ICAC boss calls for governance standards and donation reform in his first media interview

ICAC chief commissioner John Hatzistergos has called for uniform donation rules across the country to avoid parties skirting them, a practice highlighted during a 2019 inquiry into NSW Labor banking Aldi bags full of cash from a prohibited Chinese donor.

John Hatzistergos, ICAC Chief Commissioner, has spoken to the media for the first time. Picture: Richard Dobson

A former NSW Labor attorney-general says political parties are circumventing NSW’s strict rules on donations by funnelling prohibited cash through federal campaign accounts.

Independent Commission Against Corruption (ICAC) chief commissioner John Hatzistergos has called for uniform donation rules across the country to avoid parties skirting them, a practice that was highlighted during a 2019 inquiry into NSW Labor banking Aldi bags full of cash from a prohibited Chinese donor.

Mr Hatzistergos called for new laws to impose “governance and control standards” on party bosses in his only media interview since being appointed to the ICAC role by then-premier Dominic Perrottet in ­August last year.

Mr Hatzistergos highlighted inconsistencies between NSW and federal donations laws as something which needed to be fixed.

“Developers can donate federally, as can a number of these other prohibited (in NSW) groups,” he said.

John Hatzistergos, ICAC Chief Commissioner. Picture: Richard Dobson

He said the inconsistency between state and federal ­donations was a “vehicle which can be used by political parties” to accept banned cash, by funnelling donations through federal party accounts.

“It would be much better in my view, if there was legislation dealing with the question of donations that was uniform across the country,” Mr Hatzistergos said.

He noted that in evidence to ICAC’s investigation into the Chinese Friends of Labor fundraising dinners, former NSW Labor secretary Sam Dastyari said donations banned at a state level could be banked in federal accounts.

“If the series of events that have been purported are true, they could have just ­accepted the money into the federal campaign account, which is what, how you ­normally take money from prohibited donors or people above the limits,” Mr Dastyari told Operation Aero at the time.

“The federal rules allow you to take that money.”

Property developers, for example, are banned from donating to NSW election campaigns, but are not banned from donating to federal political parties.

Mr Hatzistergos would not say whether he thought other groups of donors should be banned, saying that was a ­matter for politicians to ­decide.

However, he said politicians could also be improperly influenced without any money changing hands.

Mr Hatzistergos would not say whether he thought other groups should be banned. Picture: Richard Dobson

“They (politicians) have to use their position in the public interest and we make that point clearly to them all the time,” he said. “It’s not their electoral interests, it’s not the interests of their friends or their donors or anyone else.”

Mr Hatzistergos also reiterated ICAC’s call for political parties to be subject to certain “governance” standards in order to get funding for administrative purposes.

That would need to be done via legislation, something recommended in ICAC’s Operation Aero report.

The ICAC wrote to Premier Chris Minns late last month asking for an update on how the government plans to ­respond to those recommendations.

Mr Hatzistergos also conceded that ICAC had historically relied on lessons from its reports being learned through “osmosis”, which is something he wanted to change, in part by holding information sessions for MPs and public servants.

Meanwhile, he defended the ICAC for holding public inquiries, such as the probe into former premier Gladys Berejiklian.

“We have to observe the principles of procedural fairness, we do it publicly … and we report publicly to parliament,” he said. “We also explain in every report why we’ve decided to go public.”

Mr Hatzistergos was a minister in the NSW Labor ­government between 2003 and 2011 and was appointed District Court judge in NSW in 2014.

Originally published as ICAC boss calls for governance standards and donation reform in his first media interview