Source : the age
NSW Premier Chris Minns says there’s a key winner from the damaging allegations being aired at the ICAC – One Nation.
Minns was asked during an interview on 2GB this morning if he was enjoying watching the Liberal Party suffer the pain of an ICAC inquiry.
“What I think this actually does is give us all a bad name,” Minns said. “And for insurgent political parties like One Nation, I think they’re licking their lips and going, ‘oh, this is proof that the system isn’t working for many people’.”
The ICAC is important because in some cases the fear of being dragged into an inquiry is enough to stop corruption before it happens, Minns said.
The first week of public hearings heard explosive claims about efforts to hide political donations, the extraordinary influence of fugitive property developer Jean Nassif over Liberal Party figures, and efforts to smear the reputation of then MP David Elliott.
Bevan Shields has the top five revelations here:
The Herald team have been following every second of this inquiry, scrutinising the evidence and bringing you fresh exclusives since long before these public hearings began.
Here’s a taste of the team’s recent agenda-setting work:
Chief investigative reporter Kate McClymont compares the theatre of the ICAC inquiry to Game of Thrones after witness Robert Assaf told the commission about betrayals, backstabbers and rats. Check out her must-read analysis here.
An ICAC summons is almost always an unwanted invitation to come and tell the truth before the commission and the public. Yesterday the commission heard some persons of interest used that summons as an opportunity to “align” their stories – here’s senior writer Alexandra Smith and state politics reporter Jessica McSweeney’s wrap of the day’s evidence.
Long before the ICAC hearings, key person of interest Christian Ellis “f—ed with the wrong person” when he attempted to unseat Sussan Ley in her seat of Farrer. Senior writer Bevan Shields has this roaring read of the 11-hour drive and the attempted coup that ushered in the beginning of the end for the Reformers.
Hello and welcome to the Herald’s live coverage of the ICAC’s Operation Rosny public hearings.
I’m state political reporter Jessica McSweeney, and along with the Herald’s senior writers, we’ll be bringing you all the latest updates as they happen from today’s hearing.
Today we’re expecting to hear from businessman Frits Mare, who gave evidence to the 2023 parliamentary inquiry into branch stacking in the Hills that Jean-Claude Perrottet and Christian Ellis, both persons of interest in this ICAC inquiry, asked Mare for $50,000 to fund a branch operation to unseat Scott Morrison’s right-hand man Alex Hawke from his federal electorate. Mare wanted no part in their scheme.
We’ll also hear from upper house MP Damien Tudehope, who stood down as shadow attorney general when he received his summons to appear as a witness. Tudehope has not been accused of wrongdoing, but is expected to answer questions about his connections to a right-wing factional group called the Reformers.
Here’s what we covered yesterday:
- Robert Assaf revealed he met with fellow person of interest Jeremy Greenwood at a Belfield cafe to discuss their summons to the ICAC, knowing full well he was not meant to discuss it. The pair went for a walk and deliberately left their electronic devices in Greenwood’s car to avoid being traced.
- Assaf agreed Greenwood was trying to “standardise the message” and wanted to “align” evidence before key Reformers spoke to the ICAC.
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Jean-Claude Perrottet, a key Reformer and Catholic Schools NSW staffer, told fellow Reformer Christian Ellis in a text message that he was doing political work without being compensated fairly, while claiming Assaf received “$135k for Rob to work for faction”. The commission heard $135,000 was Assaf’s salary at the schools body, he denied he was paid for political work.
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Assaf said there were widespread concerns, as well as “jokes and insinuations”, in the right faction of the Liberal Party around Ellis’s connection to Nassif’s Toplace.
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It became a joke among Assaf’s associates, including Toplace lawyer Sharangan Maheswaran, that Assaf was a “rat” for wanting to appear before the 2023 parliamentary inquiry and be honest. Some would send him rat emojis, and he would be fed false information to try and weed out who he was speaking with, Assaf said.
