Hood is walking proof that Australia's whistleblower laws need revamping. But so too, he says, is his story evidence of the need for a new approach to policing corruption and misconduct at the federal level of government. Reserve Bank governor Glenn Stevens received a Companion in the Order of Australia this month. Credit:Rob Homer He says the patchwork of integrity and enforcement agencies with no obvious leader, or over-arching authority, needs an overhaul. The bribery inquiry that he helped trigger would have been an ideal candidate for the sort of dedicated anti-corruption agency increasingly sought by integrity experts but, to date, opposed by the major political parties. Apart from Greens leader Richard Di Natale repeatedly calling for such a body, the issue of a federal ICAC has been largely ignored by the major parties in the federal election campaign. But Hood is firm: "The existing system is not adequate".

"In hindsight, had there been an independent federal anti-corruption agency operating, I would have gone there." Every state now has such an agency, and the Northern Territory is about to get one. The NSW version – the Independent Commission Against Corruption (ICAC) has repeatedly shone in a light in the darkest of Labor and Liberal backroom corners, its investigations having led to the sacking, resignation, or retirement upwards of 20 MPs over 18 years. Even in Victoria, which prides itself on its political purity, the new Independent Broad Based Anti-corruption Commission (established in 2011) has unearthed corruption in the education and transport departments. So why not a federal anti-corruption or integrity commission? What's so special about Canberra? Opponents of a federal ICAC say there is no need because Australia is not a corrupt country. And compared with much of Asia, Africa, southern and eastern Europe, and South America, it isn't. In 2015, it was ranked 13th cleanest of 168 countries by Transparency International's Corruptions Perceptions Index.

An Australian National University study in 2012 found the direct, personal experience of corruption low, with nine out of 10 interviewees reporting no incidents of bribery in their lives in the preceding five years. Nor, argue the opponents, does the presence of a national integrity body necessarily equal success in fighting corruption. Those countries perceived as most clean – including Germany, France, Finland, Sweden and Denmark – don't have dedicated corruption busting agencies. The free market think tank the Institute of Public Affairs (IPA) has weighed into the debate, slamming all ICACs, state or federal, as "undemocratic" and unaccountable. Such bodies, IPA policy director Simon Breheny told a senate select committee in May, are "always in danger of losing sight of their original mission, objectivity and values of the common law justice system". Federal ICAC critics have been emboldened by the high-profile excesses of the NSW ICAC, its reliance on theatrical public hearings, and the ultimately doomed pursuit of Crown prosecutor Margaret Cunneen over allegations she advised her son's girlfriend to fake chest pains after a car accident in order to delay a breath test. After the High Court in 2015 struck out ICAC's findings against Cunneen on the grounds of a faulty definition of corruption, she declared her inquisitors "lawless gangsters". The IPA seized on the Cunneen case with Breheny citing it as evidence that a federal commission "would also would invite abuses of power".

And anyway, say supporters of the status quo, Canberra already has an adequate, multi-pronged integrity system, capably overseen by the Attorney-General's department. In April the department deputy secretary Leanne Close warned that a national ICAC – it would cost more than $100 million to run – would be an unnecessary and expensive duplication. Existing corruption fighters include the Australian Commission for Law Enforcement Integrity (ACLEI) which polices federal law enforcement agencies including Border Force, the Australian Crime Commission and the Australian Federal Police. Then there's the Australian Federal Police itself with its Fraud and Anti-Corruption Centre and the Commonwealth Ombudsman. Underpinning the current system, said Close, is representative government and the separation of powers enshrined in the constitution, effective parliamentary committees. But Brian Hood says the current system is not working. Many years after he first complained about international banknote deals and the alleged payment of bribes across the world, neither the companies nor all the individuals responsible have been held to public account in Australia.

The RBA initially sought to deal with complaint internally and only called in Australian Federal Police in 2009 after Fairfax Media's extensive revelations about the alleged bribery. The corporate watchdog ASIC, refused to investigate. "All this has taken far too long. Without the perseverance of investigative journalists nothing would have come out," Hood says. Even then, only the most serious allegations from the banknote scandal are being pursued. The so-called grey areas of corporate failure and misconduct, and mistreatment of whistleblowers have so far remained largely unexamined. In truth, there are major gaps in the system. The police corruption force ACLEI only covers law enforcement agencies. The AFP's Fraud and Anti-Corruption Centre is focused only on fraud against the Commonwealth. The Ombudsman is limited to complaints about the public service. There is not integrity monitoring of MPs, not even a code of conduct.

