Speaker 1: For decades.
Speaker 2: It's shone a light on corruption of the highest order,
Speaker 2: even toppling premiers.
Speaker 1: I still can't.
Speaker 3: Recall the receipt of a gift of a bottle of
Speaker 3: nineteen fifty nine range.
Speaker 4: I can't explain what happened.
Speaker 5: My resignation as Premier could not occur at a worse time,
Speaker 5: but the timing is completely outside of my control, as
Speaker 5: the IKAK has chosen to take this action during the
Speaker 5: most challenging weeks of the most challenging time.
Speaker 2: Now New South Wales AYIKAK, the state's corruption watchdog, has
Speaker 2: set its sights on a secretive right wing Christian faction
Speaker 2: of the Liberal Party, the Reformers, and it's cashed up
Speaker 2: group of backers.
Speaker 6: We expect that the Commission may see the confluence of
Speaker 6: personal greed and political ambitions.
Speaker 2: Already, the public Inquiry code named Operation Rosney, has heard
Speaker 2: of shit sheets, sham payments, phone taps and dodgy deals
Speaker 2: with fugitive developers, with the Reformers connections reaching all the
Speaker 2: way to the top of the Liberal Party. I'm Ruby
Speaker 2: Jones and you're listening to seven AM today, Sydney Morning
Speaker 2: Herald's chief investigative reporter, Kate mcclemont unpacks the tangled web
Speaker 2: of players at the center of what she's calling aka's
Speaker 2: Game of Thrones.
Speaker 1: It's Wednesday, August five.
Speaker 2: Kate, let's begin by talking through some of the major
Speaker 2: players in this case. Could we start with this group
Speaker 2: of conservatives, the right faction of a liberal party known
Speaker 2: as the quote unquote Reformers.
Speaker 1: Who are they?
Speaker 4: Well, the two key people who started the Reformers are
Speaker 4: Rob Asif and Christian Ellis. And then we've got a
Speaker 4: lobbying outfit connected to them, which is Jeremy Greenward. Christian
Speaker 4: Ellis is connected with them, and also two brothers of
Speaker 4: former Premier Dominic Perroite. We've got John Claude Perrote and
Speaker 4: we've got Charles Perrote. And then as a sideline, we've
Speaker 4: got Disappeared, developed by John Lecief who is in Lebanon,
Speaker 4: but there's a warrant out for his arrest over serious
Speaker 4: forward matters. And we also have Dallas McInerney, who is
Speaker 4: the war was up until recently basically the boss of
Speaker 4: Catholic schools New South Wales. And another person of interest
Speaker 4: is a young employer a Dylan White Law although he
Speaker 4: hasn't been mentioned in the terms of.
Speaker 6: Reference Allegation one. This involves an investigation into potential breaches
Speaker 6: of the electoral funding laws between twenty nineteen and twenty
Speaker 6: twenty three by a number of persons who were interested
Speaker 6: to bolster the recruitment of Conservatives into branches of the
Speaker 6: State Liberal Party.
Speaker 2: And so by the sounds of it, this group of men,
Speaker 2: they had some pretty big ambitions. They were trying to
Speaker 2: recruit as many as five thousand people and completely changed
Speaker 2: the direction of the New South Wales Liberal parties. So
Speaker 2: how big of an operation were they building?
Speaker 4: Look, it was actually quite a small operation. But in
Speaker 4: order to achieve their goals, which was basically to have
Speaker 4: people elected to either state executive or to Parliament or
Speaker 4: to councils people of a like minded worldview and that
Speaker 4: is basically conservative Catholic values. But they needed money to branchstack.
Speaker 6: Including from prohibited donors in amounts that were not declared
Speaker 6: and exceeded applicable donation caps for purposes that included the
Speaker 6: recruitment and or renewal of members to the Liberal Party.
Speaker 2: Okay, so tell me a bit more about where the
Speaker 2: money was coming from.
Speaker 4: Well, the money was coming from John resif the developmer
Speaker 4: now John Asique was having trouble in Castle Hill.
Speaker 7: He had some very.
