ABC 891

SUBJECTS: Federal Minister Mark Butler responds to an email from his office re "alleged paedophilia" at a school; Nauru Presenter: Minister for Climate Change, good morning to you Minister. Mark Butler: Good morning gentlemen. Presenter: And he is the Federal Labor Member for Port Adelaide. Chris Pyne is the Federal Liberal MP for Sturt, he’s Shadow Minister for Education. Chris Pyne, good morning to you. Christopher Pyne: Good morning Matthew – you seem to be struggling with my name this morning. Presenter: I am. It’s a very difficult name, I’m overwhelmed. Butler: That one syllable [laughs]… Presenter: I’m overwhelmed in the presence of greatness. Pyne: Ah yes. Well I’m not there… Presenter: Chris Pyne look thank you for joining us as well. Pyne: Pleasure. Presenter: Mark Butler, a specific issue to put to you this morning. This program has received an email, a copy of an email. Now this has come to us from the Opposition and as a result of freedom of information request, which produced some 66 documents, had to go through the ombudsman to get final release of these, we say that just to put aside any thought of a dodgy document – this email exists because it was produced by the government in response to an FOI request through the proper channels. This email is dated April 2, Monday April 2 last year and it is from one of your staffers in your Electorate Office and it is addressed to the then education minister, Grace Portolesi, and we will just read it quickly, it’s quite short. Dear Minister and Staff our office has been notified of an alleged case of paedophilia at an after-hours and before school care centre at, and the name of the school is deleted. The constituent who contacted us is concerned that the school is not taking the proper course of action in this situation as families’ were not notified of the occurrence, I was hoping for further advice to provide to the constituent. Would this matter fall under your portfolio or as it is out of school care, is it a matter for the federal minister. Many thanks for your assistance on this matter. Now Mark Butler that email was sent to Grace Portolesi and it was sent 7 months before Jay Weatherill said he only heard about, the first he’d heard about this abuse was in parliament. Now you are close friends, and a close factional colleague with Jay Weatherill, your electorates over-lap. In that 7 months did you at any time raise this issue with Jay Weatherill? Butler: Well no, I didn’t. To the best of my recollection I don’t recall the email that you’ve just read out being raised with me. It’s reasonably common; I have to say for constituents to contact my office about issues that are essentially State issues. And although my staff said that maybe out of school care is a federal issue, out of school hours is a state issue as well. So it’s reasonably common for that to happen and what our usual process is is to contact the relevant minister in the State Government and say that constituent so and so has contacted with concerns about this issue and we’d like you to follow up. We would then say to the constituent that we have done this and they should expect some communication from the State Minister and if they don’t get that, or if it’s not to their satisfaction, they should come back to us and we will raise it again. And if they did come back to us then there’s the possibility that my staff would elevate it to me and say… Presenter: So they wouldn’t raise it? Look we are not talking about a parking fine here. We’re talking about a constituent who comes in with a specific school and raises a case of paedophilia and your staff – they didn’t raise that with you? Butler: Well, look. I don’t recall them raising it with me and you’re right, this is about as serious as it gets. I mean, a lot of this stuff that comes through my office about state government issues is serious. A lot of them have related over the last few years to health issues, and mental health issues in particular. But you’re right, the issue that you’ve raised this morning is about as serious as it gets. I don’t recall it being raised with me. I haven’t had the opportunity to go back to my staff and ask them to drag this email up and see what response we got, if any. Presenter: Well you don’t remember it being raised with you back in April 2012? Butler: No. I don’t. Presenter: Your office would have got a response, I assume from Grace Portolesi’s office. Did your staff tell you what advice they received from Grace Portolesi? Butler: Well no. I don’t recall the email or a response being raised with me at all and I haven’t had… Presenter: Isn’t this the Jay Weatherill advice? Isn’t this a Jay Weatherill defence? Butler: Well no. If it was a federal issue it would have definitely been raised with me…. Presenter: Well it appears that it is a federal issue because it did occur during after-hours school care and… Butler: Out of hours school care is run by State Government. It’s run by school councils in State Schools so although my staff member asked a question whether it might be a federal issue, it is quite clear whether it was a school issue or an out of hours school care issue… Presenter: Well you don’t know, because you don’t know what the advice was. Has your staff member at any stage since then raised this email with you? Because there has been an enormous amount of publicity about it. We’ve had the Debelle Inquiry, so we’ve had a full on, you know effectively a Royal Commission; there has been an enormous amount of publicity and concern. Had at any time your staff member said to you, “Oh by the way Minister, I sent that email off to Grace Portolesi, remember, back in April 2012.” Butler: Look, not that I recall. But I want to go back and check the email and check the constituent and the school concerned. Obviously it’s been redacted through FOI and that’s appropriate in terms of publication but I want to go back to my office now that this email has been presented by you to me and just follow the trail of emails that might have followed it and see whether I do recall it but off the top of my head, 18 months ago, I don’t recall this being raised with me. Presenter: Is it reasonable for our listeners to assume that if you did know about this, you would have raised it with Jay