Premier dismissed concerns about ‘gold standard’ red shirts rort, Somyurek claims

Former Victorian minister Adem Somyurek has sought to blame other members of parliament, racism in the Labor Party and an opposing faction for the practice of ethnic branch stacking, as the state’s anti-corruption commission called the sacked powerbroker to the stand for the first time in its investigation into allegations of serious corrupt conduct.

Mr Somyurek, who left the Labor Party after being accused last year of a widespread branch stacking operation, claimed he had told Premier Daniel Andrews of his concerns in 2014 that electorate office staffers were being misused for political campaigns, but that the then Opposition Leader had dismissed his concerns.

A grinning Adem Somyurek when hearings began on Monday morning.

In an appearance punctuated by calls from counsel assisting the commission Chris Carr, SC, to stop making speeches and answer the question, Mr Somyurek said former Senator Stephen Conroy was “building an empire” while working as a staffer, and accused former MP Tayfun Eren of branch stacking while working for then Opposition Leader John Brumby.

He characterised “Anglo-Saxon” MPs whom he said had been engaged in branch stacking as “cheats”, saying MPs such as federal politicians Anthony Byrne and Richard Marles did not face the hurdles confronted by people from ethnic backgrounds. Systemic racism in the party made ethnically diverse members believe branch stacking was a form of “affirmative action by stealth,” he claimed.

Commissioner Robert Redlich warned Mr Somyurek not to “offer gratuitous comments” about other people.

Mr Somyurek is being investigated as part of an Independent Broad-based Anti-corruption Commission and Victorian Ombudsman probe into what Mr Carr has described as the “premeditated and systematic rorting of taxpayer resources”.

Mr Somyurek said the so-called red shirts affair, in which taxpayer-funded staff were directed to work on Labor’s 2014 re-election campaign was a “gold standard” rort, but that a subsequent Ombudsman’s investigation into it had missed the opportunity to clean it up because it had not been harsh enough.

The red shirts affair was the name given to what the Ombudsman concluded was Labor’s misuse of $388,000 in public funds to pay campaign staff working on the 2014 election campaign. But Mr Somyurek said parliamentarians across the political divide had been emboldened by the finding because the scandal had not been referred to IBAC and no criminal charges were laid.

Mr Somyurek told IBAC that, after the Ombudsman’s report, the political parties were on a “unity ticket” when they changed laws in early 2019 in response by not cracking down harder on the use of electorate officers for political activity.

“When the Ombudsman came back and basically admitted defeat and didn’t call IBAC or charges, we were all settled, that means that you do whatever you want, you can get your electorate officers, you can determine the duties and responsibilities of your officers without limitations,” he said.

IBAC Commissioner Robert Redlich speaks during the Operation Watts public hearing in Melbourne.Credit: AAP

“I would contend because the Ombudsman didn’t use harsher language and didn’t refer matters to charges, it created the impression that it was carte blanche, you could do whatever you wanted.”

The comments were described by IBAC commissioner Robert Redlich as a “terrible indictment” on the alleged culture in parliament.

Mr Somyurek told IBAC he raised concerns about the scheme with Mr Andrews in the lead-up to the 2014 election, who responded: “Do you want to win an election or not?”

On ABC Melbourne’s Drive program on Monday afternoon, Deputy Premier James Merlino was asked: “Are they the sorts of things you’ve heard Dan Andrews say about using taxpayer-funded money for political purposes?“

“The answer is no,” he said.

A spokeswoman for Mr Andrews said it would be inappropriate to comment while the hearings were ongoing.

During a robust day in the stand, Mr Somyurek lashed out at Mr Carr for taking the “mickey” out of him, “being cheeky” and “mocking” the Labor Party’s “collectivist culture” in his answer about whether it was appropriate for the Moderate Labor faction to collect internal ballot forms and fill them out on behalf of others.

Mr Somyurek claimed federal MP Anthony Byrne had been the “boss” of the so-called Moderate ALP faction, and that Mr Byrne had asked him to contribute to funds to pay for other people’s memberships. IBAC put it to Mr Somyurek that it was in fact him who was leading the faction.

Mr Somyurek said he could not recall when he started paying for other people’s memberships, but probably after he was elected in 2002, and that he had continued doing so since.

Mr Somyurek, a former Andrews government minister, admitted on Monday he rarely went to his electorate office, even after he was dumped from the ministry in 2015 over bullying allegations. In August 2019, Emma Walters, the wife of Victorian CFMEU secretary John Setka, started working for Mr Somyurek and undertook an internal review of the electorate office.

Electorate staff were primarily employed for factional purposes, according to Ms Walters, who made private notes about the set-up of Mr Somyurek’s new office in Melbourne’s CBD.

In a handwritten note shown at IBAC, Ms Walters wrote there were three reasons to be employed in Mr Somyurek’s electorate office: “1. Factional, 2. Manning = answer phone, constituent inquiry, 3. Office management, day-to-day.”

The review also found there were no walk-ins to the electorate office in a week and they were generally infrequent; staff were doing their own thing and possibly factional work; invoices were done on a haphazard basis; and the phone had rung only once over a three-day period.

Mr Somyurek told IBAC that he had not seen that review and he would have enjoyed reading it if he had seen it.

Former cabinet minister Marlene Kairouz told private IBAC hearings she accepted her ministerial and electorate staff were “significantly involved in factional work for significant periods of time during working hours”, according to Mr Carr.

Earlier, Mr Somyurek said in the 1990s, when he first joined the Labor Party, the Left and Right factions were “going at it hammer and tong” with regard to signing up new members into Labor Party branches in Melbourne’s south-eastern suburbs.

He said the internal jostling ramped up in the lead-up to Mr Byrne’s preselection for the seat of Holt. Around this time, Mr Andrews was “organising” for the Socialist Left while Mr Byrne was “leading the charge from the Right”, Mr Somyurek said.

The hearings will continue on Tuesday.

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