COMMONWEALTH OF AUSTRALIA
SPEECH BY '& iR
The Rt Hon. HAROLD HOLT, M. P.,
ON
WANT OF CONFIDENCE MOTION
ROYAL AUSTRALIAN AIR FORCE VIP FLIGHT
.[ From the ' Parliamentary Debates', 31 October 1967]
Mr HAROLD HOLT ( Higgins-Prime
Minister) * 2.55]-Mr Speaker, the Leader
of the Opposition ( Mr Whitlam) has moved
what by parliamentary practice is the most
serious motion within the capacity of any
member or section of the Parliament to
move. He has moved that the House has
no confidence in the Government. If that
motion were carried, of course, the Government
would go out of office. This is not an
unfamiliar parliamentary technique; we
have witnessed it many times over the
years. It has become almost traditional in
relation to the Budget brought down by the
Treasurer. But with the whole gamut of
Government policy to range over, with all
the varied activities of a Commonwealth
Government involved in military operations,
involved in far-reaching foreign policy
relationships, with the conduct of a great
buoyant developing economy, with the
problems of employment and social welfare
-the whole gamut of national policy to
seize on as a ground for attacking a government
in office-the Opposition has not
found an opportunity to do this until now
when it comes to us on this particular issue.
I am glad to think that the Commonwealth
of Australia is regarded by honourable
gentlemen opposite as being in such good
15240/ 67 state in its domestic, foreign and defence
situation that they have to turn to this
issue in order to attack us.
I welcome the motion. In point of fact
I had intended not to anticipate it but to
deal with what I believe were thoroughly
unjustified and cowardly allegations made
in the Senate last Friday against me and
others. It is a welcome change to find the
Leader of the Opposition, who throws out
his chest and says ' I will debate with you
in any forum of the Commonwealth',
coming into this Parliament and debating
with us here in the place where these
debates should be conducted. If he really
believed, and the Leader of the Opposition
in the Senate ( Senator Murphy) believed,
that I had lied to the Parliament and that
my colleague the Minister for Air ( MT
Howson) had. lied to the Parliament or that
the Treasurer ( Mr McMahon) had lied to
the Parliament, the proper place for him to
state that was here before me where I
could hear the charge and answer it. But
the Leader of -the Opposition let his hatchet
man in the Senate get the run on us. He
let the matter run all round Australia on
a Friday when we were not sitting, knowing
that there would be no effective opportunity
for me to deal with this matter at
length and to have it on the record until
the Parliament met on the Tuesday.
As soon as I saw these reports I let it be
known through my own Press secretary to
the Press Gallery in a formal set of words
that I not only repudiated these charges but
also that I would be seeking an opportunity
to comment on them. The Leader of the
Opposition said that he did not know that I
was going to make a statement here today.
Mr Irwin-He is a liar.
Mr SPEAKER-Order! The honourable
member for Mitchell will withdraw that
remark. Mr Irwin-I withdraw it.
Mr HAROLD HOLT-I do not know
how far the honourable gentleman consults
his colleagues. He says that he sought
information from the Leader of the House
( Mr Snedden). We were not able to ascertain
until I had returned from lunch what
the Opposition was doing. The Leader of
the Opposition could have ascertained as
soon as Cabinet rose what we were doing.
I have here not notes prepared to answer
the honourable gentleman in relation to a
motion of no confidence but notes for a
statement which I was to make to the
House in which I would have dealt with the
position which had arisen in the Senate.
Mr Daly-Make it now.
Mr HAROLD HOLT-I will, and I shall
take longer to do it than the Leader of the
Opposition who went through one of the
most laboured performances on a motion
of no confidence that I have heard in this
place. The irony of it is that a motion of
no confidence on the ground of the Government's
untruthfulness is presented by a man
who, as Leader of the Opposition, has
established a record for lack of credibility
unequalled, in my experience, in the history
of Federation. He is the man who says:
' The Government cannot tell us the facts
or the truth.' There is not a man on this
side of the House who has not challenged
the credibility of statements made by the
honourable gentleman opposite. I mention
only one in passing. He told us the other
day that only one government in South
East Asia supported the bombing policy
of the United States of America. I will
not elaborate. There will be another
occasion when we can examine his statement
in more detail. But should we move a motion of no confidence in the Leader
of the Opposition because he so wilfully
misstated the facts of that situation? There
are scores of illustrations.
