Governor-General David Hurley kept Scott Morrison waiting longer to be officially appointed to the secret portfolios he sought in 2021 than before the pandemic, documents obtained under freedom of information laws show.
Hurley took two weeks to sign the instrument making Morrison the treasurer and home secretary after the then prime minister asked for those extra powers in April 2021.
Morrison’s application to be appointed to run the health department was dated March 13, 2020, and Hurley signed that instrument, released last month by the Department of Prime Minister and Cabinet, the following day, March 14. .
Morrison’s application to run the finance department was sealed on March 30, 2020, and Hurley’s instrument was signed on the same day.
Letters Morrison signed and sent to Hurley recommending the additional portfolio appointments were obtained by Guardian Australia under FoI laws.
Morrison’s 2021 letters to the governor-general gave no official basis for his request to be sworn in to the industry, treasury or home affairs portfolios. His previous requests in March 2020 to grant himself the power to administer the health and finance departments expressly referred to the Covid pandemic.
“The severity of the coronavirus crisis requires us to be prepared for all eventualities. In the event that the Minister for Health, the Honorable Greg Hunt MP, is unavailable to exercise his important powers as Minister for Health, I consider that it would be appropriate for another senior minister to exercise them in an emergency,” Morrison wrote in the March 2020 health letter.
“To facilitate this contingency, I recommend that you appoint me, in addition to my present appointment, to administer the Department of Health.”
The finance letter is almost identical, simply substituting Hunt’s name for the then finance minister, Mathias Cormann.
A different course of events and form of letter was used in the post-Hurley recommendations.
Morrison’s application to the Governor-General to administer the Department of Industry, Science, Energy and Resources (Diser) was sealed on 12 April 2021, but Hurley’s instrument was signed three days later, on April 15
Morrison’s letter recommending appointment to the Treasury and Home Affairs departments was sealed on 22 April 2021. Hurley did not sign the instrument to that effect until 6 May 2021, 14 days later.
The Governor-General’s Public Program states that Hurley was business as usual during this period, attending numerous events in Canberra and Darwin.
Guardian Australia asked the Governor-General’s office if there was any reason for the subsequent delays. Hurley’s office has not described what legal advice or information he may have sought before each appointment.
Morrison’s letters recommending industry, treasury and home affairs appointments did not mention Covid, unlike earlier correspondence.
“I am writing to recommend a change in the appointment arrangements for a minister… my recommendation is that you appoint me, as Prime Minister, to administer the Department for Industry, Science, Energy and Resources. [Diser] to allow me to be the minister responsible for matters within that portfolio, if and when necessary,” Morrison wrote on April 12, 2021.
The same wording was used in the letter of 22 April on Finance and Home Affairs.
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Mr Morrison has defended the secret ministries, saying the appointments were made out of “precaution”. When asked last month why he was appointed as Treasury and Home Affairs in April 2021, Mr Morrison said it was because the pandemic was continuing.
“Covid was still real in 2021…you think there was no chance this would pick up again? How did it?” he said
Diser’s appointment was the exception with Morrison asking for powers over that portfolio to make the decision to block the Pep-11 gas exploration project.
“I only did it particularly in portfolios of major areas of importance, namely Treasury and Home Affairs, because there were unilateral ministerial decision-making powers,” Morrison told reporters in mid-August.
“After we got through the initial phase and the pandemic was still going on, we took the precaution of putting them in place in these other important portfolios where there were unilateral decision-making powers over ministers who were not under cabinet.”
Morrison also defended his decision to keep the appointments largely secret from the other ministers already in those portfolios.
“I think there was a huge risk that in the midst of this crisis those powers could be misinterpreted and misunderstood, which would have caused unnecessary distress in the midst of a pandemic,” he said.
Morrison wrote in the final two letters to Hurley that “as this change is only administrative in nature, I should not take an oath of office,” a line not included in the earlier letters.
The former prime minister’s actions are the subject of an investigation by former Supreme Court judge Virginia Bell. This week he asked for input from the public to “inform the inquiry”.
The current prime minister, Anthony Albanese, has said it would be “extraordinary” if Morrison did not co-operate with the inquiry, warning that coercive powers could be used if he refused.