Top bureaucrat Amy Brown to be grilled on emails for John Barilaro’s New York job

The Perrottet government faces a growing crisis as an inquiry into former deputy premier John Barilaro’s plum New York posting homes in on emails sent in the days before he quit politics.

Investment NSW chief Amy Brown. Picture: Investment NSW

The senior public servant who awarded former NSW deputy premier John Barilaro a $500,000 a year New York trade commissioner’s job will be grilled by a parliamentary inquiry this week about a flurry of emails that show her agency frantically working to enable “an option for ministerial appointments” in the days before Mr Barilaro resigned from parliament.

The jobs affair is fast becoming a crisis for the Perrottet government, with the Premier declining on Sunday to answer questions about whether he had instructed Mr Barilaro not to take up the New York job.

Questions directed to Dominic Perrottet were referred to Investment NSW, which issued a statement saying Mr Barilaro’s “date of commencement and onboarding (are) yet to occur”.

The spokesperson said reports the government was negotiating a financial settlement with Mr Barilaro to end the appointment were “inaccurate.”

On Wednesday, Investment NSW chief executive Amy Brown will be questioned by an upper house inquiry into the appointment, with MPs to zero in on emails from mid-September while Mr Barilaro was still minister for trade, two weeks before he announced his resignation.

In an email dated 21 September, Investment NSW chief counsel Chris Carr told another executive: “We are now asked to consider whether there are alternative methods that STICs (senior trade and investment commissioners) could be employed. Specifically, we have been asked whether there is an option for ministerial appointments.

“The urgency driving this is that recruitment processes are well advanced for the next batch of appointments and there is now a need to clarify whether this ­alternative is viable.”

Two weeks later, on October 3 – the day before Mr Barilaro announced his resignation from politics – Ms Brown emailed the recruitment firm engaged to find suitable candidates saying its services would no longer be needed because the positions were to become ministerial appointments.

“I appreciate you’ll keep this confidential but we’ve now had confirmed instructions to commence preparation of legislation to convert the global STICs to statutory officers (ie ministerial appointments). We will be handling the STIC New York position as an internal matter.”

At some point after Mr Barilaro resigned and successor Stuart Ayres became Investment and Trade Minister, it appears the process reverted to having the public service select the candidate, allowing Mr Perrottet to assert the appointment was at arm’s length from the government.

One matter up for review by the inquiry is why the “final ­decision-maker” in the Barilaro appointment, according to Mr Perrottet, was Ms Brown, who reported to Mr Barilaro when he was trade minister.

Former NSW deputy premier John Barilaro. Picture: Jeremy Piper

Under terms of reference drawn up by Labor’s upper house leader Penny Sharpe, the public accountability committee will also investigate why another highly qualified candidate, businesswoman Jenny West, was originally told she had the job only have the offer rescinded, and how much compensation was paid to her after her draft contract was torn up.

On Sunday, Ms Sharpe said the inquiry would investigate how much the affair had cost taxpayers. “We’ve already had an expensive recruitment process where a very well qualified woman was given and offered the job, that subsequently was rescinded - they’ve had to make a payout for her of several hundreds of thousands of dollars, we estimate, and there’s now discussion that if they pull the pin on John Barilaro, taxpayers will be up for another several hundred thousand dollars.

“We still haven’t heard from the government that they’re not sending him - they need to not put John Barilaro on the plane until these inquiries are finished.”

Former NSW public service commissioner Graeme Head has been appointed by secretary of Premier and Cabinet Michael Coutts-Trotter to undertake an investigation of the process that led to Mr Barilaro’s appointment.

Mr Perrottet has committed to make the results public.