Deceit

by Richard Evans

  Everyone left in a rush, but Messenger took a seat as the others left. He withdrew his phone and tapped:

  WE ARE FORMALLY ASKING THE SPEAKER TO RESIGN.

  Excellent. Use the Cameron case.

  ANYTHING ELSE?

  Invite the clerk as a witness.

  WHO ARE YOU?

  Not important at the moment.

  Gordon O’Brien put the phone back in his shirt pocket and waited for a visit from Messenger. It wasn’t long before Paige Alexander announced Barton Messenger and Christopher Hughes.

  ‘Gentlemen, come in. Please sit down.’ Gordon ushered them to sit. ‘Can I get you a drink of something? Tea, perhaps?’

  ‘Thanks, but no thanks, Gordon,’ Hughes said, as the two politicians took a seat before Gordon’s desk. ‘We are here to talk to you about a matter vitally important to the preservation of the parliament.’

  ‘Not more retirement joy? Surely not.’ Gordon wanted to seem as unaware as possible of the political dance that was going on behind closed doors.

  ‘Gordon, you are no doubt aware of what happened in the chamber earlier,’ Hughes began.

  ‘Yes, it was very disturbing. I am not sure what the speaker was thinking.’

  ‘We remain very concerned about the correctness of parliamentary practice and standing orders not being applied so that the parliament operates appropriately, and we think what the government did in the senate last night is unacceptable.’ Hughes set out the case. ‘We firmly believe the appropriation legislation, specifically the new money added by the senate, should be subject to greater scrutiny by the parliament than has been the case so far, and we believe we should vote it down today.’

  ‘Fair call,’ O’Brien said. ‘The entire legislation or just the amended version?’

  Messenger jumped in. ‘We only want the Indonesian money taken out; the stimulus package can go through.’

  Hughes continued. ‘We don’t believe the speaker will allow us to debate the legislation, or indeed allow a formal vote on it. We consider her actions in expelling the leader when he had the call to move a motion was reprehensible, and contrary to the standing orders of the parliament. Therefore she is not acting in the best interests of Australian citizens, and it is not appropriate for her to continue as speaker.’

  ‘I must refresh your memory about the agreement with the government that you signed on Monday, and there is not much you can do about that,’ Gordon offered. ‘You have agreed not to take a vote, so the speaker is within her rights to withhold any vote.’

  ‘Yes, that may be so, but the scene has changed now. What was once is no more,’ Hughes said. ‘We have a newly elected leader, and it is our view that all bets are now off. The agreement does not mean diddly-squat anymore.’

  ‘I’m not so sure the prime minister would agree with your view.’ Gordon swivelled in his chair.

  ‘Yes, agreed. The prime minister no doubt wants us to allow the amended legislation through the parliament and we unfortunately believe the speaker is acting under his instructions.’ Hughes wiped a hand across his face. ‘She is normally a reasonable and fair chair, but she has been a little too ruthless with us in recent days and loose with procedure this week. Gerrard’s fingerprints seem to be all over her closing down the parliament.’

  Messenger added, ‘We have therefore made the decision to ask her to resign, effective immediately. We are presenting a letter to her at 1.15 pm, prior to her reopening the chamber.’

  ‘This will be unprecedented.’ Gordon, pleased with the announcement, remained deadpan.

  ‘We are aware of how important this action is and that it is regrettable,’ Hughes said. ‘But it is clear to us that we cannot have Speaker Bagshaw impeding proper parliamentary process if we are to be allowed to vote on the legislation.’

  ‘So, why are you telling me this?’

  ‘You are the parliament’s most senior officer other than the elected representatives, and we would like you to attend our meeting with the speaker, as a witness to the proceedings,’ Hughes said.

  ‘You really need a legal officer. Have you considered the chief justice?’ Messenger and Hughes sat mute and looked at each other. ‘What you are about to do is very grave and Hopetoun should be there.’

