposition currently occupy the position of the President of the Canberra Liberals;
(h) does this person work in the latter capacity from Level 5, 221 London Circuit, Canberra City;
(i) if so, has the holder of these positions sought and received unpaid leave from the Leader of the Opposition’s employment prior to any work as President of the Canberra Liberals, during normal working hours;
(j) have any other staff of the Leader of the Opposition have written approval to work off-site; if so, in what capacity and for what periods;
(k) have any staff employed by the Leader of the Opposition undertaken party political campaigning or related activities without having received prior approval for unpaid leave from the Leader of the Opposition; and
(l) if so, have these periods of political campaigning been declared as gifts or gifts in kind under relevant ACT and/or Federal electoral campaign finance laws; if not, why not
For those wondering where the second half of this is going Tio Faulkner is the Director of Electorate Services and also President of the Canberra branch of the Liberal Party.
This dual role has raised eyebrows before.
It gets worse for Zed though.
Because in addition to Zed’s significant homework the Speaker (Shane Rattenbury) has been directed to get a workplace audit done, which will include reconciling the timesheets with the Legislative Assembly’s building access records.
For Zed’s sake one hopes the coming homework, the retrospectively filed timesheets, and the building access records don’t show significant discrepancies.