OpinionJuly 6, 2026 — 5:00amOn Wednesday, a report will be issued by the NSW Parliamentary Committee into “Identity Protection”. The origins of the committee lie in swinging criticism of the Office of the NSW Director of Public Prosecutions (DPP) – two District Court judges said that sexual assault cases it brought to court were too weak and should not be prosecuted.Director of Public Prosecutions Sally Dowling SC should be allowed to do her job without political interference. Nick MoirIn a massive reversal, the Judicial Commission then disciplined the judges, finding their criticism went too far. Add another incident where the fact that another judge had invited a young offender to open judicial sittings with a Welcome to Country was leaked to radio identity Ben Fordham and, suddenly, you have an all out war – one being fought on several fronts.George Orwell would struggle to come up with a more deceptive name for the committee than “Identity Protection”; the truth is that the committee has had little or no interest in that subject. Rather, some members of the committee have been fully engaged on two side issues. The first is to question the rate of prosecution of men for sexual assaults; the second is to question the actions of the DPP, Sally Dowling SC, for her part in prosecuting those men.Both pursuits are puzzling. Gendered crimes, especially violent sex crimes, are on the rise – you would hope our politicians would support efforts to control this scourge. As for Dowling, while some describe her prosecution of male sex offenders as aggressive, others (myself included) consider her position justified and fair. It is entirely appropriate to have a debate around that. But Dowling should be allowed to do her job and, more to the point, to do so without political interference. That is the point of having an independent DPP.Unfortunately, while we do not know yet what the committee’s report will say, all the signs are that the committee would be better renamed as the “Committee for a Hatchet Job on Women”. The issues it is considering are of the highest importance: the independence of our criminal justice system (ie, freedom from political interference); the protection of women through our criminal justice system (a system long biased against the protection of women); and the encouragement of women, like Dowling, to hold and discharge the important offices of state.You would hope that parliament would uphold each of those values – they are community aspirations. Yet the smoke signals are not promising, which may not be a surprise – probably the worst place to debate and resolve such important issues, parliamentary committees usually reflect party political prejudices or (even worse) the personal prejudices of the few participating politicians.The outcomes of many parliamentary inquiries are uncomfortably predictable – even before the inquiries start.Among the big issues, the first is whether politicians should control criminal prosecutions. In NSW, we have been proudly free of such control for 40 years. That is why we got an independent DPP. People my age and older will remember the bad old days when far too much power resided in the hands of the attorney-general – a person subject to political party discipline. Compromising that independence now will again allow political considerations to influence criminal prosecutions.That, in my opinion, is a disgusting idea – it smells of Trumpism. The criminal justice system is already tilted against women. Rumours are the committee will recommend tilting it a little further. If it does, this committee is the manifestation of a culture war – an idea that somehow we strayed when we started prosecuting men for hurting women. That sounds mad, but it is a belief (sadly) widely held in the 2026 manosphere. Anyone who says the criminal justice system operates unfairly toward men in sexual crimes has rocks in their head; anyone who says women are treated fairly in that system needs to wake up.My third concern is one about which I confess substantial personal misgivings. Women are still shut out of high public office. The few women who hold high office are held to a different standard to men. This has been shown time and time again. An ageing white male, I have enjoyed every advantage of our political and legal systems. But at whose expense? Well, you know who. I do not believe for one moment that the current personal attacks on the DPP would be made if a male held that office and had pursued the same prosecutions.Geoffrey Watson is an anti-corruption campaigner and a director at the Centre for Public Integrity.From our partners