Factions, developers, and a Sunday sacking in New South Wales

State politics in New South Wales has long functioned as a contact sport where property development and factional power seamlessly merge. The sudden dismissal of a cabinet minister is usually presented as a matter of administrative hygiene, but the underlying reality is often far more transactional. Former Fair Trading Minister Eleni Petinos has now offered the Independent Commission Against Corruption a rather different explanation for her abrupt exit from the Dominic Perrottet government in July 2022. The official line cited allegations of workplace bullying. The unofficial reality, according to her testimony, involved her failure to execute a political hit on the state's building commissioner.

The target of this alleged machination was David Chandler, a regulator known for his abrasive but effective approach to a notoriously difficult industry. Petinos informed the inquiry that almost immediately upon assuming her portfolio in December 2021, she faced a coordinated pressure campaign from within her own political ranks to remove him, with the premier's brother, Charles Perrottet, allegedly describing the commissioner as unreliable. As the months progressed, the lobbying intensified. Former parliamentarian Chris Spence repeatedly contacted the minister's office, teasing the existence of a compromising video. Meanwhile, former Nationals leader John Barilaro played audio recordings suggesting the commissioner had used racial slurs on construction sites, though he refused to hand over the evidence for fear of industry reprisals.

These backroom whisper campaigns did not occur in a vacuum. The anti-corruption probe, known as Operation Rosny, is examining a much larger web of financial and political relationships. At the centre of the investigation are alleged payments totalling two million dollars from the fugitive property developer Jean Nassif to a network of Liberal Party operatives, including Charles Perrottet, Christian Ellis, and Jeremy Greenwood. The minister's chief of staff, Cassandra Lawry, testified to a persistent circulation of rumours regarding the building commissioner, including unsubstantiated claims of illicit cash payments. Both Petinos and her staff eventually concluded they were being manipulated by party figures seeking to sideline a regulator who was causing problems for developers.

The culmination of this pressure arrived during a bizarre weekend in late July 2022. On a Friday, Premier Dominic Perrottet, then travelling in India, offered his minister support regarding the bullying allegations, yet by Sunday evening, the political calculus had shifted entirely. The catalyst was an incendiary resignation letter submitted by Chandler to departmental head Emma Hogan, which detailed undue developer influence over the government and criticized the minister's lack of support. Following the receipt of this document, the premier abruptly terminated his minister's commission via a brief, cold telephone call. Chandler was subsequently reinstated, leaving the distinct impression that a coordinated effort to undermine a troublesome regulator had collapsed spectacularly, exposing the fragile and highly transactional nature of executive power in the state.

Written by Thorben Thiede thorben.thiede@alpineweekly.com