John Faulkner (NSW, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Hansard source

I have been invited by the Leader of the Government in the Senate, Senator Abetz, to put a case in support of Senator Wong's motion and I certainly intend to do so. I believe that, in the circumstances we face, it is absolutely essential that Senator Sinodinos come into this chamber and make a full and comprehensive statement explaining all aspects of his involvement with Australian Water Holdings, a company of which he was firstly a non-executive director and then the chairman.

I have been very consistent in these sorts of circumstances, regardless of which political party has been in government, in taking the position that the proper course of action for any minister whose actions, behaviour or propriety have been questioned is to come into the Senate and lay out the facts. This is particularly important in this case because Senator Sinodinos, then a backbench senator, did make a statement to the Senate on 28 February 2013 about these matters. Since making his statement over a year ago, Senator Sinodinos has made it very clear that he has stood by that statement—in fact all previous statements—on the issue of Australian Water Holdings.

The problem that Senator Sinodinos faces is simply this: there is now incontrovertible evidence that that statement—the only statement that Senator Sinodinos has made about this matter—of more than a year ago was not a complete statement and not an accurate statement. We know that. As a result, a further statement is required. The original statement cannot stand, given the circumstances and given the evidence we have before us now.

I will focus on three elements of the statement. I touched on this in my brief contribution to the debate on the suspension of standing orders a little earlier this morning. We know that Senator Sinodinos was firstly a non-executive director and then became chairman of Australian Water Holdings. We know that concurrently he served first as treasurer and then as president of the New South Wales division of the Liberal Party. But we now also know that, while Senator Sinodinos was serving as an officeholder in both organisations, Sydney Water became a principal donor to the New South Wales division of the Liberal Party. But Sydney Water did not know this. We now know it; Sydney Water did not.

As counsel assisting the ICAC, Mr Geoffrey Watson SC, said:

From the records I have seen, it seems that Sydney Water has unwillingly, unknowingly been a principal donor to the Liberal Party.

At the time, Sydney Water could not and would not have known this was occurring and could not get access to the documents that would have established it was occurring. All it knew was that the administration costs were excessive, and this blew up into a dispute.

Courtesy of what has occurred at the New South Wales ICAC hearings, we also know that, as Mr Watson has said:

Based upon the PricewaterhouseCoopers valuation, if the PPP came through Mr Sinodinos would have enjoyed a $10 to $20 million payday.

It is presently difficult to offer observations on the conduct of Mr Sinodinos. He has other involvements which will come under scrutiny in Operation Spicer.

Mr Watson also said:

It is quite transparent that Mr Sinodinos's true role in Australian Water Holdings—

and I stress this—

was to open lines of communication with the Liberal Party. There will be evidence that he tried to do so.

Now, the fact is—

Senator Brandis interjecting—

You just listen to my contribution, Senator Brandis, and you will learn something. The truth is that the company, Australian Water Holdings, were making major donations to the Liberal Party and charging them back to Sydney Water. That is the first thing we now know, and, of course, that was not known at the time that Senator Sinodinos made his statement. I am concerned that credulity is being stretched to breaking point on this matter that a non-executive director, then chairman, of Australian Water Holdings, while at the same time Treasurer, then President, of the New South Wales division of the Liberal Party, had no knowledge, in either role, of this extraordinary amount of money being channelled to the New South Wales division of the Liberal Party from AWH.

The second issue that I would like to focus on in the brief time that is available to me relates to the awarding of a contract to AWH by Sydney Water. In Senator Sinodinos's statement to the Senate last year he said:

I played no role in the awarding of the January 2012 contract to AWH by Sydney Water.

But we do know now that Senator Sinodinos, as chairman of Australian Water Holdings, wrote a letter to Dr Thomas Parry AM, the chairman of Sydney Water Corporation, on 29 August 2011 about the contractual relationship between AWH and Sydney Water. We also know for the record—and completeness of the record—that that letter was copied to the New South Wales Premier and the New South Wales Minister for Finance. Further, according to the evidence in ICAC, we now know that there was a meeting about these contractual arrangements, on 6 September 2011, between Sydney Water and Australian Water Holdings. I commend page 153T of the ICAC transcript, where it is made clear that Mr Rippon, then Mr Sinodinos and Mr di Girolamo were present.

The third issue I raise is about Senator Sinodinos's statement of last year to the Senate in relation to the Obeid family, where he said:

I became non-executive chairman of AWH on 3 November 2010. I was not aware that, at around this time, the CEO of the company had negotiated what has been reported as a personal loan agreement with members of the Obeid family, secured against shares in Australian Water Holdings.

To be fair to him, he goes on to say:

I believe that there should have been such a disclosure made to me.

What we now know is that the personal loan agreement with members of the Obeid family that Senator Sinodinos referred to in his earlier statement to the Senate is a sham. We now know that that personal loan agreement was no such thing. It was, in fact, a 30 per cent shareholding in AWH. We know that Senator Sinodinos—then Mr Sinodinos—attended meetings with Eddie Obeid Jr, and we assume that Senator Sinodinos would have had some understanding of the Obeid family involvement—