  ‘We probably would prefer not to engage him at this time.’ Messenger sounded a little unsure about the suggestion. ‘What do you recommend the procedure should be if she does resign?’

  ‘You will need to immediately elect a new speaker. Parliamentary practice states that if the speaker were to vacate the chair, then the deputy speaker would need to be appointed, but given the tragedy, and the unfortunate death of Catherine Kennedy last week, that obviously is no longer possible.’ A replacement has not been nominated by the government.

  ‘Why can’t we just ask the chair of committees to stand in as speaker?’ Hughes asked.

  ‘If the speaker were absent, that would be fine, but if she resigns, then the parliament virtually closes until we have a new speaker,’ Gordon explained.

  ‘Who is the chair of committees?’ Hughes asked Messenger.

  ‘Charlie Edmunds.’

  ‘If she doesn’t resign, why don’t we just have parliamentary officers detain her in her office and have Charlie take the chair?’ Messenger asked.

  ‘A very creative idea, Mr Messenger,’ said Gordon. ‘I suspect Zara Bagshaw is not the type of person who could be detained.’

  ‘Well, it’s something to consider if the meeting with her doesn’t work out.’ Messenger was out of his chair. ‘So we’ll see you there at one-fifteen then, Gordon? Thank you for seeing us.’

  ‘Jeezus, they are kidding me.’ Peter Cleaver was responding to an email from the leader of the opposition. ‘Anita! Get the hell in here.’ Anita Devlin was not at her desk as Cleaver burst from his office; she was in the parliamentary library.

  ‘We have a mutiny on our hands, folks!’ Cleaver shouted to the office so everyone could hear. ‘The opposition have suddenly grown big hairy balls, and they are about to go to war.’ Heads started bobbing above cubicles. ‘It seems the opposition is calling for the speaker to resign and they have cited the Cameron case from the fifties as their reference.’ Cleaver was looking for volunteers. ‘Who wants to handle this page-one story?’

  Heads started disappearing, but a few intrepid souls, the hard news nuts, were keen.

  ‘Okay, Denis, Margot and Laurie, get what you can from the opposition, and seek a view from Gerrard’s office – should be interesting, although most of it will likely be unprintable. Let’s get it up online before the meeting at one-fifteen. Depending on what happens, we may run it on the front page tomorrow.’

  The parliamentary library, on the second floor of the ministerial wing in the centre of the parliament, was bright with sunlight from the window wall and quiet with researchers and librarians capable of putting together a research paper in a few hours. Anita Devlin had sifted through the budget papers and discovered the estimate for the immigration detention centres was four billion, payable in four lots over three years – four hundred million next February, and the rest in three allocations over the following two years. She also confirmed that the amended appropriation legislation now contained an extra forty million added to the budget estimates, without any explanation about what the money would be used for. She searched the papers, but found no references to contingency funding. This was the first point she identified that added weight to the potential scam she thought was being cooked up by the prime minister, an administrative cost that had no connection to anything previously planned and conveniently equalling one per cent of the total project.

  Anita was now scanning Indonesian newspapers to find any references to construction plans for the immigration centres, and was not having much luck. A researcher was sitting nearby studying a book and taking notes. ‘Excuse me, sorry to disturb you,’ Anita crept up to her. ‘Do you find it curious that there have been no announcements in the Indonesian press about the money Aus
tralia is providing their government? I do.’

  ‘Perhaps they haven’t announced it yet. Maybe they want to keep it a secret until they are ready to announce it.’

  ‘A secret?’

  ‘Maybe they don’t want anyone to know their government is getting the money.’ The researcher went back to her book.

  As Anita scanned Bisnis Indonesia, the national daily business newspaper. She was interested to see several photographs of President Amir Surriento pictured with various business entrepreneurs, confirming his reputation as a politician keen to encourage serious property development and a supporter of business in his country. It suggested the president was too close to many of the developers, implying that he benefited from this association and approved questionable projects, although there was little evidence of corruption.

