What we learnt today
Damien Tudehope’s evidence has concluded and that bring today’s hearing to a close, but we’ll be back for another full day with witness Jean-Claude Perrottet tomorrow.
There were a few major moments late in the day from today’s hearing. Here’s a recap of what we covered:
- The Liberal Party’s most senior member in the upper house, Damien Tudehope, leaked a confidential draft report from a 2023 parliamentary inquiry to Jeremy Greenwood, a key witness who refused to give evidence. Greenwood is also a person of interest to this corruption inquiry.
- Tudehope told the commission he had a conversation with then-premier Dominic Perrottet about his younger brother, Jean-Claude, who was also avoiding giving evidence to the parliamentary inquiry. Tudehope said “I think he may have told me that he was in Fiji”.
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Tudehope said his son, a Catholic Schools NSW staffer, was “agitated” after being pressured to pay invoices from Christian Ellis that he felt were “unjustified”.
- The MP gave an impassioned defence of his friend, Michael O’Hara, and said he never thought O’Hara’s support of the Reformers could be considered a political donation.
- Tudehope told the commission that Jean-Claude Perrottet, who worked in his electoral and ministerial offices, had a “talent” for factional work.
Tudehope leaked confidential report to a key target of inquiry
Damien Tudehope leaked a confidential draft report from by a parliamentary committee investigating allegations of illegal donations in the Hills to a target of the inquiry who had been avoiding giving evidence.
Jeremy Greenwood, a lobbyist aligned with the Reformers, is a person of interest to this ICAC inquiry and was also sought for questioning when a 2023 parliamentary committee inquiry was looking into allegations raised by MP Ray Williams about alleged corruption in his own party.
Greenwood, along with Jean-Claude Perrottet and Christian Ellis, avoided the inquiry.
The ICAC has just heard evidence that Tudehope was in contact with Greenwood and leaked him a copy of the draft findings, knowing it was meant to stay confidential.
“I thought that he had would have had an interest in that report,” Tudehope said.
Dominic Perrottet knew brother was hiding in Fiji, Tudehope says
Damien Tudehope has told the commission that then-premier Dominic Perrottet knew his brother was hiding in Fiji to avoid a 2023 parliamentary inquiry into illegal donations involving Hills Shire Council.
Key persons of interest in this ICAC inquiry including Jeremy Greenwood, Christian Ellis and Jean-Claude Perrottet went to lengths to avoid appearing before the 2023 committee.
Counsel assisting Dr Peggy Dwyer, SC: “You were aware that he was deliberately not attending, and did you discuss that with Dominic Perrottet?”
Damien Tudehope: “I did have a discussion with Dom at one stage, and it was a very casual discussion … I just said ‘where is Jean-Claude’ and he said he didn’t know. But then in a subsequent discussion, I think he may have told me that he was in Fiji.”
Asked if it concerned him that key witnesses were avoiding the parliamentary inquiry, Tudehope said he took the view the men were making their own decisions and that the inquiry was politically motivated.
‘Back to basics’: Commission turns to group chat messages
Damien Tudehope is now being asked about a group chat he was part of which also included Charles Perrottet, Christian Ellis and former premier Dominic Perrottet.
The members of the group chat, called “Back to basics”, attended a meeting at Tudehope’s home for a “meeting of the minds” organised by Charles Perrottet to discuss factional issues.
“Lots has been going on, and some concerning developments this week in both the left and right has accelerated the need for us to get together and discuss. This group share the same values, and although between us at times we’ve had our differences, I’m sure we can put them to one side to try and protect and advance our common interests,” he said in the text message.
Tudehope could not recall the details of what was discussed at the meeting.
After the meeting, another messaged the group recapping what they spoke about and what was to come. That included goals of adding members in certain branches, moving members between branches and “private clients for retainers”.
Tudehope did not know what the reference to private retainers referred to.
Tudehope says son raised concerns about Catholic Schools contract
Damien Tudehope said his son, a Catholic Schools NSW staffer, was “agitated” after being pressured to pay invoices from Christian Ellis that he felt were “unjustified”.
James Tudehope is in New Zealand and aware the commission would like to speak with him, but has so far declined to give oral evidence in the public hearing, counsel assisting Dr Peggy Dwyer, SC, said in her opening statement.
