Gladys Berejiklian didn’t expect ‘corrupt’ ICAC report finding — but she should have

Gladys Berejikliangives evidence at the ICAC inquiry.

Gladys Berejiklian did not expect this.

That’s a measure of how deeply in denial she has been about her own conduct in this sordid affair.

She had hoped to escape with a finding that she was guilty of misconduct but not corrupt.

That was always unlikely.

Instead she can count herself lucky that ICAC has not recommended she be prosecuted.

The evidence revealed against her at the Independent Commission Against Corruption hearings was damning.

The corruption watchdog has found that the former premier engaged in serious corrupt conduct by exercising her power over funding to pet projects of her then-lover Liberal MP Daryl Maguire without disclosing her close personal relationship with him.

It found that when she was treasurer she put Mr Maguire’s proposal for funding for the Australian Clay Target Association in his Wagga Wagga electorate before the expenditure review committee and helped push it through.

Failed to flag her suspicions about Maguire

Likewise, influenced by her secret five year tryst with the MP, ICAC found she pushed his proposal for money for a local conservatorium of music through official channels.

And then she failed to tell the watchdog of her suspicion that Maguire was engaged in activities that were or might have been corrupt.

That “grave misconduct” undermined “the high standards of probity that are sought to be achieved by the ministerial code which, as premier, Ms Berejiklian substantially administered.”

But more alarming than the secret relationship, the taped phone calls (“I don’t need to know that bit”) and the Chinese developers, was Berejiklian’s refusal to accept she had done anything wrong — beyond being unlucky in love.

She took the people of NSW for mugs.

The former premier lost her claim to the highest office in the state not just by acting in a manner ICAC has now found to be corrupt but by treating its citizens with contempt.

Many in Sydney – though possibly not those locked down in the southwest suburbs for months – were grateful for Berejiklian’s strong leadership through the pandemic.

She made tough decisions, fronting up day after day to inform and explain - a model of patience and transparency.

Daryl Maguire gives evidence before ICAC in 2021.

Her behaviour at the ICAC hearings could not have been more different: dismissive, petulant, evasive.

Perhaps she thought after that first gobsmacking revelation that no one would stop to look at the evidence. That people would believe her only mistake — as she insisted repeatedly — was that she’d “stuffed up in my personal life.”

It worked for a time, after a scattergun PR blitz in which she first declared to the Sunday Telegraph that she had been in love with Maguire and thought they would marry, then told Ben Fordham on 2GB the Wagga Wagga MP wasn’t even her boyfriend, let alone “anything of note”.

But in late 2021 she became one of the key subjects of the inquiry and resigned, expressing outrage and declaring: “I have absolutely no regrets during my time in public life.”

When she returned to the ICAC witness stand, counsel assisting, Scott Robertson, threw her a lifeline.

“Ms Berejiklian, if you were able to have your time again, would you disclose your close personal relationship with Mr Maguire to your ministerial colleagues, or any of them?” he asked.

The former premier was being handed an opportunity to concede that, yes, with the benefit of hindsight her judgment was flawed.

Money for pet projects

That keeping secret her affair with Maguire, even after she was aware of the corruption allegations against him, was not only unwise but so patently wrong that every minister and public servant who gave evidence to the inquiry said they would have acted differently if they had known of the relationship.

But Berejiklian slapped the offer down.

No, she said. The five-year relationship with Maguire was not “of sufficient standard or of sufficient significance” to disclose; not even something she felt worth sharing with her parents or sisters.

The former premier has been dismissive at every turn of the obvious conflicts of interest arising from her secret relationship.

“Isn’t that the sort of thing, when you’re making decisions in relation to projects Mr Maguire would advocate for, it would at least cross your mind?” asked Assistant Commissioner Ruth McColl, as Berejiklian was questioned about her role in advancing one of her lover’s pet projects – $30m funding for the Riverina Conservatorium of Music.

The proposals were about the community, she responded, not something from which she would benefit personally.

“It was demonstrative of the deep emotional attachment you had to him, was it not, Ms Berejiklian?” McColl asked.

“Oh absolutely, but I had no assurance it was reciprocated or that it was going to lead anywhere and that is the threshold question, with due respect, Commissioner.”

“I think we’ll decide the threshold question, Ms Berejiklian,” the ICAC Commissioner replied curtly.

And now they have, finding that Ms Berejiklian stepped well over that threshold.

ICAC’s findings of corrupt conduct are unlikely to threaten Berejiklian’s job at Optus or perhaps even a potential run for a seat like North Sydney at the next federal election.

She has already made it clear she’ll appeal an adverse decision.

Some Liberal Party insiders believe her popularity with the public will be virtually untouched by the findings of the commission. That’s unlikely.

But owning her mistakes would be a start.