A former New South Wales Labor staffer has given secret evidence to a parliamentary committee that he was phoned in 2014 by then-candidate Chris Minns, who asked what to do about thousands of dollars of donations collected at a fundraiser.
David Latham, then a state ALP organiser, says in an affidavit presented to the committee that Minns, now the premier of NSW, wanted to know how to get the unreceipted money into his campaign fund, the ABC reported on Wednesday.
The names of donors to politicians, and the sums contributed, must be disclosed under electoral laws.
Latham’s affidavit alleges that in September 2014 Minns, then Labor’s candidate for the seat of Kogarah, accrued thousands of dollars in campaign donations at a fundraising dinner at the Sunny Seafood restaurant. But, it is alleged, he and his campaign staff failed to keep a record of the sources.
The Sunny Seafood restaurant fundraiser was first raised in the Independent Commission Against Corruption’s Operation Aero, which reported in 2022. Icac took evidence from Latham but did not interview Minns.
There was no evidence that the donations came from improper sources, only that they lacked the proper paperwork, and there were no findings by Icac regarding the donations.
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Operation Aero’s main focus was whether the ALP had disguised donations, including $100,000 in cash delivered in an Aldi shopping bag, which was alleged to have come from banned donor Huang Xiangmo. Huang has since had his visa revoked by the Department of Home Affairs on security grounds.
Aero zeroed in on a Chinese Friends of Labor dinner held at a restaurant in the inner-Sydney suburb of Haymarket, which was used to create fake paperwork and donors to disguise the money from Huang.
That Icac investigation found that the former NSW Labor MP Ernest Wong, the organiser of the dinner, engaged in corrupt conduct by concealing the illegal political donations and then trying to get one of the fake donors to lie about it.
The Sunny Seafood matter was reportedly referred to the NSW Electoral Commission, which investigated until 2023. Minns was interviewed as part of that process.
Asked about the Latham affidavit on Wednesday, Minns told reporters: “I absolutely reject any suggestion of wrongdoing comprehensively. I don’t want there to be any ambiguity about that. A charge, or a suggestion, that my staff or myself are directly involved in some kind of inappropriate or illegal behaviour is completely wrong.”
The premier noted that the “specific allegations have already been investigated by the Icac and the Electoral Commission – so the suggestion from the committee that they didn’t do their job, or that somehow they’ve been derelict in their duty, I think, should be met with a degree of scepticism”.
The NSW independent MLC Mark Latham, who is no relation to David Latham, has raised the theory in parliament that the Sunny Seafood donations were a dry run for the more extensive scheme investigated by Operation Aero.
In August he said in parliament: “Was the now-premier compromised in telling the truth about Jamie Clements [in relation to another matter] because of cash washing by Labor head office during Minns’ campaign for Kogarah in March 2015, which started at a Chinese engagement dinner at the Sunny Seafood Restaurant in September?”
In November Mark Latham raised the subject again.
The parliamentary committee now examining the issue wants the NSW Electoral Commission to reveal details of its investigation into the Kogarah donations – and to interview David Latham.
“The committee believes that the NSW Electoral Commission has a clear obligation in the public interest to keep the people of NSW informed of progress with any investigation into this matter,” the committee chair, Abigail Boyd, told parliament on Tuesday.
“Members of parliament have an obligation to report any credible knowledge of a crime. The … committee has referred material it has received to the NSW Electoral Commission, the DPP and Icac.
“We urge the NSW Electoral Commission to review this information and consider interviewing additional witnesses.”
A Labor MP, who asked not to be named, said the revelations by David Latham of a phone call were hardly a “smoking gun”. He suggested the reported call was open to multiple interpretations.
“It’s possible Minns was just asking head office to do its job and chase up the paperwork,” the MP said on Wednesday.
