ICAC: NSW Premier Gladys Berejiklian’s contacts may be fatal, like Covid

Former MP Daryl Maguire, left, with Gladys Berejiklian, right, in Wagga Wagga in 2017. Picture: Supplied

We all know, don’t we, that corruption isn’t sexually transmitted?

You can’t catch it from your boyfriend, like you can COVID, just by getting close.

What a shame it would therefore be for a smart, capable woman like Gladys Berejiklian to lose her job as NSW Premier for what at this point amounts to no more than some rather stunning contact tracing by our friends, the corruption investigators, at ICAC.

Where is the evidence of wrongdoing? For sure, there’s plenty of prurient interest in the scandal, after the Premier was forced on Monday to admit to what looks to be an extremely messy relationship with the former Wagga MP Daryl Maguire, who is being investigated for corruption.

Having known nothing of the five-year relationship before Monday, the NSW public now knows even the nicknames they had for each other.

He called her “Hawkiss”, which is apparently Armenian for cute little thing.

She called him “my numero uno” which is of course Italian, for my No 1.

Well, that’s all very pleasingly inclusive, you might think.

But it’s devastating for Gladys, because she is in fact the state’s No 1, as in the premier minister, and here’s her lover giving out her personal email address to a property developer, saying it might help the deal, to get “a tickle from up top”.

As wording goes, it couldn’t really be more unfortunate, could it? A tickle from up top, when your lover is the Premier?

Then came the time he was speaking to her about a windfall he was hoping to get, from a property deal he was involved in.

“I don’t need to know about that bit,” she said, according to a recording of the call.

Asked about this, the Premier said: “I deny the proposition that I turned a blind eye … Perhaps I was bored and busy and wanted to move on.”

Quarantining, anyone?

Some commentators believe that Gladys will now have to resign, surely the ultimate punishment for failing to isolate, where there has been, as yet, no evidence of contagion.

It will be a pity, because she’s been the best performer in the nation on COVID, keeping the state open, and the infection rate low.

Others are saying, look, this is basically about her sex life, right, and who doesn’t understand how hard it is in Sydney to find a man who doesn’t talk about property to the point of exasperation?

It’s either that, or they’re about to make a motza on a casino deal with a side hustle of coal-seam gas.

What was most surprising about this scandal was finding Gladys in it.

As she said on Monday, she has always been “a very private person”.

She has never, as far as anyone can remember, mentioned having any kind of partner. She is not married, and she has no children.

She has, in fact, been less like the office siren and more like the office plant, which is in turn why so many people were walking around on Monday, wide-eyed that there could even be a sex scandal involving Gladys.

“Gladys?”

“Yes, Gladys.”

“Really?”

“Yes, really.”

Because she’s at the opposite end of the spectrum from, say, Jacqui Lambie, who makes plain her frustration with the paucity of male talent out there.

Gladys’ private life has always been exactly that: private.

You can see why: open the door even a crack on these matters, and you open it forever, and that can be completely devastating for women, in particular.

But this does look messy.

For one thing, Maguire until very recently had a wife, Maureen, with whom he has two kids.

ICAC has already taken testimony which suggests that he wanted an extra term in parliament, in part because he had to give Maureen a $1m settlement as part of their divorce.

Maureen was removed from his Wikipedia page only as recently as September.

The Premier says her relationship with him started in 2015 and ended “a few months ago”.

Still, these things should matter only if they impair one’s political judgment, or if there’s actual wrongdoing.

But we know that Maguire was forced to quit parliament in 2018 after being accused — he’s not yet convicted of anything — of trying to broker property deals on behalf of a Chinese developer.

ICAC is looking into allegations that he misused his public office for personal financial gain.

No findings have yet been made, but the “tickle from up top” email isn’t a good look.

It looks for all the world like he thought the Premier might use her influence to help him out.

She says she would “never, ever, never” have turned a blind eye to wrongdoing, not even for a lover.

Looking back on the relationship now, she has said she thinks he lied to her about his finances, and so she wonders what else he lied to her about.

That said, why should Gladys lose her job when there is not yet any evidence of any harm to anyone, beyond the obvious hurts to people’s hearts?

In Victoria, meanwhile, Dan Andrews keeps his job, with millions of lives completely ruined.

It is important to remember that Gladys is allowed to have personal relationships, even messy ones.

That is, as they say, her business.

If her lover was doing dodgy deals and she knew about them? That’s when it becomes ours.