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NSW premier Dominic Perrottet is speaking following the handing down of the Graeme Head Review into the appointment of John Barilaro to the $500,000-a-year trade commissioner role in New York.

He is announcing the changes that have come of the report, including:

• A minister cannot direct a secretary in the exercise of their employment function.

• Changes to ministerial code of conduct will see a minister be required to wait 18 months before taking on a role in the public sector.

• Senior public servants will also need to seek ethics advice in relation to future employment, which will be publicly published.

Michael McGowan

‘Rolled gold example’: Shoebridge on Morrison secret minister saga

More on the Greens’ response to the secret Morrison appointments following a public press conference earlier.

Greens senator David Shoebridge says his party will refer the secret minister saga to the federal parliament’s privileges committee, insisting the Department of Premier and Cabinet can’t run an investigation into something it advised former prime minister Scott Morrison on at the time.

While some ministers have said they were not aware Morrison had also been sworn in alongside them, Shoebridge said at a press conference on Tuesday that the privileges committee should also examine the role of the other ministers who were sharing their portfolios. He said:

We need to have not only former prime minister Scott Morrison answer questions, but of course those other ministers.

How could they stand up in parliament notionally answering questions about their portfolio, knowing at the same time that just behind them was some secret minister in the form of the prime minister who might veto their decisions?

While the prime minister, Anthony Albanese, has avoided criticising the governor general, David Hurley, in his role in appointing Morrison to the five extra ministries, Shoebridge said it was “hard to understand” how he had agreed to the arrangement.

This wasn’t a tick-and-flick exercise by the governor general; this was a critical part of our constitutional makeup.

Shoebridge labelled the secret minister saga a “rolled gold example” of the need for a federal Independent Commission Against Corruption and called on Labor to introduce the body by the end of the year,

… and commit to it having a broad enough jurisdiction so it can look at this entire mess.

The prime minister, Anthony Albanese, earlier today revealed former prime minister Scott Morrison was appointed to the Department of the Treasury on May 6 2021.

The Australian is reporting that the former treasurer Josh Frydenberg was never informed by Morrison that the former prime minister had himself sworn in as treasurer, but does not name the source of this information.

Editor at large Paul Kelly reports:

Frydenberg, the Liberal deputy leader, had no knowledge of this. Nor was Mr Frydenberg informed that Mr Morrison had himself also sworn in as finance minister from March 2020.

These events are without precedent in national politics. That Mr Frydenberg was never told by Mr Morrison is baffling given the close ties between them.

Dutton has stressed that Morrison’s decisions were made in a “warlike situation” when cabinet ministers like himself were hospitalised with Covid-19.

At the start of this pandemic … leaders all over the world, it was a warlike situation and there is concern about what would happen … there was concern as to what would happen in … the cabinet at the time, and I was sent to hospital, and people were in ventilators, and people were dying at that stage and that’s the context in which the prime minister at the time, Mr Morrison, made some of those decisions.

As he explained this morning, I wasn’t aware … I wasn’t there for decision-making in that regard and I think he’s made statements this morning that you can reflect on.

Asked if he would act the same as Morrison, Dutton responded:

I’m not getting into hypotheticals … it’s very hard for anybody to speak beyond what is publicly known now. The prime minister has a process out and thus the appropriate thing to do and will wait back to him on that.

I am the opposition leader. The joy of that is I am not in government. The prime minister has announced the process and they are waiting on legal advice and they will get back next week and I would wait for the legal advice.

He would not respond to the question of whether the former treasurer Josh Frydenberg was aware.

We are also hearing Frydenberg was not aware of the secret ministerial appointments, according to reports in The Australian.

Dutton calls for ‘cooler heads to prevail’ as other Liberals call for Morrison to resign

Peter Dutton, the opposition leader, has taken to the microphone. While senior Liberals like Karen Andrews are calling for Morrison to resign following the revelations of his secret appointments, Dutton is defending the former prime minister.

He says it is “time for cooler heads to prevail” saying there are “bigger issues families in Australia are dealing with”.

