If NSW Premier Dominic Perrottet is at all serious about better standards of governance, his Deputy Liberal Leader Stuart Ayres has to resign. It’s an open-and-shut case of misleading Parliament — something that used to be, by common agreement, the political equivalent of a capital offence.
“It is important to recognise that at the end of the first round of recruitment there was no suitable candidate identified,” Ayres told the NSW Parliament a month ago about John Barilaro’s appointment to the lucrative New York trade posting. Except we now know Ayres was told on August 17 last year that “a full recruitment process for the role of senior trade and investment commissioner (STIC) — Americas has been undertaken and a successful candidate identified”.
The “successful candidate”, a term used over and over again in the document, was Jenny West. West was, according to the document, to meet with Ayres to discuss her role in New York.
We know Ayres saw this document, and not just his staff, because his signature is on it, “noting” it. There’s no parsing or explaining this away, no John Howard-style casuistry, no wriggle room. It’s stone-cold bang-to-rights stuff.
Ayres now says the document “does not represent the end of the recruitment process”. Except (1) it does and (2) that doesn’t matter. Which part of “full recruitment process” isn’t clear?
The brief itself, including the words “full recruitment process” and “successful candidate”, was signed by Amy Brown, the secretary who later withdrew the offer to West at a ludicrous “walking meeting” at Balmoral because the job was to be “a present for someone”. Brown should go immediately as well. Her claim that the process wasn’t actually completed doesn’t stand up either.
And regardless of whether it was the end of the recruitment process, Ayres told Parliament “no suitable candidate” was identified when he read a brief saying one was, quite clearly. Does “successful” mean “suitable”? No — but in the context of any recruitment process in a public service body, “successful” definitionally means “suitable”. You can’t be appointed within the public service if you’re not suitable.
The best Ayres can do is suggest Brown has subsequently misled him when the scandal blew up, and gave him faulty advice that he relied on for his statement to Parliament in June. But that signature of his makes it impossible to see how this isn’t a simple case of misleading the house.
Perrottet would face similar danger except that he made clear when he made a similar statement to Parliament that he was relying on advice from Ayres:
I met with the minister for enterprise, investment and trade this morning and I was advised the following… The first recruitment process did not identify a suitable candidate.
Perrottet was included in the list of ministers whom Brown told Ayres would be notified, so Perrottet would have received a similar brief — but it was not his portfolio. He is entitled to rely on the advice of his minister, who told him the recruitment process hadn’t identified a suitable candidate.
The fact that we’re parsing the meaning of “successful” is itself ludicrous: right from the grubby Friday afternoon media release — indicating it knew this whole thing reeked — the NSW government has mishandled this scandal, and Perrottet’s apparent incapacity to display any initiative in relation to it has left his premiership adrift.
If his insistence that he’ll be applying higher standards than applied under Gladys Berejiklian is to be justified, then a minister misleading Parliament, no matter how senior, should go. It might also give Perrottet a chance to reassert his now much-reduced authority as leader.
Even on the lax standards prevailing these days, Ayres has to resign and should be looking at criminal charges. But what about Perrottet? Along with Berejklian and Barilaro, he was one of the leaders of the government that produced this corrupt deal. He has misled Parliament, allegedly on Ayres advice, but has yet to take action against him. On the standards you’ve previously applied to Andrews and others, Perrottet should be out.
Liberal party “leaders” have long made an lying an art form .Howard survived on plausibility and unctuousness. But will Airhead Ayres be able to pushback with a faction ridden NSW Liberal Party. Ayres and Brown also oversaw the appointment of Barilaro’s new partner for a job in Investment NSW. This is in clear breach of the NSW Public Service Act.
Correction – Howard survived on plausible deniability ie: the ability to deny knowledge of or responsibility for any damnable actions committed by members of their organizational hierarchy. Morrison and Perrottet do not have Howard’s rat cunning.
Sadly, however, they do have his example, and continue to believe that Howard’s Way remains the path to electoral glory. Simply because he remained in power for so long. What he did to the country in the process is generally considered a word best described as ‘four letters’.
Nice to see your description of Howard’s boot print on this country. Spot on.
So the best government in Australia cannot even competently manage corruption. And although the turgid fascination with who know what and when dominates this story, the question screaming out for resolution is: How dumb is Pork Barrelaro and the delightful Amy Brown for thinking they could get away with this scam?
I would argue the NSW Coalition Govt is actually very adept at managing corruption. It’s honesty, integrity and transparency (the HIT values) that they have trouble with.
PB has gotten away with pretty much every scam he’s pulled so far, despite FJ shining a light on his dodgy dealings…
Shanks did screw the pooch a bit though – pity he was stupidly racist about it (although some of that shtick was actually pretty funny). Would also help if he wasn’t such an obvious Labor fanboy. But he totally dacked PB for everyone to see. The subsequent turkeyslap was just pushing it a bit
“Best” according to whom, and by what measure?
Perrottet wants to hunt with the truth hounds and run with the lying hares.
You think Ayres might be a Roman Catholic?
On 30 June, in a comment on one of Bernard’s articles on the Barilaro matter, I wrote: “One other question: where was Trade Minister Ayres in all of this? It would be good to learn more about his role…”
Someone once said in relation to another matter that Ayres prefers not to leave his fingerprints on things – maybe it’s time to call in forensics.
But his signature is there – so no need to search for his fingerprints.
We know Ayres saw this document, and not just his staff, because his signature is on it, “noting” it.