Speaker 4: Big developments, but the Building Commissioner David Chandler had issued
Speaker 4: rectification orders and also local MPs David Elliot and Ray
Speaker 4: Williams had expressed concerns from their constituents about these developments.
Speaker 4: So we've heard that some of the money from John
Speaker 4: Nacief was being channeled through these people to ruin the
Speaker 4: careers of Elliot and Chandler.
Speaker 7: We've also heard that some of the.
Speaker 4: Money was coming through just to bankroll the activities of
Speaker 4: the reformers.
Speaker 6: Mister mcief wanted the removal of the Old Hills Council
Speaker 6: linked to the center right faction and mister David Elliot MP,
Speaker 6: so as to replace them with members of the Liberal
Speaker 6: Party whom he thought would support his developments, and that
Speaker 6: may well have motivated him to make certain payments to
Speaker 6: Christian Ellis, Jeremy greenwo Good and Charles Perrete.
Speaker 4: We've also heard evidence from Michael O'Hara, who is a
Speaker 4: Conservative Catholic and he was also a hotelier and developer
Speaker 4: and being involved in the liquor business and development. He
Speaker 4: too was a band developer, so he was putting in,
Speaker 4: you know, quite considerable sums of money to a lobbying
Speaker 4: group associated with these people for work that was never done.
Speaker 2: So the allegation is essentially money wandering through this lobbying company.
Speaker 4: Yes, I guess it was. It was washing money to
Speaker 4: make it look like it was to be used for
Speaker 4: something else.
Speaker 2: And Ike also heard claims that Dallas McNerney, the former
Speaker 2: Catholic Schools New South Wales CEO, had wanted to shake
Speaker 2: down Angus Taylor for thousands of dollars.
Speaker 1: Tell me what exactly the inquiry heard about that.
Speaker 4: Well, it was interesting because they were always trying to
Speaker 4: get money from somewhere. So there was a text message shared.
Speaker 8: Bombshell text messages in a reformers group chat boasted that
Speaker 8: Angus Taylor committed personal funds, got the commitment from Angers
Speaker 8: for a fifteen K injection plus a three K monthly donation.
Speaker 4: But there has been no evidence that that money was
Speaker 4: actually forthcoming. It was just that they were all chatting
Speaker 4: with excitement about the possibility of receiving it.
Speaker 6: I'm not going to give a running commentary on all
Speaker 6: of this, so I'm not a party to the proceedings,
Speaker 6: but no payment was made, but.
Speaker 3: They produced text messages claiming that you were donators.
Speaker 5: Can you just think I said that no.
Speaker 1: Payment was made.
Speaker 2: Can you tell me a little bit more about the
Speaker 2: ideological bent here what they actually wanted to see happen
Speaker 2: within the Liberal party.
Speaker 4: Look, I think that they wanted to see Christian conservative values,
Speaker 4: anti abortion, anti trans, anti same sex marriage. And it's
Speaker 4: interesting that we've heard that quite a few of the
Speaker 4: people actually went to school at Redfield College, which is
Speaker 4: in the Hills area, and that is associated with Opus Day,
Speaker 4: which is a right wing group within the Catholic Church.
Speaker 4: A lot of the people shared those values and in
Speaker 4: fact that's where some of them met. And this includes
Speaker 4: the Perrote brothers. Dominic Perrote, the former premier, was school
Speaker 4: captain in the year two thousand. Now there's no suggestion
Speaker 4: that Dominic Perrote was involved in any of the activities
Speaker 4: of his brother, but they basically shared a right wing
Speaker 4: religious view of the world that they wanted to.
Speaker 7: Impose on others.
Speaker 4: Share with others, but that's what their goal was.
Speaker 2: Still to come sheets, wire taps and branch stacking. Kay
Speaker 2: The Reformers are also accused of branch stacking at the
Speaker 2: hills Shire Council, replacing the old members with people that
Speaker 2: they hoped would approve the developments of one of their
Speaker 2: main backers, the fugitive property developer Jean Nasieff. Can you
Speaker 2: tell me a bit more about Nasif?
Speaker 4: Well, yes, John mcief was at one stage one of
Speaker 4: the biggest private developers in the state, but things started
Speaker 4: to go awry for him when the Building Commissioner put
Speaker 4: rectification orders. It just basically meant you have got a
Speaker 4: lot of problems with your buildings. There are serious defects.
