Grayson wanted $30k to set up venture with AWH

CAMPBELL Newman’s top public servant asked for $30,000 in consultancy fees to setup a joint venture with AWH.

CAMPBELL Newman’s top public servant asked for $30,000 in consultancy fees to set up a joint venture in Queensland with Australian Water Holdings when the company was allegedly siphoning taxpayer funds from Sydney Water to pay for its interstate expansion.

Documents show that a year before Jon Grayson was appointed director-general of the Department of Premier and Cabinet, the then businessman emailed AWH boss Nick di Giro­lamo with a $450,000 estimate to establish and begin operations for the joint venture.

A month later, in March 2011, the new company — Gasfields Water Management — was registered with Mr Grayson taking a 25 per cent stake and AWH, through its subsidiary Australian Water Queensland, the remaining 75 per cent.

Documents, including the email, have been tendered to the NSW Independent Commission Against Corruption. They show the new company was working to secure contracts for the disposal of waste water from the burgeoning coal-seam gas industry.

The email provides the first detailed evidence on the cost of the new venture, and Mr Gray­son’s co-ordination in the setup of the company, which was de­regis­tered only late last year amid emerging allegations over AWH. “Initially, equity will be held by QIP, and contributions made by AWQ (and any other equity participants) will earn equity in the company (per the HOA) or other rights,’’ Mr Grayson told Mr di Girolamo.

Two other companies were mooted as partners in the venture, but business records show it was just Mr Grayson and AWH that ultimately had a stake in the venture.

Mr Grayson has so far failed to answer questions about Sydney Water funds being used in the setup of the joint venture.

Last month, ICAC heard that AWH’s political donations, as well as possibly hundreds of thousands of dollars worth of expenses to expand into Queensland, were billed to Sydney Water as part of costs to provide water infrastructure in Sydney’s northwest.

On April 25, Queensland’s Crown Solicitor, Greg Cooper, wrote to The Weekend Australian, on instructions from Mr Grayson: “Mr Grayson rejects any suggestion he has a conflict of interest or that his shareholdings in those companies have influenced any decisions made in the discharge of his ­duties.”