Behave badly, get sacked. Why treat MPs differently?

Should politicians be sacked if they’re found to have engaged in corrupt conduct, or breached a parliamentary code of conduct, if one is established?

New independent Kylea Tink suggests MPs should be expelled from Parliament, if necessary, if they’ve breached a parliamentary code of conduct — and breaches of that code would be assessed by the coming federal integrity body.

Integrity veteran Ian Temby disagress — he told Crikey’s David Hardaker only parliaments should have the power to expel MPs. Labor MP Kate Thwaites suggests the integrity body report to Parliament on breaches and let Parliament decide.

Thwaites at least acknowledges the clear problem with this — that a party with a majority simply won’t vote to expel its own MPs, especially not when parliamentary numbers are tight, which they have been in every Parliament but one since 2010. And even political opponents may be concerned about expelling an MP from the other side because of the precedent it might set for them.

The philosophy behind only Parliament being able to expel its members is that MPs are “employed” by voters, and only voters should therefore determine if an MP should continue to serve them. Given this can’t be done except through a byelection, politicians have decided that Parliament itself will stand in the stead of voters and determine if MPs should be expelled — something almost vanishingly rare.

It’s a classic case of the principal-agent problem: the agents (Parliament) responsible for representing the principals (voters) have a different agenda to the interests of voters, because Parliament is usually controlled by one party that wants to stay in power.

The result is that MPs are almost uniquely protected from the consequences of breaching the basic principles of workplace conduct. In most Australian workplaces now, harassment, bullying, sexual misconduct and even consensual relationships between people in different positions of power are regarded as sacking offences — joining rorting or otherwise misusing workplace funds, which have traditionally been seen as meriting dismissal.

Employers that refuse to sack someone found guilty of embezzling company funds would find shareholders in a rage; employers that declined to sack a workplace harasser or bully can now expect a torrent of negative publicity, interventions by key shareholders and demands for the board to resign.

But corporate Australia is now far in advance of parliaments, and especially the Commonwealth Parliament, where the most appalling rorting of taxpayer money for partisan ends, sexual harassment, bullying and sexual predation have all been ignored or covered up.

A parliamentary code of conduct that explicitly identified such behaviour as grounds for expulsion would only remain a code, a guideline, unless legislated, and unless enforced independently of political parties.

Let’s dump the fiction that politicians are somehow special, and carry some democratic anointment that protects them from having to face the consequences of their actions. Parliament should be a workplace like any other in Australia — if you break the rules, you pay the price, up to and including losing your job.