In the statement I proposed to make to
the House I wanted to deal with three
aspects. One was the important constitutional
issue raised in the Senate. I hope that
honourable members of this House of
Representatives who have some regard for
the authority of this chamber will allow me
to develop that, because it concerns where
we stand and where governments drawn
principally from this chamber stand in
relation to the Houses of the Parliament.
The second aspect of my intended statement-
I felt almost apologetic at having to
do this-dealt with what I can describe only
as the trivia raised in the Senate discussion.
I had made two statements to the
House on this subject. After the second I
replied to the Leader of the Opposition who
had spoken following my statement. So, had
I made another statement today, it would
have been my fourth statement-and I hope
a reasonably comprehensive statement, in
four weeks on the VIP fleet.
I think it was in my second statement
that I said: ' I hope we can avoid the pettifogging
and concentrate on the pertinent'.
The need for this comment is apparent to
anybody who takes the trouble to read the
debate in the Senate. It is true that two
issues of substance were raised. I have mentioned
the constitutional issue. I will deal
with the other later. It relates to the information
given by the Government. Much
of the rest of the debate was devoted to the
pettifogging trivial matters that had led
me to warn the Parliament, and long before
that to warn the Press, that the
answers to the questions asked of us, if
given by us in the form sought, could only
create a quite misleading impression and
give a distorted view of-what is happening.
That is why we delayed the answers to the
five questions asked by Senator Turnbull.
Unless the Parliament had a background
knowledge of how the flight is actually conducted
and an authoritative statement on
the subject, the answers would be hopelessly
misleading and in some respects, for practical
reasons that can be instanced, would be
to a degree inaccurate. What I feared would
happen did happen and I will come to some
of the detail of it in a moment. As I said,
while I apologise to the House for taking
time to deal with matters which to fair
minded and sensible people must seem
pretty trivial, they are on the record and
while they stand uncorrected I know the use
that will be made of them by honourable
gentlemen opposite.
Mr Courtnay-You bet your boots.
Mr HAROLD HOLT-I know that boots
are a weapon of offence with which you
would be familiar. We do not act in that
way. Your philosophy is boots and all. But
we do not think that is the way the Australian
people would like to have their
fighting done. Let me just deal-and I will
try to do it quite speedily-with these
aspects. Firstly, the attack on my wife and
my family. I concede that the Leader of the
Opposition and, indeed, the only other
honourable member who spoke at any length
on this matter, the honourable member for
Hindmarsh ( Mr Clyde Cameron), said that
there was a need for the VIP flight and that
it was proper that the Prime Minister, going
about his official duties, should use it. The
honourable member for Hindmarsh conceded
the same right to the Leader of the
Opposition, as indeed I have always done
myself. The honourable member said-and I
give the honourable member for Hindmarsh,
who is not usually liberal minded in these
matters, credit for saying-that he did not
see anything improper in my wife or my
family accompanying me; that he was not
churlish in these matters, if I can quote his
own phrase. In point of fact I have exercised
a good deal of care in relation to this,
bccause I have had no wish either to
embarrass my colleagues or to give the
public any impression of abuse.
When I drew on my own recollections the
other day-and I say at this point of time
quite clearly that I was drawing on my
recollections-I had no knowledge of the
papers which were subsequently produced in
the Senate chamber. I have never misled this
Parliament wilfully or wittingly in the 31
years during which I have ' been a member
of it. I have never had an attack that was
established or, for that matter, as far as I
can recall, seriously pressed against my good
faith in providing information to this Parliament.
If honourable gentlemen opposite try
to dredge through the Hansard records over
these decades, let them find the examples
where my own good faith and the information I have given to this Parliament have
come under attack. When I was speaking of
my family I said that there had been only
one occasion on which a flight had brought
them on a journey without my personally
being present. I have since had an opportunity
of checking through the records and
I find there were two other occasions, and I
will mention them.
