Last week, the Caretaker Conventions Committee heard extremely concerning evidence that a publicly funded staff member was deployed to work on Liberal election campaigns.

The witness gave evidence under oath that she was directed to undertake campaign work for Jane Howlett, including door-knocking, letterboxing, organising campaign activities and distributing Liberal campaign material using a government email account, including when she was no longer a member of parliament.

Given the Premier, by his own admission, “dropped the ball” on the secret Liberal legal fees saga, Labor called on him to immediately launch a full and independent investigation into these serious allegations.

So far, he has refused.

Worse, Marcus Vermey repeatedly worked to obstruct further evidence from being heard by the Committee.

We believe the Committee was entitled to receive the evidence under its existing terms of reference, but in order to remove any possible doubt and ensure the Committee can fully hear, test, and scrutinise the evidence the Shadow Attorney-General and I have written to the Chair suggesting amended terms of reference.

This must happen because Tasmanians deserve to know whether their money was used to deliberately subsidise Liberal election campaigns.

The Premier cannot refuse to investigate while his own MPs try to stop Parliament examining the evidence.

After 13 years of the Liberals, they are cutting jobs and services to pay for their waste while serious questions remain about the use of taxpayer-funded staff for their own political benefit.