The Albanese government has multiple shortcomings, among them a love of secrecy and a lazy, non-responsive attitude to reports and inquiries by parliamentary committees.
The cross-benchers recently tallied up more than 100 reports from House and Senate committees that have languished on the desks of ministers without a response to the findings.
A report from a committee of the House of Representatives should be responded to by the government within six months, and within three months for a Senate committee.
Half of the required responses are overdue by more than a year and a quarter by 18 months.
Allegra Spender MP says this is “disrespectful” to the people who are affected by committee findings and go to the trouble of making submissions.
As an example, take the unhappy world of “press freedoms”.
There was enormous consternation following raids by the Federal Plods in 2019 on the home of News Corp journalist Annika Smethurst and the headquarters of the ABC.
They were after Smethurst’s source for a story about government proposals that would allow the Australian Signals Directorate to access the digital data of citizens, without a warrant.
Important information that is clearly in the public interest, but is deemed top secret.
The wallopers barged into the ABC looking for the source of reporter Dan Oakes story about war crimes committed by Australian soldiers in Afghanistan. The information was based on leaked defence documents, and one of the sources, supposedly, was former Major David McBride, now doing stretch of pokey.
See: The Afghan Files
Again, fascinating information that the government wanted to keep under wraps.
On June 24, 2019, the ABC went to the Federal Court to challenge the search warrant, but Justice Wendy Abraham would have none of it. She dismissed the application, with costs.
News Corp was more successful in the High Court, which unanimously found the Smethurst search warrant was invalid, but the AFP was allowed to keep the seized material.
The Commonwealth DPP later said there was no public interest in prosecuting Dan Oakes over the use of the leaked classified documents.
Since then, there has been a flurry of inquiries probing press freedom and secrecy laws, with recommendations that variously recommended a twiddle of the knobs.
This includes:
• The Parliamentary Joint Committee on Intelligence and Security, which reported in August 2020 on the “impact of the exercise of law enforcement and intelligence powers on freedom of the press”.
Unusually, there was a prompt response from the government in October 2020. The report made 16 recommendations, which the Gazette of Law & Journalism described as “tepid” – a beefed-up role for public interest advocates; better record keeping; the need for “cultural change” at security agencies; and a mechanism by which journalists could consult informally with national security agencies.
• The Senate Environment and Communications Reference Committee inquiry into press freedom, published in May 2021.
The government gave a non-response five years later – of which more in a minute.
• The Attorney General’s Department published a weighty review of Commonwealth secrecy provisions in November 2023. It identified secrecy requirements across 238 Commonwealth laws, including 11 general offences in Part 5.6 of the Criminal Code; 295 non-disclosure duties in 102 Commonwealth laws which attract criminal liability; and 569 specific secrecy offences in 183 Commonwealth laws.
To a significant extent it drew on the Australian Law Reform Commission’s 2010 report on Commonwealth secrecy laws.
• The Independent National Security Legislation Monitor also did a secrecy review of Part 5.6 of the Criminal Code, published in June 2024, dealing with secrecy offences relating to the unauthorised disclosure of information by Commonwealth officials.
The final report made 15 recommendations targeting overlap and duplication; uncertainty and complexity; the growing culture of secrecy across government agencies; and the impact of Part 5.6 on journalists and whistleblowers.
In February 2024, there was even an NSLM roundtable with civil society and media groups, where things like the “chilling effect” and the need for the media to be recognised as an essential element in a democracy came in for a good chinwag.
A year earlier, the then Attorney General Mark Dreyfus had hosted a journalists’ roundtable jamboree in Canberra.
More recently, there were amendments to the Royal Commissions Act so that intelligence officers could give information to the Bondi Terrorist Attack Royal Commission without legal penalties.
Many of the secret state provisions were the love children of former Attorney General George (Bookshelves) Brandis.
It was the Senate Environment and Communications Committee report on press freedom in May 2021 that made the most far-reaching recommendations for journalists.
It dealt with federal crimes on secrecy; whistleblower legislation; shield laws for the protection of sources; and warrants that give access to journalists’ information.
That was nearly five years ago, and now the Attorney General has mustered a sort of non-response.
In a letter to the President of the Senate, dated March 12, 2026, Michelle Rowland writes:
“The government notes each recommendation of the report. However, given the passage of time since the report was tabled, a substantive government response is no longer appropriate.
I would like to take this opportunity to outline some developments relevant to the committee’s report and recommendations. The Attorney-General’s Department is currently progressing a comprehensive package of reforms to streamline, simplify and clarify the Commonwealth secrecy framework and improve protections for press freedom, while continuing to appropriately protect against unauthorised disclosures.”
Just before Easter, Rowland announced that the Secrecy Provisions Amendment (Repealing Offences) Bill, 2026, had been introduced to parliament.
The government claims it will repeal or remove criminal liability from over 300 secrecy provisions, about a third of the Commonwealth’s secrecy laws.
The new legislation requires ministerial consent for the prosecution of journalists for secrecy breaches. There’s also a targeted offence that provides for Commonwealth officers to be strung up for “harm caused” as a result of a breach of confidentiality obligations.
The Senate Environment and Communications recommendations from almost five years ago cast a far wider net than the focused secrecy reforms. What is now before parliament are proposals that the AG’s Department developed nearly two-and-a-half years ago, based on 61 recommendations from the ALRC 15 years ago, INSLM proposals of almost two years ago, and nearly six years after Smethurst and the ABC were raided by the AFP on a pointless hunt for sources.
This is the same Attorney General who recently tried to shepherd amendments to the Freedom of Information regime that sought to quietly throttle journalists and civil society access to government records.
A carefully prepared report that no doubt cost considerable sums of money can be ignored for years, and then it is claimed that the passage of time makes it inappropriate to address the substantive recommendations. As Allegra Spender (Independent, Wentworth) would say, it’s “disrespectful”.
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There’s another wrinkle.
According to Austender, last month the Attorney General’s Department signed up law shop Thomson Geer on a contract for $25,000.
The work relates to “public interest disclosure matters”.
What could it be? We asked the media muffins at AGs and have been told that the “contract is unrelated to the reform process”.
“Due to confidentiality, the department cannot provide any more details.”
Another top-secret mission. We turned to the spokesmodel for Thomson Geer, and met a brick wall.
No doubt, it’s to do with something worth knowing.