Transport Minister Mark Bailey will not be referred to Ethics Committee

AN ETU boss wrote directly to Premier Annastacia Palaszczuk to ask her to intervene in a wage dispute at Ergon Energy in January 2016, he then forwarded the correspondence, which he conceded was unusual, to then energy minister Mark Bailey’s personal email.

ETU boss Peter Simpson wrote directly to Premier Annastacia Palaszczuk to ask her to intervene in a wage dispute at Ergon Energy in January 2016.

The union boss then forwarded the correspondence, which he conceded was unusual, to then energy minister Mark Bailey’s personal email.

“As you’d appreciate, I don’t write to you very often and won’t unless I’m passing on concerns of our membership, that is, after all, my job,” Mr Simpson wrote to Ms Palaszczuk at an official email address in January 2016.

The email is among a new tranche of documents released under Right to Information laws that detail secret discussions between Mr Bailey and union officials on his “mangocube” yahoo email.

Hundreds of pages of correspondence to and from Mr Bailey’s personal email have been deemed official documents after he breached ministerial guidelines by using the account to discuss government business.

Former treasurer Curtis Pitt was also in secret discussions with union bosses about a wage dispute with state-owned power companies. Picture: Annette Dew

The former energy minister, who now holds the transport portfolio, was last year cleared of corruption by the CCC over the saga.

Mr Bailey this afternoon escaped a referral to parliament’s Ethics Committee over LNP allegations he misled the house when he claimed he only used the account for “private purposes”.

Deputy Speaker Scott Stewart ruled Mr Bailey did not have a case to answer and said he would not be referred to the committee.

Former treasurer Curtis Pitt was also in secret discussions with union bosses about a wage dispute with state-owned power companies, the Australian newspaper reports.

Further documents released to the Australian reveal Mr Simpson wrote to Mr Pitt, who is now Speaker, on his personal email account.

In a surprise move, Mr Pitt today excused himself from making a ruling on whether Mr Bailey misled parliament and instead delegated the decision to deputy speaker Scott Stewart, who found the minister had no case to answer.

Deputy Speaker Scott Stewart has found Transport Minister Mark Bailey (pictured) does not have a case to answer. File picture

“On March 22, the Speaker decided while these matters raised do not directly relate to his previous duties as the treasurer, he decided out of an abundance of caution approach to delegate the functions of speaker in relation to the matter under Standing order 2696 to me, as deputy speaker,’’ Mr Stewart said.

This revelation comes hot on the heels of news earlier today that Transport Minister Mark Bailey will not be referred to the Ethics Committee over LNP allegations he misled Parliament over his mangocube email account.

The LNP had written to Speaker Curtis Pitt in March asking him to refer Mr Bailey, alleging emails released under Right to Information from the yahoo account were at odds with the Transport Minister’s assertion that the account was used only for “private purposes”.

Deputy Speaker Scott Stewart revealed the ruling in Parliament this afternoon after Mr Pitt delegated the decision to him to avoid any conflict due to his former role as Treasurer.

He said he had found Mr Bailey did not have a case to answer.

It comes almost two months after the LNP wrote to Mr Pitt with its complaint.