CANBERRA, Aug 21 — Australian politicians could be fined up to five per cent of their salary or suspended from Parliament for bad behaviour under new government workplace laws.
The governing Labour Party introduced new legislation today to establish an Independent Parliamentary Standards Commission (IPSC) to crack down on politicians and staff who engage in bad behaviour, reported Xinhua.
The IPSC will have the power to enforce behaviour codes for, conduct workplace investigations into and impose sanctions on elected members of both houses of Parliament, their staff and other employees in Parliamentary workplaces.
If serious misconduct is found to have been perpetrated by a current or former politician, the commission will be able to recommend that they be fined up to five per cent of their annual base salary or suspended from the Parliament.
The IPSC was first proposed in 2021 in a report from the government's Sex Discrimination Commissioner that found 33 per cent of people working in Commonwealth Parliamentary workplaces had experienced at least one incident of sexual harassment and 37 per cent had been subjected to bullying.
The landmark Set the Standard report was commissioned after former government staffer Brittany Higgins went public in February 2021 with allegations that she was raped by a colleague in Parliament House in March 2019.
A federal court judge ruled in April this year that Higgins was raped by fellow political staffer Bruce Lehrmann.
"The 2021 Set the Standard report laid bare the serious issues of bullying, sexual harassment and sexual assault at Parliamentary workplaces.
"We have been working hard to put the systems in place so that people can raise workplace complaints, and when complaints are substantiated, that both staff and Parliamentarians are held to account for their behaviour," said the Minister for Finance, Minister for Women and Minister for the Public Service Katy Gallagher in a statement.
In cases where alleged behaviour would constitute criminal conduct, the IPSC would be allowed to investigate but any finding would not be one of criminal guilt.
For allegations of sexual assault, it would only be investigated if the complainants consented.
The whole process will be confidential but if the commissioners recommend sanctions against an elected representative it is likely to be made public.
— Bernama
