NSW Premier Dominic Perrottet has urged former Liberal minister John Sidoti to resign from parliament after the NSW Independent Commission Against Corruption (ICAC) found that he engaged in serious corrupt conduct.
The ICAC recommended seeking advice over possible criminal charges for Mr Sidoti after investigating his lobbying of local councillors to rezone blocks at Five Dock in Sydney, where his family owned the property. The serious misconduct was found to have occurred between late 2013 and February 2017.
Following the findings of the investigation, the NSW Premier said he told Mr Sidoti to leave public office.
“I have contacted Mr Sidoti to inform him that I believe he should resign from the parliament,” he said in a statement on Wednesday.
“Should Mr Sidoti not resign, the NSW government will move a motion to have him suspended. The NSW government has also sought legal advice in relation to this matter. There is no place for corruption in the NSW Parliament.”
Labor Leader Chris Minns said the opposition would support the motion to suspend Mr Sidoti if he did not resign.
Meanwhile, the Drummoyne MP declared he would fight to clear his name. Mr Sidoti believes the ICAC made errors in its report as they had not interviewed people from crucial meetings to support his statements and failed to chase exculpatory evidence.
“This report has a number of unfounded inferences, errors and assumptions, and its findings are completely rejected,” he said.
“The only positive for myself and my family is that the ICAC part of this saga is over. I will continue to fight to clear my name and have instructed my lawyers to lodge an application in the Supreme Court.”
In its report, the state’s corruption watchdog recommended seeking advice from the Director of Public Prosecutions (DDP) to determine whether any criminal charges can be laid against Mr Sidoti.
Operation Witney was helmed by Chief Commissioner Peter Hall and published its report on Wednesday.
It probed whether Mr Sidoti misused his position to try and improperly influence City of Canada Bay Council Liberal councillors to benefit his family’s property interests.
It found he indulged “in a protracted course of conduct” using his position as the MP for Drummoyne to pressure and threaten councillors Helen McCaffrey, Mirjana Cestar and Tanveer Ahmed.
Despite insisting he was acting in the interests of his constituents “the outcomes that he wanted those councillors to deliver were entirely directed to his private interest in increasing the development potential of his family’s growing number of properties in and around the Five Dock town centre”, the report said.
ICAC found he engaged in a breach of public trust by “representing that he was acting at all times in the interests of his constituents and the local community”.
Mr Sidoti also failed to declare his interest in family properties from the time he entered parliament in March 2011 until April 4, 2017, contrary to his obligations under the code of conduct for MPs and the ministerial code.
He stood aside as sports minister in 2019 after ICAC began its investigation, and later resigned from the Berejiklian cabinet in March 2021, shortly before the public hearings began.
With AAP