One was an occasion on which an aircraft
had been ordered for me because I was
accompanying President Johnson to Melbourne
on his official visit to Melbourne and
as I was about to go on the aircraft-and my
family were to accompany me back to Canberra
in order to take part in official celebrations
here connected with the President's
visit-the President asked me whether I
would join him on his aircraft so that we
could have talks together. This flight appears
on the manifest as a flight for my family,
but it was a plane ordered to take me back
to Canberra. This is one of the illustrations
I have given of how, even when we present
all the documents to the Parliament, misleading
interpretations can still be brought
into a matter. It may interest the House to
know that the whole of my family returned
the following day by commercial aircraft at
their and my expense.
The only other occasion-and my wife
reminded me of this one-was on
the day which preceded a 7.30 a. m.
takeoff for Western Australia where
we were going for several days of
official visit to Perth and to developmental
projects in the west. My wife had a
speaking engagement in Sydney and she had
to be there and back in time to get ready
for this early morning takeoff the next day
and to undertake all the necessary preparation
for what looked like being a week's
absence from either Melbourne or Canberra.
As she was going to Sydney on this
occasion she invited two of her daughters-inlaw
to go with her for company. I do not
know whether she was expected to make the
flight alone and just sit and meditate, but
anyhow, if it was a crime, she committed
the crime of asking two of her daughters-inlaw
to go with her on the flight there and
back. I invite the honourable gentleman
opposite to name any other occasions. They
are the only two that I have been able to
ascertain in addition to the one which I
mentioned. I said then that no flight had
been ordered especially for members of
I
my family. When Princess Alexandra was
here she was entertained by me at the
Lodge. I wished to have my family with
me while I provided this entertainment. The
next morning an aircraft was going to Melbourne
to pick up at least three Ministers.
Two of the boys went off by commercial
aircraft in the morning-because they wanted
to be back at their offices in time. The rest
of the family went down in the aircraft
which was going to Melbourne anyhow to
pick up the Ministers. I know of no
occasion when an aircraft was positioned
to take members of my family, other than
my wife, to any occasion whatever.
When not accompanying me, my wife
has flown far more by commercial aircraft
than she has by VIP aircraft. She does this
when she goes about her official occasions.
I think it proper that if she needs to have
a VIP aircraft to make one of these trips
it should be available to her. My wife has
made two journeys to Whyalla. The first
of these trips was made entirely by commercial
aircraft. In order to get from Canberra
to an aircraft which would pick her
up at the appropriate time to take her to
Whyalla and the function, and then wait
till the chain of connections could be established,
it took her the best part of 3 days
to do the job. She said to me what a boon
the new Mystere was because it left Canberra
at 9.30 on the one morning, arrived
at Whyalla by lunch time and returned
to Canberra by lunch time the next day. I
might add that this was an occasion when
something was made of the fact that the
passenger on the flight was the Ambassador
of the United States of America, affectionately-
or was it derisively-referred to
by one of the honourable member's party
colleagues in the other place as the ' Talking
Horse'. That was his reference to this particular
flight. Honourable members opposite
may laugh about it if they wish, but those
were the circumstances.
I will not go through all the details as
far as my colleague the Treasurer is concerned-
he will speak for himself-except
to say that he is one of the most hardworking
men who has ever held a ministerial
portfolio. He is handling a Budget of
$ 6,000m apart from all the other financial
transactions of the Treasury. He does not
travel by himself, apart from the officials.
The honourable gentleman made no mention of the fact that Ministers were frequently
with the Treasurer because it sometimes
happens that after a delayed Cabinet
meeting they go in a group together. The
Treasurer is named as the applicant for
the flight and that is why he has clocked
up such a record. He is the applicant.
Ministers go along with him. If we were
able to save an hour a day in working time
for the Treasurer, I would think that any
business organisation handling that kind
of money would regard the saving as very
well incurred.
