In a typically explosive stunt, Bill Heffernan, the man who once brought a replica pipe bomb into Parliament House to make a point about security standards has accused a former Australian Prime Minister of being a paedophile.
The Liberal senator was speaking before the estimates committee yesterday when he made the allegation, saying that he has obtained a “very disturbing” police document that names 28 alleged paedophiles, some of them high-profile public figures.
In further surprising allegations, Heffernan went on to say that he believes every Commonwealth Attorney-General since Phillip Ruddock has seen the list, but none have acted on it in any way.
Heffernan fumed at the failings of the nation’s “institution of law”, saying:
“We have in Australia, sadly, a compromise at the highest of levels. There is a former Prime Minister on this list and it is a police document. It’s not so much the secret that’s the problem, it’s when a group of people, such as the 28 people on this page, keep each other’s secrets that the institution is compromised.”
The Senator says that he has given copy of the document to the Royal Commission into Institutional Responses to Child Sexual Abuse, but that they do not plan to expand their investigation to include it.
Current Attorney-General George Brandis, who says that he does not have a copy of the document, says that Heffernan should respect the decision of the royal commission, adding:
“The royal commission has a process for dealing with complaints and other information brought to its attention and placed into its hands by citizens. It is for the royal commission to judge whether, by reference to its terms of reference, that information is something that it should or indeed is capable of inquiring further into.”
via ABC News
