Pressure mounts for the nation’s former chief law officer, Christian Porter, to reveal information about the ‘blind trust’ used to pay his legal fees.
Prime Minister Scott Morrison says he is seeking legal advice on how to handle the fact that the former Federal Attorney-General had his legal fees paid by unknown sources.
Mr Porter, who is the current Federal Minister for Industry and Science, has come under intense criticism for accepting the money, which was donated through an entity called the “Legal Services Trust” .
He is now under investigation for possibly breaching Ministerial Standards.
The money helped Mr Porter to fund his defamation case against the Australian Broadcasting Corporation (ABC) and it’s reporter Louise Milligan over a story which mentioned that a senior Federal Cabinet Minister had been accused of historical sexual assault.
So, as the situation stands, any person, group, organisation or entity, Australian or foreign could have established the blind trust and contributed to it.
Given that Mr Porter has only recently declared the blind trust, it is possible that the trust was recently established, and it is also possible that it was established for the sole purpose of finding the legal challenge.
The fact that Mr Porter accepted the funds from a completely unknown source not only shows a lack of judgement, it also shows a lack of integrity and transparency.
Will this be the end of Christan Porter’s Ministerial career?
Most agree that he now has a duty to find out. As several experts and commentators have also pointed out, the situation also exposes weaknesses in the current political donation laws.
Both the Labor Party and the Greens are insisting that the trust details be made public.
Former Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull has gone one step further suggesting that Mr Porter needs to disclose the identity of any contributors to the trust or give the money back.
“Basically what Porter is saying is that it is okay for an Australian cabinet minister, a former attorney-general – not just of Australia, but of Western Australia – to take a large donation, a large gift to himself, without disclosing who the donor was and apparently without him knowing who the donor was either. It is so wrong,” Mr Turnbull told media, adding that he would be surprised if Scott Morrison allowed it to stand.