Damien Tudehope told the commission that his son told him at a Sunday lunch that he felt pressured by Ellis to pay the invoices on behalf of Catholic Schools NSW despite his concerns.
Christian Ellis’ job in Tudehope’s office terminated after three months
The commission heard that key Reformer Christian Ellis came to work for Damien Tudehope in a senior role in April 2019, only to be terminated from his role after just three months.
Dwyer said Tom Rabe, a journalist writing for this masthead at the time, had published stories about a concerted effort by sections of the party’s hard right to undermine sitting members in several safe state and federal seats. That included references to Jean-Claude Perrottet and Christian Ellis.
One of the politicians targeted, member for Berowra Julian Leeser, was particularly “exercised” by the branch stacking activities, Tudehope said.
Dwyer asked Tudehope if “blowback” on his office from Ellis’ factional activities was what motivated him to remove the staffer from his office.
“I think I can’t but agree with that. That was probably the precipitating event that he could not stay,” Tudehope said.
‘Not on your life’: Tudehope’s impassioned defence of friend O’Hara
Damien Tudehope has given a full-throttled and impassioned defence of his friend Michael O’Hara, who is a person of interest to the inquiry.
A key allegation under investigation in this inquiry is whether O’Hara, a prohibited donor, donated to the Reformers through bogus contracts to obscure what were, in fact, political donations.
Tudehope said he does not believe O’Hara falls into the definition of a prohibited donor in this case, because he does not believe that O’Hara’s contributions were political donations.
“The premise of becoming a prohibited donor is that you are actually making a political donation, and if you think for one moment … that I would have exposed Michael O’Hara to a circumstance where he would [be] having to give evidence in this commission the way that he had to give evidence last week, if you think that I would expose a friend of mine to that level of scrutiny that he was exposed to … do you think that I would have done that in circumstances where I knew that he would be a prohibited donor for the purposes of the Electoral Funding Act? Not on your life,” he said.
Sloane doesn’t know if she’ll lose more frontbenchers
Liberal leader Kellie Sloane has conceded that she doesn’t know whether she’ll lose more frontbenchers due to allegations of developer-funded branch stacking within the party heard by the ICAC.
With almost seven weeks to run in Operation Rosny, Sloane on Tuesday admitted that she couldn’t be sure there wouldn’t be more resignations from her shadow ministry.
“I just don’t know the outcome,” she said. “I’m not going to pre-empt anything. I’m not going to stand here and pretend I know what’s coming. I don’t. This happened before my time.”
In her first press conference since Operation Rosny began, Sloane also refused to back federal Liberal Party president Tony Abbott’s criticisms of the anti-corruption watchdog.
Tudehope ‘warrior’ for social issues, less interested in faction matters
Tudehope has told the commission that he was more interesting in speaking about causes rather than getting people to sign up to the Liberal Party when asked about his participation in Reformers events.
In a text message in 2018, founding member of the Reformers and one-time Tudehope staffer Christian Ellis told the MP:
“Apologies for the weekend. When initially planned, we were told numbers would likely be a bit lot higher, but it is what it is, and we’ll try and continue to tap into the Mormon community. Thanks for coming along.”
Tudehope wrote in reply: “No worries. I would go and talk to two people if it helps this cause.”
Tudehope explained that he would attend events around social issues that he was a “warrior” for.
Jean-Claude Perrottet had ‘talent’ for renewing members
Asked by Dwyer if renewing memberships was part of Jean-Claude Perrottet’s role in Tudehope’s electoral office, the MP said the young staffer “had a talent for that sort of stuff”.
“He had a fairly wide connection of friends, which he was able to marshal together and exploit – well, I won’t say exploit, but sort of get to do things for him,” he said.
Jean-Claude Perrottet, who is the younger brother of former premier Dominic, also worked as a junior staffer in Tudehope’s ministerial office when he was minister for finance.
Tudehope said that at one time he recalled his chief of staff “blew up” about staffers in Tudehope’s office undertaking Liberal Party recruitment work during working hours at the ministerial office, which is against the ministerial staff code of conduct.
He said that incident may have involved Christian Ellis and Jean-Claude Perrottet.
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