Gladys Berejiklian ICAC: John Barilaro appears at Daryl Maguire hearings

The former deputy premier has told ICAC that ex-Premier Gladys Berejiklian’s relationship with Daryl Maguire was a conflict of interest.

Gladys Berejiklian’s secret relationship with MP Daryl Maguire was a conflict of interest, former NSW Deputy Premier John Barilaro has told the corruption watchdog in no uncertain terms.

Mr Barilaro appeared as a witness before the Independent Commission Against Corruption on Monday where he was questioned about two grants in Wagga Wagga approved after local MP Daryl Maguire lobbied his own government.

The first involved $5.5m for a shooting club, the second involved $30m, spread across two grants, for a music conservatorium.

Bureaucrats in the top levels of the government have said the grants, for various reasons, did not seem to add up but they understood there was “pressure” to get them across the line, the ICAC has heard.

Former NSW Deputy Premier John Barilaro arrives at ICAC today. Picture: NCA NewsWire / Dylan Coker

Those officials have told the ICAC that staffers in Mr Barilaro’s office were offering “advice” on the grants but it was alleged the real driver behind them was Ms Berejiklian in her roles as Treasurer and then Premier in 2016-2017.

The ICAC has heard Ms Berejiklian did not declare any conflicts of interest when the shooting club grant came before Cabinet’s Expenditure Review Committee (ERC) in late 2016.

She was chairing that committee as Treasurer and, had she declared the relationship, Mr Barilaro said things would have been handled differently.

“The conflict was the relationship (with Maguire),” Mr Barilaro said on Monday.

“As the member for Wagga Wagga … he was in a relationship with a member of the expenditure review committee, and therefore a conflict arose that should have been disclosed, and that would have changed the course of events in relation to how we managed the process but not necessarily the outcome,” Mr Barilaro said.

Gladys Berejiklian leaving her office in Northbridge today. Picture: Toby Zerna

Millions of dollars were handed out to a Wagga Wagga gun club after a push from Daryl Maguire.

Mr Barilaro said he never believed the grant to the Australian Clay Target Association would benefit either Maguire or Ms Berejiklian.

But, he added, MPs routinely declared relationships with people they knew or had worked with - let alone those they are dating.

Ms Berejiklian’s lawyer asked Mr Barilaro if he had disclosed all of his “intimate relationships” to his premier.

“That’s a hard question because my relations are with my family,” Mr Barilaro said.

Earlier Mr Barilaro said the ACTA grant was moving through the ERC without the normal two to three week “lead time” most grants faced.

He didn’t know why at the time, he told the ICAC, but said the expediency was at the behest of Ms Berejiklian.

“On the covering page on the submission there was a note that it was on the request of the treasurer at the time,” he told the ICAC.

Gladys Berejiklian with Daryl Maguire

Mr Barilaro said it was “unusual” for a grant to move through the process without its funding nailed down and it was also unusual because of the size and way the grant came to the ERC.

The ICAC has previously heard the NSW Government handed ACTA $40,000 so it could draw up a proper business case proposal despite the club having at least $1.2m of its own.

Mr Barilaro said it was “very rare” for the government to fund a business case on behalf of organisations seeking grant money.

“It is very rare that we’d fund business cases on behalf of proponents because if we did that we’d actually have no money to fund projects because they would have been chewed up by business cases,” he said.

A “cleaner” way to manage the ACTA grant would have been for the proponents to put the application through a competitive process for funding in March 2017, Mr Barilaro told the ICAC.

He said the funding “still would have been approved” if the gun club applied in this way rather than the matter going before the ERC.

Former Deputy Premier John Barilaro on a break after giving evidence at ICAC in Sydney. Picture: NCA NewsWire / Dylan Coker

“That would have been a cleaner (way) and a way to have managed the issue if we knew there was a relationship between the Treasurer at the time and Mr Maguire,” he said.

Mr Barilaro said he recalled conversations with Ms Berejiklian in which she indicated her support for the project but said it was “appropriate” for her to express that.

Mr Barilaro’s adviser Peter Minucos told the ICAC he did not understand there was any special interest in the gun club grant.

The only impetus to get it off the ground, Mr Minucos said, was that it had been approved by the ERC pending a proper business case being prepared for the project.

Other staffers told the ICAC they understood the project was being backed by Mr Barilaro, Ms Berejiklian and then-Sports Minister Stuart Ayres to appease Maguire.

“A range of conversations at that time indicated the Premier (Berejiklian)’s Office was particularly interested in that particular project,” staffer Chris Hanger said of the gun club grant.

Mr Barilaro said Maguire was “a pain in the arse” when it came to contacting staff and chasing down funding for his projects.

“He was a dog with a bone,” Mr Barilaro said.

Mr Minucos said he had been tasked with staying on top of the project and updated Maguire after the MP made repeated calls to the Deputy Premier’s office.

“I believe following another call from Mr Maguire asking what was happening I would have been asked to call him back,” Mr Minucos said on Monday.

The ICAC previously heard Maguire had also called Treasurer Berejiklian’s office in 2016 and met with her to discuss the gun club grant.

Mr Hanger told the ICAC, in his evidence last week, he had raised concerns about political advisers from Mr Barilaro’s office weighing in on the project as he assessed its business case.

Mr Minucos was his primary point of contact with Mr Barilaro’s office, Mr Hanger said.

Mr Minucos said he had no recollection of being told to “pull your head in” or anything similar but said it was possible concerns had been raised along those lines.

Stuart Ayres at ICAC last week.

It’s expected Mr Barilaro will be asked about whether the government, at that time, feared losing regional seats after a devastating loss at the Orange by-election in 2016.

Ms Berejiklian’s lawyers have attempted to tie the concerns about regional voters to the granting of the Wagga grants.

But, late last week, Mr Ayres told the ICAC that had no bearing on his interest in getting the gun club grant approved.

Rather, said, it was just a project that he felt had merit.

Mr Barilaro retired from politics just weeks ago.

It came after Ms Berejiklian resigned the day the ICAC announced it would publicly examine her role in the Wagga grants.

Ms Berejiklian, who denies all wrongdoing, will give evidence later this week after Maguire is called on Wednesday.