Ex-Liberal MP revealed as NSW Premier Gladys Berejiklian’s ‘numero uno’

Gladys Berejiklian has spoken about her secret relationship with former Liberal MP Daryl Maguire, revealing it wasn’t very important.

Gladys Berejiklian has repeatedly insisted her relationship with Daryl Maguire was not of “sufficient status” to reveal to anyone.

The NSW Premier this afternoon said not even her family or close friends knew of the long-term romance that emerged today during a bombshell Independent Commission Against Corruption into the former Liberal MP.

“This was a relationship I did not share with anybody - not my family, not my closest friends,” she said when she fronted media.

“It was not a relationship that I regarded of sufficient status but yet I will say that I am - well, I don’t want to take away the responsibility for my actions - and say I’m human, but I am.

“I’m human, and I stuffed up in my personal life. And for someone who’s extremely private and extremely cautious and very conservative in the way she leads her life, it’s been very difficult to have to have that out on full display.”

Ms Berejiklian revealed the close personal relationship with Mr Maguire in explosive evidence to the inquiry this morning, insisting it was “never, ever” a conflict of interest.

She was the star witness today at hearings investigating Mr Maguire’s conduct after the inquiry heard evidence he sought payments to help broker deals with property developers.

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NSW Premier Gladys Berejiklian with former Wagga Wagga MP Daryl Maguire.

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When asked by media if in hindsight she should have declared the relationship, Ms Berejiklian insisted it wasn’t important enough.

“The relationship wasn’t of sufficient status for me to talk to anybody about it,” she said.

“I didn’t even talk to my family about it, because it wasn’t of a sufficient status.

“I wasn’t sure about its future, to be honest. And these are very difficult things to talk about. But if I did, I would have obviously made those matters known. But I did not regard it as sufficient status at that stage to be able to make that public, or in fact tell people closest around me.”

PREMIER’S SECRET NICKNAME

Few get a glimpse into Ms Berejiklian’s private life but Mr Maguire was one of them.

Notoriously choosing work over her personal life, the NSW Premier has revealed little outside of being a politician over the years.

But the Wagga Wagga MP was close enough to Ms Berejiklian to give her a nickname.

Text messages referred to in the inquiry reveal that Mr Maguire called Ms Berejiklian “Hawkiss”, an Armenian term of affection.

“Hawkiss good news. One of my contacts sold a motel for 5.8 million. I had put her in contact so I should make 5k,” Mr Maguire said.

“Congrats!!! Great news!!! Woohoo” she responded.

Armenian was the first ­language in Ms Berejiklian’s family home.

The inquiry was told she was in a relationship with Mr Maguire for nearly five years from the time of the 2015 election until a few months ago.

In a private phone call Ms Berejiklian told Mr Maguire: “You will always be my numero uno.”

Asked what she meant by that, the Premier said she probably meant: “in my personal life I placed importance on how I felt about him.”

Ms Berejiklian is not accused of any misconduct in the inquiry but is being probed about Mr Maguire’s activities.

Last year, Ms Berejiklian, 50, spoke about the tragic secret behind her renown­ed workaholism and drive to become the first woman to be elected in her own right as Premier of NSW at the election.

In an interview with The Australian, Ms Berejiklian said she had a twin sister who did not survive childbirth and felt she had to “justify my existence by ­sacrificing”.

“So I don’t care if I’m not happy all the time. I feel like I’ve got to work hard. It was a complete fluke that I came out first,” she said.

“I had a twin sister and she didn’t make it … Life is precious and every moment.”

Ms Berejiklian with her parents and sisters after being sworn in, January 2017. Picture: Britta Campion

Ms Berejiklian as a child.

Mary Berejiklian, her younger sister, said Gladys “does always say she feels she has someone shadowing her”.

All four of Ms Berejiklian’s grand­parents were orphaned in the Armenian genocide that began in 1915, and 40 relatives lost their lives.

Her dad didn’t want to raise a family in the Middle East and so they moved to Australia in the 1960s.

Ms Berejiklian has never had children and despite admitting she is married to the job, she says she doesn’t mind.

“I think if I do get married, if I do have kids, that’d be great, for me,” she told The Australian in 2010.

“I don’t find the need to have a handbag, put it that way.”

Ms Berejiklian said her relationship with Ms Maguire did not have “sufficient substance”. Pictured in Wagga in 2017.

She told Mamamia that if she had met the right person she would have been married.

“But that doesn’t happen for everyone at the right time,” she said.

“People are interested I get it, but people shouldn’t make assumptions about what decisions women make or don’t make. It might not be because they haven’t tried, or don’t want to, it’s just happened this way.”

She said she would rather be regarded as boring or a workaholic than detract from her role as Premier.

“Because I am not embarrassed to say, I do a good job and I do it a lot better than a lot of men would,” she said.

Also opening up to The Australian Women’s Weekly about the curiosity into her private life, she said she never made a conscious decision to choose work over kids.

“It’s just the way it’s happened in my life and I’m very happy with where I am,” she said.

In 2017 she told Whimn that she was quite guarded with relationships.

“I even wonder how a coffee with a good friend will be interpreted,” she said.

“I don’t worry about that too much. I’ve been in public life for long enough that I know you just have to live your life normally.”