A former Liberal senator and Australia Post board member has blamed Labor for the Christine Holgate controversy, accusing the senate inquiry looking into Holgate’s departure of “trying to get political scalps”.
Michael Ronaldson, who served as the member for Ballarat between 1990 and 2001 before his election as a Victorian Liberal senator from 2005 t0 2016, made a colourful contribution to evidence at the committee’s second public hearing.
Ronaldson took aim at Labor senator Kimberley Kitching’s motives in asking questions on 22 October last year which led to the revelation that $20,000 worth of Cartier watches had been given to executives as a thank you for their work in completing the 2018 Bank@Post project. Holgate claims she was bullied out of her job during the controversy that followed.
In response to questions about whether Holgate had been offered natural justice, Ronaldson said he was concerned the bipartisan committee was “moving from asking questions to trying to take scalps”.
“What occurred was not of the board’s making,” Ronaldson said.
“The situation we’re in today – this inquiry, [the] media frenzy, a former CEO who’s clearly suffering – [is] not of the board’s making [and is] most definitely not where we wanted to be or ever imagined we would be.
“The moment senator Kitching asked her question in estimates and the senator knows full well why that was done and on whose behalf it was done, and the fact that it was a bit of payback, from that very moment this thing got completely out of control.”
One of the headline appearances at the Tuesday hearing was to be Tony Nutt, but the former Liberal president turned Australia Post board member said he was unable to attend due to illness and will now appear at the next committee hearing on 3 May.
None of the board members who gave evidence on Tuesday said they believed Holgate deserved an apology from Australia Post, but agreed she had been treated badly, echoing the comments of board chair Lucio Di Bartolomeo who blamed the parliament and the media.
The board also denied it had been considering privatising Australia Post, or Australia Post services, such as the parcel delivery service, as raised in the secret BCG report looking into Australia Post’s future.
In her evidence, Holgate had said she stood against any privatisation of the postal service and that it was her opposition to the BCG report which had contributed to the board and the Morrison government’s unhappiness with her. But all board members denied they had been considering privatisation and said the BCG report had not put forward “recommendations”.
Instead, they referred to “reform paths”.
All board members, including Di Bartolomeo denied privatisation was on the agenda. Ronaldson was again, the most frank.
“You never let the truth interfere with a good story,” Ronaldson said, following questions about whether privatisation had been discussed.
“This is a complete and utter beat-up. The board has never discussed privatisation.
“We’ve never been asked by the shareholder ministers to discuss privatisation and as one of my colleagues said before it would have a snowflake’s in hell chance of getting up.”
Holgate has referred to the BCG report, going so far as to table part of it using the parliamentary privilege afforded to witnesses at the Senate hearing, as one of the main issues of conflict between her and the board.
She has said the temporary regulations put in place by the government in response to the Covid pandemic, which included a cut to letter deliveries, mirrored, in part, sections of the BCG’s “reform path two” option which had been put forward by the review.
Australia Post supported the temporary changes, which came with regulatory relief, but Holgate said it was not meant to be a permanent change. The disallowance motion which allowed the changes is due to expire in June, but critics have questioned whether the government plans to extend them.
Department of finance staff said there had been discussions about the regulations and how they were working, but would not directly answer whether that included an extension of the regulation changes.
The committee has reserved its right to recall witnesses if necessary and Australia Post chair Lucio Di Bartolomeo has already been told he will need to re-appear.
