ICAC releases final report into Labor’s use of public funds during 2020 NT election campaign

The final report into alleged misuses of taxpayer funds by former Chief Minister Michael Gunner’s staffers in the lead up to the 2020 election has made no findings against individuals.

Former Chief Minister Michael Gunner. Picture:(A)manda Parkinson

The Northern Territory’s anti-corruption watchdog has released the long-awaited findings from an investigation into alleged Labor misuse of taxpayer funds in the lead up to the 2020 election, making no adverse findings against any individuals.

The final report of the Independent Commissioner Against Corruption (ICAC) investigation, Operation Jupiter Part 2, was tabled to parliament on Thursday afternoon.

The publicly available report follows allegations concerning former Labor Chief Minister Michael Gunner, and his ministerial staff, who were referred to ICAC amid claims of improper conduct by ministerial staff leading up to the 2020 Northern Territory general election.

Investigations confirmed in the months leading up to the 2020 election, officers within the Office of the Chief Minister, and in particular the digital unit, performed political campaign work within normal office hours and while being paid from the public purse.

Chief Minister Lia Finocchiaro said “this can never happen again”.

“The ICAC investigation found some ministerial staff were spending much of their taxpayer-funded work time helping the Labor Party win the election,” she said.

Chief Minister Lia Finocchiaro. Picture: Pema Tamang Pakhrin

“In a democracy, Territorians expect all political parties to be given a fair go leading up to an election.

“The report shows Labor had an unfair advantage in the 2020 election.”

Mrs Finocchiaro confirmed she had accepted all four recommendations made in the report, including updating the Ministerial Staff Code of Conduct.

“Territorians have been waiting for this report for years and neither Report 1 or Report 2 made any findings against any individuals, which is disappointing,” she said.

“The people of the Northern Territory deserve absolute confidence in their government and its representatives.”

Mrs Finocchiaro said the CLP had also established clear expectations for ministers and their staff to increase transparency by introducing the Territory’s first lobbyist register.

This was on top of delivering additional scrutiny measures, she said, including the Legislative Scrutiny Committee, independent Speaker, and doubling the time for debate of petitions.

“Since its introduction on Tuesday, we have already had five individual lobbyists from two entities sign up to the register — something that wouldn’t have existed under Labor,” Mrs Finocchiaro said.

Opposition Leader Selena said “the new Territory Labor” accepted all recommendations from the ICAC report.

“We will learn from mistakes made by previous leaders and never want to see them repeated,” she said.

Originally published as ICAC releases final report into Labor’s use of public funds during 2020 NT election campaign