Reference has also been made to a gentleman
who caught an aircraft that was going
to pick up my colleague the Minister for
Trade and Industry ( Mr McEwen) to bring
him back to Canberra, so that they could
talk on the trip back to Canberra. This was
presented as a flight which this man had
just managed to secure for himself. If honourable
members look through these records
which deal with people such as Hazel Craig,
members of my own personal staff and
others, they will find that in every instance
the positioning of the aircraft that was being
used for a particular flight was sought and
obtained by somebody who was entitled to
secure it. I could go through a mass of
detail in this regard. However, I am not
going to burden the House with it. I do not
know of any occasion where it can fairly
be said: ' There was an abuse in that particular
instance'. I said earlier that the
responsibility for this rests with my colleague,
the Minister for Air, and with
mygelf. Finally, I wish to refer to the point made
by the Leader of the Opposition about the
ordering of aircraft. Well, he has a point of
semantics here, and I acknowledge it. What
happened was that the aircraft for the flight
were decided upon by Cabinet in the period
of office of my predecessor. I have never run
away from that decision. I was a party to
it and I approved of it. But once the Cabinet
decision had been taken, so far as I was
concerned the matter was in the machine.
I did not care when the aircraft were
ordered. That was a job for the Minister
for Air. The decision had been taken, and
if the honourable gentleman wants this
strictly on the record, as it should be, I
make an amendment and say that no aircraft
for the VIP flight was decided upon
and added to that flight during my period
as Prime Minister of Australia. I hope that
satisfies him.
Let me just turn to the other matter
which is, I believe, of some importance to
this country constitutionally. I refer to the
quite arrogant statement-
Mr Clyde Cameron--Can you deal with
the statement that the material was not
available? Mr HAROLD HOLT-Yes, I am coming
to that. I still have nearly 25 minutes
left, even without an extension of time.
Mr Cross-And you are uphill.
Mr HAROLD HOLT-Well, I have
been uphill most of my life and I have got
to the summit. I doubt that any honourable
member opposite will ever get to it. The
Leader of the Opposition in the Senate
in opening his speech said this:
Responsible government means that the Government
is responsible for its administration to each
House of the Parliament. For that purpose each
House has an undoubted authority to require the
Government to answer questions and to supply
records bearing upon that administration. Each
House is entitled to full and truthful disclosure by
the Government. To deny this is to repudiate
responsible government; to depart from it is to
break down responsible government.
The point I want to make is that it is
the duty of a government to give as much
information as it can which will be of
assistance to either of the two chambers.
Neither chamber has authority to require
of an executive the tabling or presentation
of documents or information which the
government feels it would be against the
public interest to table or present, or the
tabling or presentation of which would
constitute a breach of confidence which the
government should preserve. But take this
statement of the Leader of the Opposition
in the Senate-an arrogant statement, I
repeat-at its face value. He could demand
the tabling of Cabinet minutes or of Cabinet
documents. Of course he has no authority
to do this. Or he could demand the tabling
of confidential exchanges between the
Premier of any State and the Prime Minister.
Mr Odgers, the Clerk of the Senate,
who has never been laggard in presenting
the claims of that chamber, has had something
to say on this matter which I regard
of some constitutional importance. That is why I mention it. I quote from his book
' Australian Senate Practice' at page 428:
Upon a motion being agreed to for the tabling
of Papers, the Clerk transmits a copy of the
resolution to the responsible Department. The
Paper is then delivered to the Clerk of the Senate,
and by him laid on the table. The practice of
moving for the tabling of papers was more
common in the early years of the Senate.
Then some precedents are given, and Mr
Odgers continues:
The question may one day arise: What happens
if the Senate orders the production of certain
papers and the responsible Minister refuses to
table such papers? Technically, disobedience to
the orders of the Senate is a contempt of the
House. However, it is an issue yet to be resolved
as to whether the Senate would take the matter
further if, notwithstanding an order of the Senate,
a Minister claimed he was entitled to refuse to
table papers on the ground that certain documents
were of a confidential nature or that disclosures
would not be in the public interest.