Speaker 4: We won't let you sell any more of these until
Speaker 4: they fixed. In June twenty twenty two, Ray Williams, who
Speaker 4: was a member from the Hills area, gone up and
Speaker 4: made an explosive speech to Parliament.
Speaker 9: Member for Kellyville, Ray Williams making astonishing claims about those
Speaker 9: in his own party.
Speaker 3: Who were paid significant funds in order to arrange to
Speaker 3: put new counselors on the Hillshire Council who would be
Speaker 3: supportive of future top Place development application.
Speaker 7: Now it was interesting.
Speaker 4: At the same time, John Nasieff was under investigation by
Speaker 4: Strikeforce Kohloul, which was a new South Wales organized crime
Speaker 4: Stripeforce and they were examining serious fraud allegations about Nasief
Speaker 4: and his daughter, and at the end of twenty twenty two,
Speaker 4: after Ray Williams's speech, it was decided that New South
Speaker 4: Wales Parliament would have its own inquiry into these allegations.
Speaker 4: Now I think the parliamentary inquiry, I think someone's were
Speaker 4: issued on the eighth of December, and John Nasiff departed
Speaker 4: this country to Lebanon on the ninth of December. A
Speaker 4: couple of months later there was a warrant issued for
Speaker 4: his arrest for serious fraud offenses. Basically, he was getting
Speaker 4: financial backing for his buildings by bodging up sales like
Speaker 4: pretending that he'd sold a lot more, but they were
Speaker 4: to friends and family. Since leaving the country in December
Speaker 4: twenty twenty two, there is no indication that Nasifi is
Speaker 4: going to come back for either of the four chargers
Speaker 4: or for the Aykak inquiry.
Speaker 2: Okay, So despite all of this and having left the country,
Speaker 2: it seems like he was still trying to influence politics here.
Speaker 4: Well. We heard that John Decieff was a person that
Speaker 4: seemed to have access to a lot of money and
Speaker 4: he was also funding private investigators. So we've heard that
Speaker 4: private investigators followed the then police Minister David Elliot trying
Speaker 4: to find something with which to blackmail him. We've also
Speaker 4: heard that through Genasif, the private investigators were also trying
Speaker 4: to stop summons being served by Parliament for people to
Speaker 4: appear at that parliamentary inquiry that we were talking about.
Speaker 4: So it seems that Nasif was still perhaps pulling the strings,
Speaker 4: perhaps still injecting money while overseas.
Speaker 2: Can you tell me any more about David Elliott and
Speaker 2: the so called chit sheet that was compiled.
Speaker 4: Yes, well, the shit sheet was supposedly compiled by young
Speaker 4: Dylan Whitelaw, who I think was sort of like about
Speaker 4: twenty one at the time, although even though he was
Speaker 4: shown it, he had very little recollection, like a lot
Speaker 4: of the witnesses seem to have a lot of trouble
Speaker 4: recalling until they're shown a text message or.
Speaker 7: You know, an intercepted call.
Speaker 4: So this shit sheet was basically making accusations. You can
Speaker 4: see that the attachment is David Elliot sheet doc X.
Speaker 9: The Watchdog has dug up a twenty twenty dirt file
Speaker 9: allegedly written by the so called Reformers in it a
Speaker 9: list of negative media stories and allegations mister Elliott was
Speaker 9: having an extramarital affair, but they.
Speaker 4: Were shocking this around media hoping that somebody would pick
Speaker 4: it up.
Speaker 2: And Kate, we know that John Neceiphe's phone calls were
Speaker 2: being tapped. Some of those conversations have been played out
Speaker 2: at AIKAK.
Speaker 4: Yeah, some of them have been played out, and interestingly,
Speaker 4: some of those were from twenty twenty one, so this
Speaker 4: is before either IKAK was looking or Ray Williams made
Speaker 4: his famous speech to Parliament in twenty twenty two. So
Speaker 4: some of the phone taps that we've heard, and these
Speaker 4: came from John mcif. They were rather explicit about how
Speaker 4: much he hated David and the Building Commissioner David Chandler.