  She found a reference in a profile piece on the president of an allegation from years earlier about a residential tower in Bandung being approved under suspicious circumstances – the appropriate approvals had not been given by the Regional People’s Representative Council, and the mayor of the city was Amir Surriento. Nothing unlawful had been found against the council or the mayor, but there was a suggestion of corruption within the article.

  As she scanned through back copies of the newspaper looking for any news about the president, she noticed that in most photos, there was an unidentified man lurking near the president. She first thought the man must have been his bodyguard, but she noticed he didn’t have the protective services insignia on his lapel, nor the standard plastic cord attached to his ear, so she kept looking, trying to find a connection between the two men, but without any luck.

  Anita checked the time on her phone and realised she was running out of it. She was about to call it quits when she flicked onto the Bintel Indonesia website, the television tabloid, to search through the social pages. It was in an edition dated January of that year that she spotted a familiar face from the business photographs. Mr Tombi Wawason was enjoying the largess of television executives at the start of his advertising campaign for a luxury apartment complex in central Java. Mr Wawason was the managing director of the Javanese construction company, Yogyakarta.

  The construction company name struck Anita as familiar, so she flicked back through her pad, searching her notes, finding her scribblings about Yogyakarta. It was a significant construction company specialising in residential and commercial towers, and was a major tenderer for the immigration centres, although the winning bid was kept a secret. It was a gossamer thread of evidence linking the president with the managing director of a construction company that could have successfully tendered for the project, but it was still a link. If the president could be linked with Yogyakarta, then it might link back to the Australian funding, maybe. She just needed a little more evidence.

  ‘Where the hell have you been? The shit is about to hit the fan in the house and I need you here.’

  ‘Cleave, I have a possible lead on the money and its feasible connection to the legislation. I want to follow it up, can I get more time?’ Anita pleaded.

  ‘What is it?’

  ‘I’m not sure. I think I know the winning bidder for the detention centres and I might have a link to the president, but I need more. If I could find something linking Surriento, then maybe I could get Gerrard embroiled in it.’

  ‘Are you sure, I need you here?’

  ‘No, I’m not sure, but I am close.’

  ‘Okay, I’ll give you until 1.30, but then I need you back in here.’

  ‘Why, what’s happened?’

  ‘Stanley is demanding that Speaker Bagshaw resign.’

  Anita was staggered by the news, but instinctively knew her story would be bigger. If she could link the president to Yogyakarta and any of its real-estate developments, or identify a strong business association between Surriento and Wawason, then maybe there was a reason why the funds were being pushed through with the extra money. Photographs of the two together were helpful, but not good enough on their own to assume a solid evidentiary link; there needed to be another stronger link between the two.

  She returned to her desk with the Indonesian Parliamentary Handbook, flicked open President Surriento’s biography and looked for anything that might trigger a line of inquiry. Among the many achievements listed were his education qualifications; the Indonesian Institute of the Arts was listed as his principal college. Anita suddenly became animated, bouncing in her chair, resisting a squeal when she read that Surriento’s principal college was based in Yogyakarta – the name of the construction company.

  Andrew Gerrard had stretched out on the leather lounge in his parliamentary office after watching the shenanigans in the chamber, admiring the work of his comrade, sipping on an Earl Grey tea prepared for him by Miles Fisher. A warm beef and mustard sandwich waited for him on the table beside him. Soon after the speaker fled the chamber, Miles’s voice broke the silence: Zara Bagshaw wanted to speak with the prime minister. Gerrard struggled to his feet, sauntered over to his desk and took up the phone with a sweep of his hand as he flopped into his chair.

  ‘Hello Zara, what a good job you are doing.’

  ‘You have what you want, now tell me what to do?’

  ‘Stay calm for starters would be my advice.’ Gerrard sharpened his tone to reassure the speaker, needing her to be on her best political game to withstand the pressure that might come in the chamber later. ‘When are you planning to reopen the house?’