I am going to quote to the Housebecause,
as a person who has been a
member of this chamber for very many
years and who is jealous of its rights and
of the rights of a democratically elected
Government I want it on the record-a
sta'ement made by the Minister for Education
in the Tasmanian House of Assembly
on 17th May 1960. This is a statement
that I think might well be adopted as sound
policy in this chamber. It is in these terms:
The particular practice which has caused the
Government to consider this matter is the practice
of requiring the return of a departmental file or
of all papers and correspondence relating to a
particular matter. If acceded to, such an order
would. bring before the House a number of papers
some , of which may be of a kind which should
not be disclosed. The Minister is entitled to oppose
an order for the tabling of papers of that kind,
and if an order is made in the same circumstances
he is entitled to refuse to comply with it.
Considerations of public policy and a due
regard for the interests of the State may require
the Minister to withhold information either sought
for or ordered to be returned. Were it otherwise,
it would be impossible to carry on the Government
with safety and honour. To disclose certain
information may endanger the interests of the
State or of individuals whose conduct or affairs
are not in question, and to disclose information
given in confidence would be dishonourable and,
moreover, would stop any more information being
given in confidence. The Minister concerned must
of necessity take responsibility for decisions on
these matters and so long as the House gives him
its confidence its confidence must extend to such
decisions. The same principles which apply to
giving information to the House apply to select
committees, which are not entitled to information
which the House cannot demand or receive.
It is possible that on some occasions a Minister
would be willing to make available in his office,
or some other appropriate place, a file or particular
document for perusal by members of the
House, thus avoiding publishing the file or documents
by laying them on the table of the House.
I desire to make it clear to the House, however,
that the Government has no wish to withhold
from the House any information it is entitled to
and that Ministers will not, without very good
reason, refuse it any information.
Having read that, Sir, I say that I agree with
the sentiments expressed. So far as it has
been within my capacity, I have sought to
give to this House the information that it
required. That brings me to the matter on
which the Leader of the Opposition has
dwelt in relation to the answers supplied
to the question which was asked in this
place by the honourable member for
Grayndler ( Mr Daly) but which actually
followed in point of time, as I recall it, a
question asked in the other place by Senator
Gair, the Leader of the Australian Democratic
Labor Party. The interesting thing
that the House will find about this business
is that the answer given by us was not one
that somebody could interpret as an answer
protecting the position of the Government.
In point of fact, it was an answer to a question
asked by Senator Gair about use made
by the then Leader of the Opposition of
an aircraft on a flight to Western Australia
and the people whom he took with him.
The Leader of the Australian Democratic
Labor Party asked about this. I suppose
that if the Government had had the
information readily available and had
wanted to score some point off the Opposition,
it could have said: ' Here is the
information. This is what it is'. But the
answer given at the time was that
the particulars were not available.
I hope that I do not do the honourable
member for Grayndler an injustice, but he
put his question during a period when he
had ideas-not for his own advancement
for he is, perhaps, too modest for thatthat
some change in the leadership of the
Australian Labor Party might be desirable.
When he put his question on notice, rightly
or wrongly, it was freely interpreted at the
time as another attempt to give a bit of a
nudge to the then Leader of the Opposition.
Opposition members-Oh!
Mr HAROLD HOLT--The honourable
gentleman received that same comment by
way of reply. I move on from there to the answers
given to Senator Turnbull, who had put
several questions on the notice paper in
another place. I tried to make available the
detail that could be secured. I may say that
the practice, as is well known in this
House, is normally for a department to prepare
a draft of an answer, submit it the
the Minister and for the Minister then to
settle his draft which is initialled by him
and comes into the House. My own Department,
which is asked questions which feed
out into virtually every Department of
state in one form or another, has to lean
very heavily on the information supplied
by the other department concerned. When
the questions had been asked by Senator
Turnbull-and I repeat that I mentioned a
little earlier-I felt that before they were
answered in detail, because to take them as
they stood could result in the giving of misleading
information, I should make a statement
to the House. I set out, then, the way
in which the fleet operated, the background
to it and the history of it. The House will
be familiar with those circumstances.
