Miranda Devine: What happens if Gladys Berejiklian is found corrupt by ICAC?

Scott Morrison’s support for former premier Gladys Berejiklian to move into federal politics is a classic case of allowing opinion polls to trump common sense, writes Miranda Devine.

If the cloud hanging over Gladys Berejiklian’s integrity was black enough to cause her to quit as premier and resign from parliament, then why on earth is the Prime Minister trying to persuade her to enter federal parliament?

It smacks of desperation to shoehorn the former premier into preselection for the once blue-ribbon seat of Warringah before ICAC has made findings in its ­investigation into her alleged breaches of public trust, over grants and government decisions benefiting her secret boyfriend, disgraced former MP Daryl Maguire.

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Regardless of her positive attributes or residual popularity, Liberal voters of Warringah deserve better than a candidate with such an obvious target on her back.

It’s a classic case of allowing opinion polls to trump common sense.

Former Premier Gladys Berejiklian could face adverse ICAC findings against her during an election campaign. Picture: NCA Newswire / Gaye Gerard

Sure, polling may show that Berejiklian has the best chance today of beating independent Zali Steggall, who won the seat in 2019 when former PM Tony Abbott was ousted.

But poll respondents reasonably assume that, if she’s being included in a poll, she must be a viable candidate.

The problem is she is not in any way viable because ICAC could conceivably make a finding of corrupt conduct against her and refer her to the Director of Public Prosecutions. What then?

The Liberal party machine has held off closing nominations for preselection until January, but ICAC still won’t have delivered its finding by then.

Once the campaign begins and she starts being dirtied up by the opposition and the media, it won’t be long before those opinion polls head south.

Imagine the political ads featuring her loathsome ex “dodgy Daryl” and audio of the grubby phone conversations revealed by the corruption inquiry. None of it shows her in a good light.

The gullible lonely spinster routine has worn thin. While she performed competently as premier and is a likeable person, it’s not enough.

Phone conversations between former MP Daryl Maguire and Ms Berejiklian were played at ICAC. Picture: Dylan Robinson

She can’t just dismiss the relationship as “a mistake in my personal life” and somehow absolve herself of the favours she did for her money-grubbing paramour.

She was with Maguire for at least five years, he reportedly had a key to her house, and she has said they discussed marriage. They were, in effect, cohabitating, despite Berejiklian hiding the relationship from her colleagues and trying to downplay it before ICAC.

The relationship continued even after Maguire was forced to resign from parliament in 2018 over a previous corruption scandal involving Chinese property developers and a “cash for visas” scheme for ­Chinese nationals.

He ran an influence-peddling operation to monetise his relationship with the premier and even held business meetings in her office lobby.

The idea that she is a paragon of integrity, apart from her bad taste in boyfriends, does not ring true, either, when you consider her professional entanglement with controversial ­lobbyist Michael Photios, her long-time patron, whose involvement in a contract in her disastrous light rail pet project, casts further doubt on her judgment.

Integrity in public office is crucial. You only have to see the influence peddling, corruption and personal ­enrichment among US members of Congress to see how power corrupts.

Prime Minister Scott Morrison is wading into dangerous territory. Picture: NCA NewsWire / Jeremy Piper

So the PM veered into dangerous territory when he blasted ICAC’s treatment of Berejiklian as “shameful” and “an absolute disgrace”.

“There’s no suggestion of criminal conduct by Gladys Berejiklian,” Morrison said. “The Australian people know that the former premier of New South Wales was done over by a bad process and an abuse of process.

“We’ve seen, you know, recordings of private conversations, detailed, intimate things that were paraded around in the media. What was that about? Was that about shaming ­Gladys Berejiklian? I thought that was awful.

“What I found is that Gladys was put in a position of actually having to stand down and there was no findings of anything. Now, I don’t call that ­justice.”

The problem for ICAC, of course, is that it damaged its own credibility with its political persecutions of crown prosecutor Margaret Cunneen and NSW State Emergency Services commissioner Murray Kear.

Both were cleared of bogus corruption charges in a court of law but only after their reputations were unjustly sullied by ICAC.

Under former commissioner Megan Latham, the anti-corruption body lost its way and operated at times like an unaccountable star chamber. But she is gone, and worthwhile reforms were made by former Premier Mike Baird.

The Kear and Cunneen cases were clear-cut overreach. The same cannot be said for the Maguire-Berejiklian scandal.

No one is above the law and ­Berejiklian acknowledged that when she stepped down.

If her case is so strong that she is viable to run for Warringah, then she should have stayed on as Premier ­instead of throwing the state into ­upheaval during a pandemic.

But she knew her time was up. There are consequences for poor judgment in politics. It is not up to the PM to circumvent them.

By attempting to do so he has given advocates of a federal ICAC a leg up. By showing that Canberra has lower standards of public integrity than Macquarie Street, he is demonstrating a need for an anti-corruption watchdog.

Ms Berejiklian’s potential candidacy will be a gift to Warringah MP Zali Steggall.

Scott Morrison's wooing of Gladys Berejiklian is a bad idea.

It will require a lot of lies and omissions for Berejiklian to have any chance of getting over the line in Warringah and her candidacy will be a time bomb during the election campaign, a sign of a government that doesn’t abide by the rules.

It is a giant gamble for the Prime Minister and must reflect his fears about the precarious position of his government as the election draws near.

For Steggall, it is a gift.

The former barrister scolded Morrison for his “outrageous” attack on ICAC.

“We should be seeing leadership to raise trust, call for more accountability, not undermine accountability.”

Her neophyte Ms-Smith-goes-to-Washington schtick will only be ­enhanced by the contrast with a shop-worn professional with skeletons in her closet and a black cloud over her head.

Miranda Devine is in New York to cover current affairs for The Daily Telegraph