Weatherill? Butler: No, I don’t think necessarily it is. I mean, I think at the time you are talking about Grace Portolesi was the Education Minister and if it was raised with me and I was told that the matter had been raised with the relevant minister, being then Grace Portolesi and that we had some confidence in terms of the response that her office was following it up and the constituent had not asked us to elevate it in anyway then I think… Presenter: I think there was a photo of you having coffee with him over leadership issues and factional issues. Mark Butler, you meet with Jay Weatherill all the time. He’s a mate of yours. You share the same electorate and you’ve just said that this is a matter of the gravest concern. You’re not going to talk to someone who shares your electorate, who is a mate of yours, who’s in the same faction about a matter that it of gravest concerns to one of your common constituents? Butler: Look, I think if I had any concern because of responses from an office that something wasn’t being dealt with or something was amiss, I would probably have raised it with Jay, but or with Grace for that matter if I had seen her at an event. But I just don’t, I mean I haven’t been able to check back on the responses we’ve got to see whether there was any basis for us thinking that anything other than it being dealt with appropriately was happening. Presenter: And it’s not the sort of issue that you would expect your staff to raise with you? Butler: Well again, it really depends on what the response is. Presenter: No, no, no. When the person first comes in, when the person first comes in and says I’ve got a case of alleged paedophilia at an after-hours and before school care at a school in your electorate. Would you have expected your staff to let you know about that? Butler: Well look, we don’t have a hard, fast rule about this. I mean… Presenter: No, I’m not asking you whether you have a hard, fast rule. I’m asking you, do you have an expectation that matters of the gravest concern are passed on to you. Butler: Well I think the matters of concern, whether they are the gravest concern or concern, I expect would be raised with me if there is any sense that the appropriate level of government, whether that’s State or local. In this case State was not dealing with the issue in the way that we would like and in the way that the constituent had expressed they wanted. So there is a pretty strong rule there that if we are getting the run around or the constituent continues to tell us that they feel like they are getting the run around, it would definitely be elevated. Presenter: What’s interesting here is that there is a copy of this email. While a number of emails were apparently wiped every time a minister changes office, not this one. It’s stamped received by the offices of the Hon G Portolesi MP 3rd of April 2012 with the State crest on it. Chris Pyne listening to this. You’re the Shadow Minister for Education; do you accept what Mark Butler is saying here that particularly if you were carrying a ministerial or shadow ministerial load that you would not expect to be told about something like this? Pyne: Well I would expect my staff to raise a query about paedophilia in one of my schools in my electorate with me and I’m not going to play politics with this issue because it’s far too important. I think there are other questions that Mark Butler needs to respond to and my immediate thought, I mean, one I would expect my staff to tell me this has come across the desk, you might want to know about it and my response would be I do, and I also want to know what the response is from the State Government. So I think Mark Butler needs to find out who came back to his office about a query about paedophilia, whether he was satisfied with the response from Grace Portolesi and if he was satisfied, what did she say and if he wasn’t satisfied did he elevate it to the Premier’s office because… Presenter: Well, before those questions are answered we first need for him to check. We accept what he’s saying… Pyne: I accept what he is saying and I know Mark Butler, I’ve known him for a long time and I would be very shocked if he was dishonest on your program. I’m sure he’s not been but there are still serious questions that need to be answered about what happened after this email was sent and did Grace Portolesi’s office respond satisfactorily? Presenter: Precisely, which is why it’s a significant email and which is why we’re raising it here directly with the Minister and with you. Chris Pyne also a significant issue, on to other issues and the question of asylum policy and what some commentators have described as a race to the bottom, I’m sure there are other views of that. Was it appropriate for a company that provides big tents and effectively mobile houses and mobile cities to fund the trip to Nauru of Tony Abbott where he announced his tent city plan? Pyne: Well they funded the trip of Scott Morrison but that’s neither here nor there, but it wasn’t Tony Abbott. Look, it’s entirely appropriate. It was a private trip, funded by a private supporter for Scott Morrison to find more out about what’s on the ground in Nauru and I don’t think the government would want to play politics with this when only last year when Kevin Rudd travelled at the expense of The Corba Foundation, which owns the machinery which makes filtered cigarettes to Germany to address a conference and took their hospitality for accommodation and for overseas travel, because it’s very common. MP’s don’t have the kind of resources that are available to them to pay for their own overseas travel quite often and some people take more than others. Kevin Rudd is very famous for taking a great deal of overseas hospitality travel… Presenter: Mark Butler, we will need a response on that. Mark Butler? Butler: Look the important thing is disclosure around these things. At the end of the day if people out in the community have a question about that sort of support Scott Morrison needs to answer that question. That’s the whole point of things having to be disclosed. Presenter: Well, Mark Butler thank you for your time this morning. Butler: Thank you very much. Presenter: Federal Member for Port Adelaide and Christopher Pyne the Liberal Member for Sturt. ENDS