Speaker 3: I've got my hand on the state government and you're
Speaker 3: going to see changes.
Speaker 4: And exactly what he was going to do to get
Speaker 4: them out of the way.
Speaker 2: I'm going to step on his neck and strip them
Speaker 2: from his job.
Speaker 4: Just give me two months, Kay.
Speaker 2: The reformers in this case, they began by saying that
Speaker 2: they wanted to change the Liberal Party from within, and
Speaker 2: there is nothing illegal or inherently corrupt about recruiting members
Speaker 2: to a political party. But stepping back, what does ikak
Speaker 2: allege this operation had become by the time we had
Speaker 2: Jean mcief calling himself it's godfather.
Speaker 4: Well, I think there's a breach of possible electoral laws
Speaker 4: which means that donations have to be accounted for. We've
Speaker 4: got allegations that Dallas McInerney from Catholic Schools, New South Wales,
Speaker 4: whatever his donations were for, there were invoices given for
Speaker 4: government services which apparently didn't happen. They were classified as
Speaker 4: donations and therefore exceeding the donation cap.
Speaker 7: With regard to Hotelia.
Speaker 4: Michael O'Hara and develop up John Nac they are prostributed donors.
Speaker 4: So by trying to disguise them as proper work, say
Speaker 4: for government relations or things like that, which are true,
Speaker 4: it's a way of circumventing electoral laws donation laws. So
Speaker 4: that's the kind of thing that Akaki is looking at.
Speaker 2: And in the past Aikak hearings have ended some very
Speaker 2: high profile careers, famously to New Southwal's premiers Barri O'Farrell
Speaker 2: and Gladysmorre Juclian lost their jobs after hearings that weren't
Speaker 2: really originally supposed to be about them. So how worried
Speaker 2: would you be if you were Angus Taylor or any
Speaker 2: senior lib right now?
Speaker 4: Look, it does have a way of capturing people unintentionally,
Speaker 4: so you don't know what surprises lay in store. That
Speaker 4: there was no way that IKAK was targeting Barrio Farrell,
Speaker 4: but if there are traps waiting, and look, you know
Speaker 4: we have to say about Angus Taylor. Although that he
Speaker 4: has been mentioned, both he and a Dominic Perrote whose
Speaker 4: brothers are involved, there have been no allegations about them
Speaker 4: at all. They've been mentioned in passing but nothing so far.
Speaker 2: Well, looking forward to hearing whatever else is to come
Speaker 2: in the.
Speaker 1: Next few weeks.
Speaker 4: Oh me too, me too, Okay, thank you so much
Speaker 4: for your time, my pleasure.
Speaker 2: Also in the news, the gambling industry has denied claims
Speaker 2: offered drugs and escorts as inducements to people experiencing gambling harm.
Speaker 2: Former NROL player Luke Bateman and anti gambling advocate Tim
Speaker 2: Costello made the allegations at a Senate inquiry into gambling reforms,
Speaker 2: claiming high spending customers were supplied drugs, alcohol and sex
Speaker 2: workers to keep them betting. Sports bet and Tab Corps
Speaker 2: say they have zero tolerance for the alleged conduct and
Speaker 2: are calling for any evidence to.
Speaker 1: Be referred to authorities.
Speaker 2: And a pro Palestinian protest held outside the Sydney Opera
Speaker 2: House two days after the October seven Hamas attacks and
Speaker 2: a Neo Nazi rally outside New southwalest Parliament are under
Speaker 2: scrutiny of the Antisemitism Royal Commission. The inquiry is examining
Speaker 2: police responses to the events, including allegations of anti Jewish
Speaker 2: chants and threatening behavior at the Opera House rally, and
Speaker 2: how the twenty twenty five Neo Nazi gathering was allowed
Speaker 2: to proceed.
Speaker 1: Commissioner A.
Speaker 2: Virginia Bell says peaceful protest is fundamental democracy, but the
Speaker 2: Commission will consider whether police responses to anti Semitic conduct
Speaker 2: can be improved.
Speaker 1: I'm Ruby Jones. This is seven a m. Thanks for listening.