Perrottet admits fabricating updates to developer while denying corruption charges

Charles Perrottet sat across from counsel assisting Peggy Dwyer SC at the Independent Commission Against Corruption hearing on Monday and made a confession that was, in its own way, an admission of something less than what he was being accused of. He had fabricated updates to property developer Jean Nassif about political progress on Toplace developments, he said. He made them up. But he insisted he had not lied to the anti-corruption watchdog itself, and he denied that any of this amounted to the kind of scheme the commission was investigating—one in which three Liberal figures, including Perrottet, were alleged to have anticipated receiving $2 million in prohibited political donations.

Perrottet, a member of the NSW Liberals' conservative right faction, had been providing services through a lobbying company called Beckington, controlled by Christian Ellis and Jeremy Greenwood. The work was ostensibly genuine—Beckington did lobby for Toplace on planning matters. But the payments to Perrottet came through an unusual arrangement: his wife, Anita, invoiced for the work through her business, Macquarie Consulting, and received $660,999 over two and a half years. When pressed about why he would fabricate political updates to Nassif, Perrottet explained that he did so "to keep him on side"—to encourage the developer to continue making payments to Beckington for the lobbying work. He added his own "political flavour" to messages, he said, providing what amounted to false progress reports on matters he had not actually pursued.

The contradiction at the heart of the hearing became apparent when Dwyer confronted Perrottet about a specific message sent in January 2021. In it, Perrottet had provided a summary of actions taken on three Toplace developments, including a reference to "189 spoke to my PDU contact." The number 189 referred to a Parramatta development; PDU meant the NSW Planning Delivery Unit. Perrottet told the commission he had no such contact and made no such call. "Ultimately, I made it up," he said. Yet when asked whether he would lie to Nassif to secure payments, he acknowledged that he would "regularly mislead" the developer about his own involvement in Beckington's work.

The most pointed moment came when Dwyer pressed Perrottet about a meeting in January 2021 at a Sydney pub with Toplace executive Sharangan Maheswaran. Messages suggested that Perrottet had collected a cheque for $148,500 for Beckington at that meeting. Perrottet had told Nassif the money was for "assistance for the upcoming preselections," but now he told the commission it was actually for genuine lobbying work. When Dwyer noted that this contradicted his private examination in June, when he said he was there to pick up Nassif's statutory declaration, Perrottet replied: "It could be both." Dwyer's response was sharp. She accused him of lying to the commission and noted the difficulty of maintaining false stories: "The great truism about telling a lie, Mr Perrottet, is you have to be really good at remembering it."

She laid out the sequence: in June, he said he was picking up a statutory declaration—a lie. This morning, he said he didn't know what he was picking up—another lie. Now, confronted with evidence it was a cheque, he was constructing his evidence around that fact. "That's what's going on here," she said. Perrottet disagreed. He maintained throughout that he had provided "advice" rather than work, and that the payments were not political donations. When asked by the presiding commissioner, Fabian Gleeson, whether he understood at the time that money received through his wife's business was income he did not have to disclose on his tax return, Perrottet said that was his understanding.

A further contradiction emerged regarding the invoicing arrangement itself. Perrottet said he had met with Ellis and Anita to discuss how the payments would be structured. But Dwyer noted this directly contradicted Anita Perrottet's evidence to the commission the previous week, in which she said she had only spoken with Greenwood about the payments. Perrottet insisted his recollection was that the invoicing conversations, with Anita present, were with Christian Ellis. The commission also heard evidence about an arrangement under which Beckington would receive 1 percent of the total value of any Nassif developments they were successful in fast-tracking—a percentage that could amount to substantial sums if a project generated $100 million or more.

Jean Nassif, the property developer at the center of the arrangement, fled Australia in 2022. He is expected to appear by video link from Lebanon on Friday to give evidence. He has previously denied any wrongdoing. The inquiry continues, with the commission still examining whether the payments to Perrottet and his associates constituted a scheme to circumvent electoral funding laws that prohibit property developers from making political donations.