He bemoans the fact that the result of an ICAC could be that “good people have left office without convictions being made”. It is a worry that the federal treasurer sets the bar so low on integrity. Staff within such bodies have also acted in breach of integrity at times. There are certainly cases of integrity commissions acting like they are accountable to no one. Ministers should not be able to give out funds based on who has made political donations to their party or which seats are marginal.īut there is also a need for an independent body to provide oversight. For example, community grants and infrastructure should be scrutinised for the integrity of the process by which the funds are allocated. Such a commission needs to be able to encourage integrity broadly within government. Getting the design right will be much more challenging when there are such entrenched polarised views. It is deeply disappointing that a national integrity commission has become a highly politicised issue (“ Morrison warns of ‘public autocracy’,” 4/5). To that extent the pandemic years were a fail for the university system. They are funded to produce graduates to enrich society, not to save themselves, or the government, money. How depressing to read that most universities had a financial surplus during the pandemic (“ Victorian unis bounce back despite pandemic pressures on income”, 4/5).
