In my day job we have a saying: a fish rots from the head down. What we mean is that the values and behaviours of those at the top of an organisation will inevitably establish a powerful and pervasive culture. If those values and behaviours are unethical, duplicitous or even criminal, then it's only a matter of time before that cancer infects the whole body. Good people will flee and the morally-bankrupt remainder will appoint people just like them. I've seen this process destory once proud organisations and break the will of honest employees. It is vile and destructive.
In this blog, I have tried to focus on the Australian political discourse - its language and logic. For me, the debate's the thing. The critique presented has attempted to be a study of what is said, who said it and why, rather than attacking either Labor Party or Liberal Party as institutions per se. Now, I certainly don't claim impartiality, so naturally my criticism has tended to be more (but not exclusively) directed to one side of politics. But, I have resisted the temptation to simply "have a go" at either the Labor Party or Liberal Party as organisations and structures of social power. Until now.
Politics is a rough business, that's nature of the beast. It is certainly not a game for the thin-skinned. However, in recent days, the Australian Liberal Party has put the final nail in the coffin its moral integrity. A rot that began with the Children Overboard Incident in 2001, and was incubated in the shadows by Godwin Grech, has reached its conclusion in the tail-end of 2012. The Liberal Party has clearly become an organisation of compromised morality, an organisation characterised by a vicious win-at-all-costs mentality inflamed by a petulant attitude toward being in opposition and losing hold of its god-given right to rule.
The final evidence of the Liberal's fall into a culture of entrenched sleaze lays in both Justice Rares ruling on the Ashby vs Slipper sexual harrassment case and the Party's response to the ruling and its implications.
Justice Rares comments are condemning in and of themselves. His judgement on the case brought against former Speaker of the House, Peter Slipper, by his then advisor, James Ashby, states:
"I have reached the firm conclusion that Mr Ashby’s predominant purpose for bringing these proceedings was to pursue a political attack against Mr Slipper ... I am satisfied that these proceedings are an abuse of the process of the Court. The originating application was used by Mr Ashby for the predominant purpose of causing significant public, reputational and political damage to Mr Slipper ... To allow these proceedings to remain in the Court would bring the administration of justice into disrepute among right-thinking people and would be manifestly unfair to Mr Slipper ... Mr Ashby’s pre-dominant purpose in bringing the proceedings was not a proper one ... Mr Ashby acted in combination with Ms Doane and Mr Brough when commencing the proceedings in order to advance the interests of the LNP and Mr Brough"
How might we expect an organisation (any organisation) to respond to a judgement in a Court of Law that its employees and/or representatives had deliberately misused the justice system to destroy a person in order for their personal and professional gain?
It is reasonable to expect an expression of regret, maybe an apology, and an undertaking to ascertain the origins of such unconscionable behaviour and to root it out. Remember, this is not the Labor Party making accusations and these are not the allegations of some union hack - this is a ruling by a Federal Court Judge, having review the evidence before him. This ruling deserves a respectful, considered and contrite response. An ethical organisation would send a clear message that such behaviour has no place in its ranks and would seek to divest itself of those who threaten to poison its culture. The Liberal Party has done just the opposite and this is its great failing. A fundamental failure of institutional integrity.
Individuals within any organisation will always do dumb and questionable things. How the organisation responds defines its moral compass. The Liberal's narrative on the Justice Rares ruling shows a compass firmly pointed toward the sewer. Not once has the Party looked at itself in the mirror. Its responses have been glib and entirely about the Labor Party's reaction. The Government, we are told, is "hyperventilating". Maybe they are and maybe they're aren't. But this is not about the Labor Party, this is all and only about the character of the Liberal Party. What has been revealed is a character of absence ... an absence of responsibility, an absence of integrity, an absence of self-reflection and an absence of fairness. Behaviour tolerated is behaviour condoned. The Liberal's response to the Slipper ruling sends an implicit, yet clear, message: suck it up, this is how we play the game now. Sometimes what is not said speaks loudest and truest.
Within the broader Liberal Party, there are many good people who genuinely believe in social justice and a politics of principles. Today they must feel isolated and vulnerable - tied to rocks as a poisonous tide rises around them. The Party has failed these members just as it has failed us all in leading us deeper into the sewers of its political morality. While a University politics professor once warned me to never read too much into events and scandals, one can't help but feel this is a crisis point for Australian politics. A point to stop and ask ourselves: how far down this squalid rabbit-hole do we want to go? Sadly, it seems that the answer is in from the Libs ... [fades to static]
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