Indeed, previously, as I told the
House only the other day, the then
Leader of the Opposition has notified
my predecessor that the then Prime
Minister would not find the then Leader
of the Opposition questioning his use of
the VIP fleet. After I had made my first
statement neither the Leader of the Opposition,
nor any of his colleagues, saw fit to
take the opportunity then presented to discuss
the matter. I believe I interpret their
attitude correctly. As of that time honourable
members opposite recognised the
operation of the fleet as a necessary adjunct
of modern government, as it is in so many
other countries of the world.
In between the time that I made that
statement and the next one the honourable
senators had been busy. They could see
some political mileage in this, particularly
with a Senate election forthcoming. Somewhat
half-heartedly, when I had made my
second statement, the Leader of the Opposition
rose and made some comment. As I
recall it, the principal ground of criticism
was the Government's purchase of the
BACllls, a matter that I dealt with by
way of reply. The honourable member for
Hindmarsh followed the Leader of the
Opposition. His principal complaint was
about the frequency of the use made of
the aircraft by the Treasurer. The honourable
member confirmed -that this facility
should be available for the Prime Minister
and Leader of the Opposition. He believed
that it should not be used too frequently
by other Ministers, anrd in particular it
should not be used by junior Ministers
except in some abnormal circumstance.
In my first statement I had said that I
would examine the feasibility of getting
costing done on ahis. I was not looking to
conceal information; I was looking for ways
and means by which this Parliament could
be supplied with additional information on
which there could be some periodical
scrutiny of the costs of the service and some
discussion as to how it operated. That
statement was, I think I can reasonably
state, well received in the House and produced
only these two speeches of a not
very penetrating kind from the Leader of
the Opposition and his colleague. At that
time, in addition to giving the story about
dissection of costs, we dredged through the
information available, or so I was given ; to
understand, and I tabled a document which,
of its very nature, was too unwieldy to
incorporate in Hansard and said that the
House could see the details which this
statement produced.
The matter then-went to the other place.
Honourable senators were not satisfied with
the information that had been supplied.
They said: ' No. We want details about
passengers.' It was in relation to the point
about passengers that in each of the answers
we said that the details were not available.
To the best of my knowledge and understanding
they were not available. I had
always ' been given to understand that details
of passengers were not kept for any length
of time but were destroyed shortly afterwards
because they were kept mainly for
safety and recording purposes.
The official book which is preserved, and
preserved for a continuing period of years,
is what is known as the Flight Authorisation
Book. I have a copy of it here in my
hand. I saw it for the first time last night. I
did not know of the existence of this book
or of the manifests which I also have here
-manifests of a similar form if not related
to identically the same matters, were tabled
in the Senate-until my colleague, the
Leader of the Government in the Senate
( Senator Gorton), told me -that he would
be tabling this information in addition to what I had already supplied following the
request from honourable senators for
papers. I inform the House, and I think
the House will accept my statement, that
the first time I knew of the existence either
of this Flight Authorisation Book or of these
manifests was when this was mentioned to
me by the Leader of the Government in
the Senate. The first time that I actually
set eyes on them in this form was last
night when I asked the Secretary of the
Department of Air if he could make them
available to me for inspection.
Honourable members will find that this
Flight Authorisation Book sets out in considerable
detail matters such as action before
flight, action after flight, serial number of
order, date, type and number of aircraft,
pilot or pilots, navigator, crew, the duty or
practice ordered, time ordered -to start,
duration of flight, initials of flight commander
ordering flight, initials of pilot that
he understands the order, time of take off,
time landed, day or night, task training
sequence, DCO-whatever that means-and
initials of pilot as having reported -to flight
commander on landing. That book contains
no details of passengers except that where
a VIP flight is involved it mentions the
name of the Minister applying for the flight.
If the Leader of the Opposition cares to
look at this book he will see that many of
the tasks listed are not VIP tasks but tasks
associated with the operation of No. 34
Squadron-training flights, the instrument
landing system and so on.
