Calls for Queensland corruption watchdog chief to step aside

The head of Queensland’s corruption watchdog is facing calls to step aside while an independent inquiry investigates the prosecution of seven Logan councillors.

Former Logan City councillor Trevina Schwarz leaves Brisbane Magistrates Court with Terry O'Gorman, right, and former councillors Phil Pidgeon and Russell Lutton. Picture: Richard Walker

The head of Queensland’s corruption watchdog is facing calls to step aside while an independent inquiry investigates circumstances around decisions that led to the prosecution of seven Logan councillors.

Prosecutors on Wednesday withdrew the charges in Brisbane Magistrates Court, citing “insufficient evidence”, two years after the process began.

The councillors are considering legal action to seek compensation for the ordeal, which left them unemployed and prematurely ended their political ­careers when they were sacked under new legislation brought in by the Palaszczuk government.

Russell Lutton, Trevina Schwarz, Cherie Dalley, Phil Pidgeon, Steve Swenson, Laurie Smith and Jennie Breene were charged with fraud in 2019 for their dismissal of council chief executive Sharon Kelsey in 2018.

The CCC alleged her dismissal had been influenced by Ms Kelsey making a public interest disclosure about alleged corruption by former Logan mayor Luke Smith. Magistrate Stephen Courtney, who presided over the committal hearing in November, said withdrawal of the charges was apt.

“The death of the presumption of innocence which has occurred … is appalling,” Ms Schwartz said. “It is even more appalling that those councillors aligned with Sharon Kelsey not only kept their jobs but were appointed to the administrator’s team which ran the Logan council up until the March 2020 local government elections.”

Mr Lutton, a councillor for 34 years, said his political career had been “destroyed”.

“To have my reputation tarnished and snapped from beneath me at the whim of the government and others is very soul destroying,” he said. “It’s been very traumatic … and all along the way I knew I’d done nothing wrong.”

Local Government Association of Queensland chief executive Greg Hallam has written to Premier Annastacia Palas­zczuk calling for CCC chairman Alan MacSporran to stand aside pending an investigation into the process that lead to the charges.

“Careers, lives and reputations were ruined and a democratically elected council wrongly sacked before these ­erroneously laid charges could be properly tested by the courts,” he said. “There must be an independent review to ensure this is not allowed to happen again.

“The LGAQ has always maintained the CCC overstepped the mark by wading into an industrial relations dispute — an area over which it does not have jurisdiction — and charging each of these councillors with a serious criminal offence.”

Mr MacSporran accepted the DPP’s decision but denied the CCC had acted improperly. “The ODPP considered the briefs of evidence and decided to prosecute these matters, as in their view at that time there was a prima facie case and reasonable prospect of convictions,” he said.

“There can be no legitimate claim or criticism that the CCC had no jurisdiction to investigate, or that it was misconceived or somehow inappropriate, to charge these individuals.”

A spokesman for Ms Palas­zczuk said the parliamentary crime and corruption committee had oversight of the CCC and was already conducting a scheduled review into its functions.