03/13/2002 "Heffernan bows out after judge attack"

Heffernan bows out after judge attack
- AAP/News.com.au

THE Liberal Senator who used parliamentary privilege to make shocking allegations against a High Court Judge is standing aside as Cabinet Secretary, Prime Minister John Howard said.

Mr Howard also told Parliament he had no knowledge that Senator Bill Heffernan would be making the allegations before his speech in Parliament last night.

Heffernan accused Justice Kirby of using taxpayer-funded commonwealth cars to pick up young male prostitutes and said the judge was not fit to sit in judgement of alleged paedophiles.

The Senator said he had statutory declarations from rent boys and had unsuccessfully tried to obtain Comcar records under freedom-of-information laws.

Justice Kirby has slammed the attack on him as homophobic, false and absurd.

This afternoon, Mr Howard said Justice Kirby enjoyed "a very fine reputation".

He said it was Senator Heffernan's decision to stand aside while the matter was further investigated and added that Senator Heffernan had written to New South Wales Police Commissioner Peter Ryan to outline his allegations and to urge police to investigate.

Deputy Prime Minister John Anderson said he was still thinking through the allegations, but said a royal commission into child sexual abuse was unlikely to be useful.

"I feel very deeply about it but I have to say I'm not persuaded that a royal commission will tell us anything that we don't know or provide any solutions," Mr Anderson said.

"(But) I can understand the motivation behind those calls."

He said he had an unlikely ally in NSW Police Minister Michael Costa.

Mr Anderson said Mr Costa had also acknowledged that many of society's taboos had broken down, creating an unstable and dangerous environment for children.

"He made the observation that we have to face the fact that many of the kids on the streets in our country towns are safer there than they are at home," Mr Anderson said.

He said respect for institutions needed restoring.

"The freedoms we take for granted in a tolerant, open, democratic society will prove unsustainable if we don't have trust and confidence in those institutions, but it's a two-way street," Mr Anderson said.

"Have we become too tolerant of the sort of attitudes and values that allow those things to grow in our society?"

Opposition leader Simon Crean has called on Mr Howard to sack the Senator.