He said it is best to wait for legal advice to come back.

He said he won’t call for Morrison to resign.

Karen Andrews has continued her calls for Scott Morrison to resign, following the current prime minister Anthony Albanese’s revelation the former PM secretly appointed himself to five portfolios.

She told the Sydney Morning Herald:

I did not know. When it was all unfolding over the last 24 hours I wondered if home affairs would come up for no reason other than he had launched himself into a range of portfolios. I had nothing from him, nothing from PMO, no knowledge.

It is absolutely time for him to resign from parliament. This is unacceptable.

Andrews to ask Morrison to resign

Karen Andrews, the former home affairs minister, told news.com.au she had “no idea” the former prime minister, Scott Morrison, had sworn himself into her portfolio.

Andrews was home affairs minister at the time Albanese says Morrison was sworn into that portfolio.

She said:

I am going to ask him to resign and leave Parliament.

I have nothing to say to him.

This is totally unacceptable, for a prime minister to behave in this manner undermines everything that a federal government constitutionally should stand for.

Dutton to speak soon

We are also expecting a press conference with opposition leader Peter Dutton very soon. I’ll bring you what he has to say once he steps up.

Paul Karp

Greens to push to refer Scott Morrison to privileges committee

The Greens are calling for Scott Morrison to be referred to the privileges committee to consider whether being appointed to ministries without telling parliament could amount to contempt or misleading parliament.

The party’s attorney general spokesperson, David Shoebridge, told Guardian Australia the creation of “secret ministries” is an “attack on parliamentary accountability”.

He said:

Parliament can’t hold a minister to account if we don’t know a ministry exists … In the Senate, Simon Birmingham would have been answering questions as the finance minister when it turns out there was also a secret finance minister. How can you hold them to account if you don’t know who they are?

Shoebridge also noted that currently only the department of the prime minister and cabinet is looking into the issue – the same department that would have advised Morrison on the arrangement. “This can’t be the only place we do this investigation,” he said.

Shoebridge confirmed the Greens are currently seeking advice on how to refer Morrison to the privileges committee. At a press conference at noon he will also reiterate calls for a national anticorruption body.

Benita Kolovos

Raise the age petition to be delivered to Victorian parliament

A petition signed by more than 65,000 Victorians to raise the age of criminal responsibility to 14 has been handed to crossbench MP Fiona Patten on the steps of parliament.

The petition is part of a national campaign to raise the age, which last year saw the attorneys general of all Australian states and territories agree to move toward raising the age of criminal responsibility from 10 to 12. That step has been criticised as too small by justice advocates, who say raising the age to 12 will have a minimal impact on youth imprisonment rates.

Across Australia, children as young as 10 can be arrested by police, remanded in custody, convicted by the courts and jailed. Indigenous children are disproportionately affected and make up the vast majority of imprisoned children.

Across the country, 211,670 people have signed the petition to raise the age.

Patten told reporters:

I’m just incredibly honoured to be the person that will deliver this petition to the Victorian attorney general … about raising the age of criminal responsibility in Victoria. We are out of step with the rest of the world.

We know that the earlier a child brushes up against the justice system, the more likely they are to continually brush against the justice system. We know that Aboriginal children are so overrepresented in our juvenile justice system [and] that this is going to affect them more than anyone else.

In all of the inquiries that I have done [I’ve found] disadvantage is at the core of this and this will go some way towards changing it.

Patten chairs a parliamentary committee which earlier this year recommended the Victorian government raise the minimum age of criminal responsibility to 14.

She said it would help divert children into social services rather than “trapping” them in the criminal justice system from an early age.

The state’s attorney general, Jaclyn Symes, told reporters her priority is reducing youth offending:

There’s no point raising the age to 12, 13, 14 and just delaying the justice system’s response to that particular child. We’re dealing with really complex kids, kids that are many of them in our home care, many of them require services that we need to make sure are there as a safety net … I don’t want kids incarcerated and what I’m pleased to say that here in Victoria, right now, there are no children that are aged 11 or 12 in custody and that’s been the position for some time.