Coalition calls in Feds on NBN costing leak

James Riley
Thursday, 12 August 2010 16:09

IT Policy - Government Tech Policy

The Coalition has written to the Australian Federal Police asking it to investigate the leaking of Treasury department analysis that found an $800 million dollar hole in savings the Opposition claimed could be made from axing the National Broadband Network.

Coalition Finance spokesman Andrew Robb formally wrote to AFP Commissioner Tony Negus requesting he look into the "apparent unauthorised disclosure of confidential Treasury documents."

"In the context of a federal election campaign, the security of the records and the integrity of the professional officers employed by Commonwealth central agencies is a matter of high national importance," Mr Robb said in his letter to the Commissioner.

"In particular, the Treasury's role is such that it must be expected to act with complete impartiality and integrity in the critical costing of proposed expenditure and savings policies of the Coalition and the Labor Party."

Treasurer Wayne Swan told a media conference in Canberra that the opposition complaints were "a smokescreen" to disguise the fact that the Coalition has not submitted its election proposals for costing scrutiny by Treasury.

Mr Robb said the uncertainty surrounding the identity of the source of the leak had placed "a huge cloud over the integrity of the costing process" and was preventing the satisfactory conclusion of this critical exercise.

The leaked document related to a Treasury analysis of interest savings of more than $2.4 billion the Coalition was to have claimed in interest it would not have to pay if it scrapped the national broadband network.

In a Lenore Taylor article that appeared in the Sydney Morning Herald on Tuesday, a Treasury analysis was quoted saying the interest rate savings would be $1.6 billion. The Treasury analysis was dated July 5.

The article suggested the Coalition had been planning to use the savings to announce a bigger than anticipated budget surplus at the end of the campaign as a "grand finale." The leaking of the document puts that plan under a cloud.

The Treasurer said he would cooperate with any AFP investigation.

"I would always cooperate with any authority in these circumstances, I always do," Mr Swan said.