John Pagani
This is what treason looks like.
Small, almost imperceptible slashes in the democratic fabric. Not armed insurrection and tanks rolling down Molesworth Street, but an intelligence agency making a subtle, deliberate preference for one side of politics over another in breach of the legal obligation to remain impartial.
It is enough that one side of politics has lost confidence. They are never going to be so ham-fisted that they act in a way the right won't defend. But even creating a controversy damages our democracy, because our entire system depends on trust.
The constitutional obligation of impartiality is so strong that even the suggestion of partiality makes the SIS director's position untenable.
Maybe they have not behaved in a partisan way. But it sure looks like it, and that amounts to the same thing.
What innocent explanation is there for this sequence:
- Declining to release a document to Fairfax, then declassifying it for a request from a National Party blogger, the same day the request is received.
- Liaising with the prime minister's office.
- Sending the document to the National Party blogger, and continuing to withhold it from Fairfax.
- Remaining silent while the credibility of your organisation is in an unprecedented crisis.
- Putting yourself in a position where you can no longer perform your constitutional duty to work with the leader of the opposition.
Maybe the explanation is that they do not have the ability to perceive how much damage they have done.
When you meet the spooks, you realise quite quickly they are the opposite of James Bond. Our clever intelligence specialists are in the military living the life of Riley, or in the police where they have varied and interesting jobs chasing real crooks.
The SIS spends most of their time doing mundane reference checks for the plainest species in the beige lands: public servants. So they end up recruiting people who combine Paul Blart with Mr Bean.
Maybe they blundered into this.
But they need to get out of it. Even if they think they behaved perfectly, and they haven't, it is not sustainable for an intelligence agency to lose the trust of the opposition.
The only reason for Mr Tucker to stay in his job is to put his own interests ahead of the country. He can't meet with Phil Goff alone, meaning he can't do his job. Coincidentally, if he quit he could say what he liked.