"It's a fragmented system," says leading integrity expert, Griffiths University Professor AJ Brown. "there is no strategic leadership, coordination or oversight, especially in that grey area of integrity, conduct, and risks." The NSW ICAC may have over-reached in some cases. But its broad definition of corruption and wide remit has seen it uncover some dark secrets of Australian politics. In doing so, it has also exposed a lack of such scrutiny at the federal level. One of the most troubling gaps in oversight that ICAC exposed was how property developers made backdoor donations to the NSW Liberal party when Senator Arthur Sinodinos was state Liberal financial director. They did so via the federal Liberal fundraising body the Free Enterprise Foundation. It is illegal in NSW for developers to donate to political parties. While the Free Enterprise case has clear national importance, it remains beyond the scope or interest of the assorted federal agencies, including political finance regulator, the Australian Electoral Commission. Increasingly, Australians doubt the hygiene of federal politics. Their country has slipped each of the last three years down the transparency international's corruption trust index – from 7th in 2012 to 13th in 2015.

The current system relies, to a large extent, on government departments' and agencies' internal checks and balances. The weakness is the tendency for those bodies to assume someone else is looking after such matters, and/or to protect their own reputations by downplaying corruption and misconduct. The Western Australian Corruption and Crime Commission says corruption is more prevalent than departments like to admit. "The Australian experience of Royal Commissions, parliamentary inquiries and the Australian Wheat Board … illustrate the point that organisations can be motivated to under-report corruption that exists within them," it noted in a 2012 submission. It is a view echoed by the NSW ICAC: "While it is sometimes argued that other agencies could investigate the matters dealt with by the Commission, the Commission's experience is that they seldom do (or do effectively)." An oft-repeated truism in Canberra, recently repeated by the Australian Public Service Commission, is that federal public officials are less susceptible to corruption than local and state counterparts because they're focused on lofty national policy issues and are remote from decisions where corruption is most likely – planning and licensing, for instance. The Accountability Round Table, a group that lobbies for integrity in Australian government, rejects this argument, pointing to the enhanced risks from privatisation of federal services, the growth of direct federal funding to programs, the "arms race" over federal campaign funds, the dominance of ministerial (political) staff over traditional public service, and the power of lobbyists.

In fact Australians appear to view federal politicians as the most dodgy. A 2014 Griffith University study found respondents trusted the Federal sphere the least with only 53 per cent of interviewees saying they had a good level of confidence in national government. Stephen Charles, QC, speaking on behalf of The Accountability Round Table, says there is no reason to assume that "the corrupting influences" in Sydney, Melbourne or Perth do not operate in Canberra, where the government each year purchases tens of billions of dollars of goods and services. It is a sentiment expressed by Labor's retired integrity champion, John Faulkner, who told the senate in 2014 that the issues being raised at the NSW ICAC "do not miraculously stop at state or territory borders". While the recent NSW experience has drawn attention to the dangers of ICAC media circuses and the unfair trashing of reputations, federal ICAC advocates say that lessons have been learned. A federal ICAC could and should be carefully constituted so that such risks are minimised; public hearings would be the exception rather than the norm to minimise the likelihood of media circuses. Griffith University's Professor Brown says a federal ICAC would also require the tweaking of the roles of existing agencies to minimise duplication.

Veteran journalist Quentin Dempster told a senate committee early this year that such changes, and the introduction of a one stop anti-corruption shop, could create savings, not added expense. When Queensland Labor's minister Gordon Nuttall was jailed in 2009 following an investigation by the state's Crime and Misconduct anti-corruption commission of secret commissions paid by businessmen, then premier Anna Bligh described it as one of the "inevitable embarrassments" that occur from time to time if a government takes fighting corruption seriously. "I would much rather live and work in a system which is not afraid to pick up the rock and discover the ugliness underneath than one that is content to leave the rock alone and assume that undisturbed rock is a sign of good health," she declared. So why won't the Coalition or Labor pick up the rock? Brian Hood suspects it is fear for what they might find if the established order is disturbed. "There might be some inconvenient truths. Institutions and organisations believed to be squeaky clean, may not be."

"The current system doesn't work for whistleblowers and its not working in the fight against corruption. Justice needs to be done and be seen to be done. The business community is not getting the message that corruption is being dealt with." So whistleblower Hood didn't get a Queen's birthday gong this month. He doesn't care. He'd just like a job. But the current Reserve Bank governor Glenn Stevens did, a Companion in the Order of Australia, for "eminent service to the financial and central bank sectors".