I niow refer to the manifests. These do
set out the lists of passengers. Copies are
made so that when a flight goes from one
point to another a copy is left at the departure
point and one is retained by the
Squadron. If any amendment is necessary
because of changes in the passenger composition
then adjustments are made.
Originally I was told that these were not
kept for any great length of time and that
the time they were kept might vary. I understand
that there is an order that they
should be kept for 12 months. How far
that order is strictly observed I am in no
position to say. But I have been told by
the Secretary of the Department of Air
that because once these manifests are used
by the Squadron they are then used by
other sections of the Air Force from time
to time, it is doubtful if more than
of them can be put together in one heap
at any one point of time. Others are
scattered right throughout the Air Force
for various purposes. They may ' be in the
possession of a person checking on the
instrument landing system, a person checking
on the hours the aircraft has flown or
a person checking for any other purpose.
I do not claim to be a technician in Air
Force matters; I am merely passing on what
the Secretary of Air informed me. He only
put the figure of 70% as a guess because
nobody could be authoritative about it. The
Secretary would not claim more than about
accuracy for the detail shown on the
manifests themselves because of sudden
changes in movement. The Leader of
the Opposition gave an example of this
himself when he said that a Mr Wyndham
was shown on a manifest. I understand
from the Leader of the Opposition that
Mr Wyndham did not travel at the time;
nevertheless he is shown on the manifest.
Mr Whitlam-He has never travelled in
VIP aircraft with me.
Mr HAROLD HOLT-I am merely
making the point that these things are not
necessarily precise and it has never been
claimed that they are precise. I am not
going to prejudge what the Minister for Air
will have to say about these allegations. We
have a good tradition in Australia that
before we find a man culpable we give him
a chance to speak in his own defence and
to make his own explanation. The Leader
of the Opposition has launched a no confidence
motion against me, against the
Minister for Air and against the Treasurer,
but the Minister for Air has not yet had
an opportunity to give his explanation. I
admit readily to the House that I am
troubled by the fact that answers were given
in a form which did not accord with
information which the Government itself
has supplied. I emphasise that point; this
was not something that was found somewhere
around the country; we supplied this
information as soon as we knew it was
available and we did it after consultation
between the Leader of the Government in
the Senate and myself. We were not trying to conceal this information from the
Parliament. Information on this matter can be misleading.
The Leader of the Opposition was
shown, as he will recall, as having had
relatively few flights compared with the
Treasurer. In point of fact if we apply the
tests of hours in the air or mileage flown
the result is not quite the same. We find
that the Leader of the Opposition flew about
60% of the mileage flown by the Treasurer
-if positioning is taken into account-and
had about 80% of the Treasurer's time in
the air. Yet on the facts which were given
the House in quite good faith-but with the
warning that they could ' be misleading
-one gets the picture of eight flights made
by the Leader of the Opposition as against
fifty-four flights made by the Treasurer. I
just make known to the House the problem
which the Minister for Air has had in
facing up to these matters. He wanted to
give accurate information. He was asked
about passengers. It may be that he felt that
because of the incompleteness and, to a
degree, the inaccuracy of these records he
could not validly say that a list of passengers
was available. I am not trying to interpret
what his -thinking was in the matter. I
merely say, for myself and for the Government,
that we have tried to keep the House
fully informed. Of course, I will seek an
opportunity to discuss with the Minister for
Air how this matter developed. As a result
of that discussion I hope to make such
further information as arises available to the
public and to members of both Houses of
this Parliament.
The Leader of the Opposition has moved
a motion of no confidence. The effect of
that motion would be, if carried, to throw
this Government out of office and to put
into Parliament and into government
honourable gentlemen opposite, whose
policies represent such a gulf of thinking
between ourselves and themselves, and
which were rejected wholeheartedly by the
Australian people, that on a sober consideration
of the facts I have no doubt about
the position this House will take.
BY AUTHORITY: A. J. ARTHUR, COMMONWEALTH GOVERNMENT PRINTER, CANBERRA, A. C. T.