Victoria’s public service integrity bodies say they haven’t seen evidence of change a year after their probe into Labor’s branch-stacking scandal.
A tense struggle for access to playing fields between soccer and Australian rules clubs has dominated recent deliberations at Moonee Valley City Council,which is now the subject of a probe by anti-corruption investigators.
Anti-corruption watchdog IBAC has seized the phones of four councillors in Melbourne’s inner north-west as part of an investigation into land use by a local soccer club.
The Coalition and the Victorian Greens passed legislation through the state upper house that would have given greater powers to the Independent Broad-based Anti-corruption Commission.
Branch memberships are a point of influence within Labor,with larger member rolls providing factional leaders with more votes at state conferences to shape party policy.
Victoria’s integrity bodies aren’t set up to deal with misconduct like this. It means the Labor Party will be more focused on the leakers than the forgers.
If granted,the additional powers would represent the biggest shake-up of cabinet secrecy in Victoria in years.
Just four of 79 Victorian councils are publishing contact between councillors and developers despite advice to keep a registry of activity up to date.
The former head of IBAC says less secrecy is one of several recommendations he has to bring Victoria in line with other states.
A dispute over the way Labor MPs questioned the former head of IBAC has spilled into a confrontation in the halls of parliament.
“I am not going to abandon this subject,” Robert Redlich said a day after his extraordinary appearance at a parliamentary integrity hearing.