Senator BOURNE(3.34 p.m.) —I would like to join in taking note of the answer given to the question about Mr O'Leary's involvement in any questions to estimates about Mr Kerry O'Brien, his salary and other things about him. I find that there are three really quite extraordinary points that I found in the answer and in this whole really quite extraordinary saga.

The first is that the minister who answered does not seem to think that Mr O'Leary had anything to do with those questions. The Prime Minister did not say that. The Prime Minister did not deny that, but this minister seems to think that he really did not have anything to do with it. The second point is that he went on to say, `Well, if he did have anything to do with it, there is nothing wrong with that.' He sees nothing wrong with the Prime Minister's press secretary writing questions about an ABC journalist.

We have the Prime Minister's press secretary here and a journalist over here. This journalist, who happens to be the Prime Minister's press secretary, has the extraordinary right—which the government has conferred upon him obviously, because they see no problem with it—to write questions about the salary of this journalist over here. Why does he have the right to do that? Why does the government confer upon him that right? Those questions were all so obviously designed to damage that journalist. He has, by the admission of this minister, the right conferred upon him by this government to ask damaging questions which must be answered according to this government—because they have gone through estimates—about another journalist.

That is just extraordinary. Why would he have that right? Who would be next? Who is the next person who is paid with funding from appropriations No. 1 that will have these questions asked about them? Who is the next person in a parliamentary department or in the ABA, ASIO or ASIS, and there are lots of really interesting organisations in there where people are paid with funding from appropriation No. 1? Who is the next one we are going to ask questions about their salary and everything about them?

Questions about Mr O'Brien's salary and anything else to do with his employment are questions for the board and the management of the ABC. They have absolutely nothing to do with the estimates committee. That detail is an outrageous breach of Mr O'Brien's privacy and that this government would even consider that that is a reasonable way to use time in estimates is something I find absolutely extraordinary.

The third thing—and this is the most important—is that this government would go to these extraordinary lengths to pursue their vendetta against the ABC. It has to be a vendetta. It is something that is just absolutely amazing to watch and it has been amazing to watch from day one the way the ABC has been targeted by this government.

The targeting by this government has been absolutely relentless, it has been vicious, it has been ruthless, and it continues to be so. The lengths to which the government goes are amazing. That has been shown by these questions in estimates. I would have to agree with the editorial of the Australian. It said words, which I cannot remember properly, to the effect that it believed that it demeans the government—and that is a very good word to use; it does—that the government should want to pursue its ABC vendetta to these lengths. I think it demeans the government too.

I wish to goodness the government would just get out of the mind-set it has that the ABC is evil, that Mr O'Brien in particular is against it and, if the government thinks he is against it, that it has to do something to demolish him as well as the ABC—an extraordinary thought. The idea that it is okay for that to happen, that there is no problem with the Prime Minister's press secretary asking questions which are deliberately destructive of another journalist, I find absolutely extraordinary.