The appointment of the former New South Wales deputy premier John Barilaro to a New York trade role followed a “flawed” process that showed “all the trademarks of a ‘job for the boys’ position”, a parliamentary inquiry has found.
An interim report published on Monday also found the former trade minister Stuart Ayres, who quit cabinet during the saga, “showed poor judgment and was inappropriate” in his dealings with Barilaro in the lead-up to the appointment.
Months after Barilaro’s appointment as a senior trade commissioner caused a storm of controversy in Macquarie Street, the cross-party parliamentary inquiry issued a scathing assessment of the process which led to him receiving the $500,000-a-year position.
“Despite assurances from senior public servants and ministers that the appointment process was conducted by the public service under a merit based process, it is clear that the process was flawed and that the Executive was not at arm’s length from the process,” the inquiry chair, Greens MP Cate Faehrmann, said in the report.
The saga gripped the government for months last year after revelations by Guardian Australia that Barilaro’s job had been offered first to the senior businesswoman and former public servant Jenny West.
The verbal offer from the agency charged with filling the role, Investment NSW, was withdrawn a month later.
Ayres left cabinet after a separate report commissioned by the NSW premier, Dominic Perrottet, raised concerns he may have breached the state’s ministerial code of conduct by having “input” into the shortlisted candidates during the hiring process. That report, conducted by the former NSW public service commissioner Graeme Head, found the appointment had not been conducted at arm’s length from the government.
Ayres was later cleared of any wrongdoing over the saga in another report, paving the way for his return to cabinet should the Coalition be returned to government at the March election.
After the report’s release on Monday, Perrottet took aim at the inquiry, calling it a “political committee”.
“Labor’s focused on politics, I’m focused on fixing problems,” he said.
“This is a political committee. That’s what it is. I, in my role as premier, instigated an independent review [by the] former inspector of the Icac [Bruce McClintock SC] who cleared Mr Ayres of any wrongdoing. I will listen to an independent former inspector of the Icac than Labor and the Greens in a political committee.”
Despite previously conceding Barilaro’s appointment was not at arm’s length from government, Perrottet sought to dismiss those concerns on Monday.
“It’s very clear in the report from the former inspector of the Icac … that was dealt with by the former inspector of the Icac, they can play politics I’m focused on fixing problems,” he said.
But the parliamentary inquiry, which was made up of a majority of Greens, Labor and crossbench MPs, took aim at his involvement in the saga, saying his dealings with Barilaro “showed poor judgment” and were “inappropriate”.
It found Ayres “was not at arm’s length during the recruitment process” for the role, and that he had “misled the public” by telling parliament Barilaro’s appointment to the job had been conducted entirely by the public service.
Faehrmann said the inquiry had found “a lack of transparency and integrity in the way in which a public sector recruitment process was conducted”.
“The inquiry also revealed the many ‘intersection points’ between a senior public servant and the then minister for trade Mr Stuart Ayres MP which were all highly inappropriate and unacceptable,” she wrote.
“The committee found that when it comes to the Senior Trade and Investment Commissioner recruitment processes, there was a pattern of ministerial interference and lack of transparency conducted by the government.”
Ayres and Barilaro have consistently denied wrongdoing over the appointment process, and the report on Monday included a dissenting statement from the inquiry’s Coalition MPs dismissing the findings.
Labor’s shadow treasurer, Daniel Mookhey, who sat on the committee and spent hours grilling public servants over the appointments during the inquiry, said the saga would “live on in infamy as one of the most notorious jobs for the boys scandal New South Wales has ever seen”.
“There are two people who are responsible for this debacle: John Barilaro and Stuart Ayres,” he said. “The contact between the two of them was inappropriate. It showed poor judgment and it should never have happened.”
He also slammed Perrottet for dismissing the findings, accusing the premier of “spending more time defending Stuart Ayres rather than holding him to account for what he did.”
In a statement, Ayres also took aim at the inquiry’s findings, calling it “a poor attempt at political mud slinging” and “politically motivated”.
“At no stage did I direct or indirectly encourage the public service to appoint Mr Barilaro,” he said.
“That decision was made independently of me as minister. To suggest anything else is plainly false.”
Barilaro has been contacted for comment.
