Gladys Berejiklian prefers secrecy to transparency and accountability when it comes to the intersection of her public and private duties.
Berejiklian did everything she could to keep the details of her personal relationship with disgraced former MP Daryl Maguire hidden from ministerial colleagues, personal staff and voters.
On Thursday, Berejiklian’s barrister, Sophie Callan, argued that some of Maguire’s testimony to the Independent Commission Against Corruption should not be given in public because it might impinge on her client’s “personal privacy”.
This was an extraordinary intervention, and commissioner Ruth McColl rejected the application. It delayed the hearing by an hour.
Berejiklian was only too happy to talk to radio shock jocks and newspaper gossip columnists about how she loved Maguire and planned to marry him as part of a political campaign to win public sympathy with a “bad boyfriend” defence.
ICAC is holding a public inquiry. It is about the conflict between Berejiklian’s public duties and her private non-disclosures, so it is in the public interest that testimony be given in public.
We know why Berejiklian wanted to keep the hearing secret. Maguire confirmed he loved Berejiklian and she loved him. They stayed at each other’s houses, Maguire had a key to Berejiklian’s home. They contemplated marriage and having a child.
The Ministerial Code of Conduct – a regulation under the ICAC Act – requires ministers to disclose intimate personal relationships. Berejiklian did not do so.
Maguire said their five-year relationship, during which time Berejiklian was treasurer and premier, took place between 2015 and last year, including after he resigned from parliament. (Berejiklian said it ended in 2018.)
She met Maguire’s business partners and discussed how much money he would pocket from certain deals. If they married, Berejiklian stood to benefit and so would their child.
Berejiklian also had a responsibility, under section 11 of the ICAC Act, to report any suspected corrupt conduct, but his business activities did not ring any alarm bells.
Berejiklian’s secrecy when it comes to the collision between her public duties and private life is well established.
She did not disclose the Maguire relationship to premier Mike Baird or other cabinet colleagues when they considered grants to the Australian Clay Target Association and the Riverina Conservatorium of Music in Maguire’s electorate.
During a tapped phone call, Berejiklian said: “I’ll throw money at Wagga, lots of it, don’t you worry about that.” When he said there was bureaucratic opposition, she replied: “I can overrule them.”
She did not reveal the Maguire relationship to public servants evaluating the grant proposals and preparing cabinet submissions for the expenditure of public funds.
And she apparently lied to her chief of staff, Sarah Cruickshank, about the relationship with Maguire.
The revelations about Berejiklian’s personal life invade her privacy but they are relevant to the discharge of her public duties. It is about her integrity in public life, not about the prurient details of her private life.
There should be no more secrecy; the public has a right to know.
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