Crime and Corruption Committee hearing day three

DONATIONS from property developers were allegedly funnelled into a trust account and anonymously used to support the 2016 re-election of Moreton Bay mayor Allan Sutherland, a corruption probe has heard.

Tim Connolly leaves a hearing at the Crime and Corruption Commission in Brisbane on Thursday. Picture: AAP Image/Dan Peled

DONATIONS from property developers were allegedly funnelled into a trust account and anonymously used to support the 2016 re-election of Moreton Bay mayor Allan Sutherland, a corruption probe has heard.

Accountant Kirby Leeke told a Crime and Corruption Commission hearing on Thursday he banked unsolicited cheques into the Moreton Futures Trust in the lead-up to the March 19 election.

Mr Leeke said Mr Sutherland’s wife Gayle would email him invoices for campaign expenses such as billboards, which he paid with the trust’s funds.

Mr Sutherland’s disclosure form, which all local government candidates are required to fill out, showed he received more than $118,000 from the MFT, not the individual companies.

Moreton Mayor Allan Sutherland.

Mr Leeke said he did not know how people knew to donate to the trust, but thought some of the “background work” was done by town planner Timothy Connolly and former Pine Rivers deputy mayor Bryan Galvin.

The commission was told cheques for up to $20,000 would be dropped off at Mr Leeke’s office in Everton Park with just a handwritten note to use it for the trust.

Mr Leeke said he only spoke to Mr Sutherland once at a function before the election at a farewell for councillor Bryan Battersby.

“He did ask me if we would be supporting him and I said yes,” Mr Leeke said. “I think that was the only time I spoke to (Mr Sutherland).”

A few days before the election, Mr Leeke received an email from Queensland property developer Focus Pacific’s chief executive Michael Graham stating: “I have just been speaking with Allan Sutherland and have decided to support his campaign with a $10,000 donation.”

Mr Leeke said he then emailed an MFT invoice to Mr Graham, but did not believe the money was ever banked.

“I don’t think he did pay or come through with it,” he said.

Mr Sutherland is due to testify at the hearing on Friday.

EARLIER: A TOWN PLANNER was used to establish a political fundraising body because he was “a convenient person at the time.”

Tim Connolly gave evidence at the Crime and Corruption Commission hearings into local government elections that he was nominated as the settlor of the Moreton Futures Trust because of his involvement in Bryan Galvin’s unsuccessful 2008 mayoral election campaign.

“I was a convenient person at the time because I was involved in that election campaign,” Mr Connolly said.

The trust was established in 2010 but Mr Connolly said the idea was instigated by Mr Galvin during the 2008 election.

Mr Galvin was a joint trustee before he was replaced by Kirby Leeke in 2011.

Mr Connolly said today was the first time he had seen the deed with everyone’s signatures on it.

“This is the first time that I’ve seen that signed document,” Mr Connolly said.

Earlier, a suburban doctor admitted to the CCC that he had signed a legal document without reading it that appointed him trustee of the Moreton Futures Trust.

Aspley-based GP Dr John Ryan gave evidence at a the CCC hearing that his long-time lawyer, Mr Galven, would have likely presented him with the document during a medical consult when he signed it in April 2010.

Witness Dr John Ryan. Picture: The Courier-Mail

But Dr Ryan said he had no recollection of signing the document that appointed him joint trustee of the political fundraising entity.

“I do not remember this document at all,” Dr Ryan told the CCC hearing on Thursday.

He denied any involvement with the fundraising body, or any other political activity since 2008, despite the document stating any dispersement of funds needed authorisation from both trustees.

Dr Ryan said he signed the document “without reading it”, nor “without understanding it.”

He told the hearing his involvement with politics ended in 2008 after the first local elections where council’s across the state were amalgamated.

Those elections saw Mr Galvin pitted again current Moreton Bay Mayor Allan Sutherland.

Moreton Futures is currently the fundraising arm for Cr Sutherland but it is unclear how it was transferred over for his use from his former political opponent.

However, the CCC hearing, being held as part of Operation Belcarra, heard that a person called Kirby Leeke replaced Mr Galvin as a trustee in 2011. Mr Leeke is due to give evidence this afternoon.

Dr Ryan said he knew Mr Leeke but denied having any contact with him since the 2008 election night apart from one other time a few years ago.

The hearings were then shown bank statements from 2012 that were jointly signed by Dr Ryan and Mr Leeke for an account linked to Moreton Futures Trust.

Dr Ryan denied knowledge of the bank accounts, claiming to have never received a statement, despite agreeing it was his signature on the forms.

“I have no idea,” Dr Ryan said. “I have no input into any financial dealings with Moreton (Bay Regional) Council.”