Senator CARR (6:02 AM) —by leave—I rise to speak about Greenwich University. Greenwich University is an organisation established by a Dr John Walsh out at Norfolk Island. This is a man who, I understand, has claim to a direct line of ascendancy to the Russian throne. He calls himself the Duke of Brannagh and is known throughout the education industry in this country as `the Duke'. He has extensive links through various other shonky organisations in the university area. His record is complemented by the Vice-Chancellor of Greenwich University, Dr Ian Murray Mackechnie, who—as I understand it—was jailed by the Victorian County Court for one year and four months after pleading guilty to embezzling $220,000 from the Anglican charity the Brotherhood of St Laurence.

This particular organisation came to the attention of the Senate estimates committees back in February 1999 after it was established as a result of the direct intervention of the Minister for Regional Services, Territories and Local Government, Senator Ian Macdonald, who sought to direct the Administrator of Norfolk Island to establish the university on that island after he had received correspondence and assurances from this outfit out at Norfolk that they would be establishing an Internet university which would exist and operate only on Norfolk Island. It was quite an extraordinary proposition put to the Senate by the minister—that the Internet could be stopped at the borders of Norfolk Island.

The interesting fact about these matters is that the inquiry that the government has established, which followed the revelations of a whole series of irregularities in the operations at Norfolk, has now found that on the basis of the information provided to the committee—this is the Gallagher committee, a committee made up of Commonwealth and state officials across Australia—the Greenwich University failed to meet the review criteria and is not eligible for listing under the Australian qualifications framework. The Greenwich University does not meet the required standards for Australian degrees in the fields assessed, including theology, business, computing and health sciences, and nursing and psychology. On the basis of the evidence provided to the review committee and the assessment panels for three of the courses, Greenwich does not satisfy the review criteria with respect to quality, teaching, student support or scholarship and research, and the financial status of Greenwich University cannot be ascertained on the information made available to the committee or the financial assessor. The report goes on to tell us that the governance structures have been established but it is all too early to know whether they are operating effectively.

The recommendation of the committee, which I understand the government has accepted, is that the Greenwich University not be listed on the register of Australian qualifications framework because the standard of its courses, its quality assurance mechanisms and its academic leadership fail to meet the standards expected of Australian universities. Yet Senator Macdonald saw fit to direct the Administrator of Norfolk Island to establish this university, a university which has undermined the credibility and reputation of Australian universities throughout the world. This minister was so gullible that he thought to accept the assurance of the Duke of Brannagh that he was establishing an Internet university which would operate only on the island of Norfolk. Now we have the government itself dumping this so-called university because of its scandalous behaviour out at Norfolk.

One has to ask oneself: just how far will this government go in accepting shonky outfits like that at Norfolk? What action would this government feel was necessary to allow these sorts of outfits to be established? It would appear that this minister is prepared to accept anything at all, no matter how dubious. How completely obvious this outfit is—this outfit that pretends to offer an academic program which clearly has not met the criteria of any other university in this country and, of course, has now been discovered by the government's own committee not to meet the standards necessary in an Australian university. When I raised these concerns, what did we hear from the government benches? The government said that these were trivial matters and that I should apologise for them. Perhaps Senator Tierney, Senator Ellison and Senator Macdonald should be now asking whether they are the ones who should be apologising to the Australian people for allowing this bunch of crooks to get established and undermine the reputation of Australian universities throughout the world.

It strikes me that if anyone had done the most preliminary of investigations—which clearly this government has not done—they would have known that the outfit had travelled all around the Pacific seeking to find a home. They were rejected in New Zealand, they were rejected in Victoria, they were rejected in Hawaii, they were rejected in California, but they found Senator Macdonald and they said, `Come in spinner.' The Duke of Brannagh had found the ultimate in gullible ministers, and Senator Macdonald signed up to a proposition that said that the Internet university was going to operate on only one island, no matter how dubious its courses, no matter how many of its staff were completely unqualified and no matter what the nature of the programs—deep-sea settlements, intergalactic travel and the mysticism of various religious cults. This is the stuff of the brave new world of Senator Macdonald—he would accept anything.

What really troubles me is that this issue was allowed to get so far. On 9 December 1997, an officer of the Department of Transport and Regional Services contacted the department of education. The matter was dealt with at the junior officer level because it was Christmas and people were on holidays. A bunch of crooks were able to get established on Australian soil because the Australian Public Service could not cope in December and because they had a gullible minister who was prepared to accept anything when, clearly, every other state in the Pacific was not. Minister, you stand condemned by this government's committee.