‘It’s clear to me I will leave’, Star Entertainment director Gerard Bradley flags exit

After nine years on Star Entertainment’s board, Gerard Bradley says it’s ‘clear’ he now has to move on, following damning revelations at a royal commission-style inquiry.

A royal commission-style inquiry heard former chief executive Matt Bekier used ‘vague’ language in a board report in July 2018. Picture: Richard Walker

Gerard Bradley says he will resign from the board of Star Entertainment, becoming the first director to signal their departure in the wake of explosive revelations at a royal commission-style inquiry.

Star has begun a board renewal process, with Mr Bradley – who has been a director since 2013 – telling the inquiry it is “clear to me that I will leave”.

“I won’t remain on the board beyond a matter of months beyond this review,” Mr Bradley said.

His departure’s exact date is not known, with Mr Bradley said new directors first need to be found and complete probity checks with the NSW regulator.

Mr Bradley’s impending departure comes after most of Star’s executive team – including chief executive Matt Bekier, chief financial officer Harry Theodore, chief legal and risk officer Paula Martin, and NSW chief casino officer Greg Hawkins – have resigned.

Their departures came as the inquiry heard Star disguised almost $1bn in suspicious gambling transactions on Chinese debit cards as hotel charges – misleading NAB, China Union Pay and ultimately the bank of China – during a seven-year period, and senior management “hid” material compliances breaches from directors.

The company also continued to deal with patrons with links to Chinese criminal gangs, sent fake documentation to Chinese banks and repeatedly rebuffed requests from Austrac for a copy of a damning report from KPMG into Star’s anti-money laundering program.

Mr Bradley said Star directors did not attempt to learn of illegal Chinese cash transactions in an exclusive gaming salon at its Pyrmont casino because it was misled by Mr Bekier.

“It’s very hard to ask questions when you are not aware of,” Mr Bradley said.

He is the third director to be hauled before the inquiry, headed by Adam Bell SC, with executive chairman John O’Neill set to follow in coming days. Mr Bradley is also chairman of Queensland Treasury Corporation and related companies, a non-executive director of Pinnacle Investment Management Group Limited and a Director of the Winston Churchill Memorial Trust.

The inquiry heard on Thursday Mr Bekier used “vague” language in a board report in July 2018 – two months after Chinese junket SunCity was caught exchanging bundles of cash from backpacks for gambling chips in a gaming room known as Salon 95, flouting state casino and money laundering laws.

Mr Bradley told the inquiry on Thursday that the board would have shut down Salon 95 – or at least its “service desk” – if it was alerted to the illegal and unlicensed behaviour.

“Management gave greater priority to business requirements relative to meeting our regulatory obligations, which is unacceptable,” Mr Bradley said.

But Mr Bell asked why directors didn’t ask more questions of Mr Bekier and former NSW chief casino officer, Greg Hawkins, who also attended the board meeting.

“Do you agree looking back on it now, the board should have asked questions to resolve this vague language and understood what it meant?” Mr Bell said.

Mr Bradley agreed that the board should have challenged management more but said the way the “concerns” in Salon 95 were disclosed “didn’t prompt investigation or inquiry”.

Counsel assisting the inquiry, Caspar Conde, asked Mr Bradley if he was misled. “Yes,” Mr Bradley said.

Star director Gerard Bradley gives evidence at the Bell inquiry.

Mr Bradley’s fellow director Sally Pitkin agreed and said management should not have waited two months to alert the board and should have done so in “plain language” under the heading “regulatory matters”.

“Clearly the trust that the board placed in the CEO and executive leadership team has been breached,” Ms Pitkin said.

“The board relies upon management to be open and complete in the information that it provides to the board otherwise the board cannot assess what is happening in the business, cannot monitor it appropriated and cannot make the right decisions.

“So the most senior leadership to hide issues from abroad undermines the very foundation of the governance framework.”

Again, Mr Bell asked why Ms Pitkin and other directors did not ask Mr Bekier to clarify his report about the “concerns” around Salon 95’s service desk.

Ms Pitkin said: “My reading of this would have been that the service desk, which is there to help VIPs with … boat tours around Sydney Harbour or flights to the zoo, weren't somehow been appropriately looked after. There was nothing to indicate to me in this that it related in any way to the provision of gambling”.

Star’s due diligence boss Angus Buchanan sent senior management a copy of a Hong Kong Jockey Club report, which revealed SunCity’s links to Chinese criminal gangs, in mid 2019. A month later, the media reported on a “secret” Hong Kong Jockey Club report and the club’s ban on SunCity.

Ms Pitkin said it was frustrating senior management did not tell the board it had a copy of that report at a subsequent board meeting in August, 2019.

“The company had that report. It had evidence of suspicious cash transactions in the room in breach of the agreement with the junket operator and it had access to a number of sources of information and it failed to compile those in a way that could inform a decision not to deal with SunCity,” Ms Pitkin said.

Her evidence follows Mr Bekier telling the inquiry last week that Mr Hawkins let him down, for not informing him fully of the suspicious behaviour in Salon 95.

Mr Hawkins was also accused of misleading the Bergin inquiry into rival Crown Resorts in 2020 when he said SunCity was not able to exchange cash for gaming chips in Salon 95, despite issuing the junket two warning letters about such behaviour.

“I’m disappointed in Salon 95. (Mr Hawkins) raised the risk with me on that; I thought the issues have been resolved. And I represented to the board and outside investors that the things that we learned about Crown would never happen,” Mr Bekier said.