Former NSW premier Gladys Berejiklian at the NSW ICAC (Image: ICAC)

Defiant, vehement, vociferous — Gladys Berejiklian returned to the witness box this morning on the defence. She loudly and forcefully proclaimed that she was justified in trusting her former lover Daryl Maguire. 

Repeatedly questioned by counsel assisting the NSW Independent Commission Against Corruption (ICAC) Scott Robertson and assistant commissioner Ruth McColl SC about why she hadn’t reported her suspicions about the disgraced former Wagga Wagga MP’s conduct, as required by the New South Wales ICAC Act, she became extremely defensive. 

“I didn’t suspect him of corrupt conduct,” she said over and over, despite overwhelming evidence of suspicious actions. She had given him “the benefit of the doubt and the presumption of innocence”.

Under section 11 of the act, public officials have a duty to report to ICAC any matter that the person suspects on reasonable grounds concerns or may concern corrupt conduct.

There is a legal concept that liability attaches to someone who “knew or ought to have known” something — that deliberately closing your ears to crucial knowledge does not absolve a person of responsibility. 

Despite Maguire telling her that he had been summonsed to give evidence to a separate ICAC inquiry about Canterbury Council, Operation Dasha, she repeatedly said her suspicions were not aroused.

Berejiklian and Maguire have admitted to being in a “close personal relationship” from 2015. She has given evidence that it ended in 2018 but he said they maintained contact until late last year. 

The former NSW premier repeatedly told ICAC that she had “no knowledge” of any wrongdoing by Maguire and did not consider that she had any information which needed to be reported to ICAC.

“Clearly this body had all that knowledge and information,” she said. “There was nothing that I could recall; nothing I retained. I’m not sure what I would have reported.

 “I’m completely comfortable with who I am and what I’ve done, and my record.”

ICAC heard that Maguire told Berejiklian in a tapped phone call on July 5, 2018: “You need to get a private phone. [ICAC] could be taping your conversation with me right now.”

Four days later, Maguire texted her that he was “chatting with my friends on [encrypted messaging app] WeChat now” and told her to download the app.

“OK I’ll try. What about WhatsApp, that’s easy too,” she replied.

“They can read texts but not the little green man [WhatsApp]; it leaves no trace,” Maguire said. 

Asked if this referred to the WeChat icon, Berejiklian said it could have but she had never used the app. She also said she had “never” had a second phone. 

Questioned about whether Maguire had taken steps to make his calls and texts more difficult to intercept, she said: “He may very well have. I just can’t remember. I didn’t do anything on my part.”

Berejiklian asked Maguire to resign from politics days after he gave evidence to Operation Dasha on July 13, 2018 about a potential money-making scheme to receive commissions from a property developer. In the end, those deals did not proceed and no money was paid.

After hearing about this ICAC evidence, Berejiklian said: “I questioned everything. I can’t express what a shock it was to the system. I thought long and hard about everything … I never suspected him of being corrupt.”

Ultimately, no corruption findings were made against Maguire, although ICAC did recommend that the NSW Director of Public Prosecutions consider charging him with the offence of giving false or misleading evidence to the corruption watchdog on July 13, 2018.

In this inquiry, Operation Keppel, ICAC is investigating the circumstances under which $35.5 million was promised to two projects in Maguire’s electorate at a time when he was in this undisclosed relationship with Berejiklian, who was the treasurer when it started and then premier. 

Berejiklian failed to make public the relationship, as required by the ministerial code of conduct, saying it was not of “sufficient substance” to require public disclosure. However, ICAC has heard that the two were in love, had talked about having a child and that he had been given a key to her house.

Several witnesses have given evidence of his vocal support and constant lobbying for these projects for his electorate, which had been viewed in the bureaucracy as being of dubious economic benefit. 

Maguire left politics in 2018 and Berejiklian resigned as premier on October 1. She has denied any wrongdoing.