  ‘I haven’t had time to consider that yet. How many times do you want me to shut down debate today?’

  ‘We already have the amended legislation as next business item before the house and we only need to formally move the third reading motion that it be agreed to and you call the result.’ Gerrard smiled, relaxed. ‘Only shut it down again if they look as if they’re likely to start moving motions.’

  ‘I thought if I began to bounce them from the chamber we could get the numbers back to favour you. So I’ll call a vote when you have the numbers.’

  ‘Brilliant idea, I knew you were clever.’

  ‘When will you be in the chamber?’

  ‘I’ll come in after you reopen so I can speak to the bill. We should try and get this legislation through before question time is due. Once we have it approved and I have spoken again, you can adjourn the house until next year, after the elections.’

  ‘Do you still want to speak after the legislation is passed?’

  ‘Yes. Once the legislation is enacted, call me to make an address to the house.’ Gerrard leaned back in his chair and put his feet on the desk.

  ‘This will be over in a few hours, gorgeous, so stay strong. Use whatever methods you can, but ensure the legislation gets through today.’

  ‘I don’t like this Andrew,’ Bagshaw said softly.

  Gerrard picked up a partially smoked cigar from his ashtray, flicked open his lighter, and drew the flame into his cigar, blowing out a cloud of smoke. ‘Zara, you’ll get what you want, just stay focused and don’t let those conservative morons from the other side take advantage of you. I’m relying on you.’

  Gerrard had been little help to Zara, and she replaced her phone feeling a little queasy. She imagined a lump of stress building in her stomach – she hadn’t eaten at all, yet she felt enormously full. Zara wanted comfort and support from Gerrard, but got nothing and now she felt abandoned. She knew the media would hound her after the outcome today, and her family would be disappointed in her. She promised herself her family would never know she’d breached parliamentary practice to save them from hardship. She hoped her father would understand that her actions were necessary to protect him and their mob, given it was his idea in the first place to send her on this hazardous political path.

  Zara stood and crossed to her window, closing the thick green curtains and shutting out the day, then doing the same across the glass corridor that led to the chamber, allowing just enough light for her to fumble to her desk and sit quietly for a few moments, taking a
tissue from a box on her credenza. In the darkness, she melted into tears.

  She was not surprised when the opposition leader requested a formal meeting with her at one-fifteen. She had been expecting a delegation from the opposition seeking an explanation, and asking about parliamentary procedure for the remainder of the day. She was very surprised to be advised that the clerk would also be at the meeting. She made a call to a colleague, asking him to come to the meeting as well to support her.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE

  THURSDAY 1.15 PM

  Gordon waited by the glass corridor leading to the speaker’s suite, looking out into the small adjourning courtyard where he had been presented with his Lancaster fishing rod, pondering whether he would use it as intended next Sunday, or if unfolding events would stymie his plans.

  The idea that a speaker would resign on the demand of the opposition was far-fetched, but Gordon hoped the plan would work and save him from taking a more egregious step to ensure the amended legislation was stopped from passing through the parliament. He was only assuming the prime minister was colluding with the Indonesian government – he didn’t have time to investigate a more substantial link – but the small coincidences raised serious doubts in his mind.

  Gordon checked his watch and could hear the noise of the delegation approaching with what seemed to be a buzz of journalists asking questions. He turned to meet the politicians.

  When the delegation had left their leader’s office, they had not expected the crush of media cameras and lights. Journalists stood behind the cameras bellowing questions at the men as they squeezed past the throng of flashing cameras. The five-strong delegation refused to answer questions as they marched in single file toward the speaker’s office. As they reached the whip’s foyer and turned, they were greeted by Gordon. He stood aside and allowed them to pass without comment, and followed the group as they entered the speaker’s chambers, journalists still shouting their final questions but receiving no response.