{"id":834136,"date":"2026-07-30T20:09:14","date_gmt":"2026-07-30T20:09:14","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/834136\/"},"modified":"2026-07-30T20:09:14","modified_gmt":"2026-07-30T20:09:14","slug":"icac-revelations-have-left-angus-taylors-colleagues-anxious-and-his-factional-enemies-angry-new-south-wales-politics","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/834136\/","title":{"rendered":"Icac revelations have left Angus Taylor\u2019s colleagues anxious \u2013 and his factional enemies angry | New South Wales politics"},"content":{"rendered":"

After the opening days of an inquiry exposing a dark underbelly of the New South Wales<\/a> Liberals, the prevailing mood among Angus Taylor\u2019s colleagues is one of apprehension.<\/p>\n

The federal opposition leader is not a specific target of Operation Rosny, which is investigating allegations of corruption against people associated with the NSW branch. He is not accused of wrongdoing.<\/p>\n

But Taylor is the highest-profile person mentioned so far \u2013 and the political figure with the most to lose.<\/p>\n

To briefly recap, the opposition leader was on Tuesday named as a potential donor to the Reformers<\/a>, a group of hard-right Liberal operatives plotting to take over the party from the inside.<\/p>\n

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The inquiry heard that a screenshot of a message from Dallas McInerney, then the chief executive of Catholic Schools NSW, was sent to Reformers members in which McInerney said he planned to \u201cshake down Angus for 10k\u201d during a breakfast meeting in Canberra.<\/p>\n

The message was allegedly sent in March 2021 when Taylor was energy minister in the Morrison government.<\/p>\n

Dylan Whitelaw, another Reformers associate who gave evidence on Tuesday and Wednesday, was read a later intercepted text message in which he claimed McInerney had told him he had secured a commitment from Taylor for a \u201c15k injection and a 3k monthly donation!\u201d<\/p>\n

Whitelaw couldn\u2019t recall sending the message and told the inquiry he would be \u201cvery surprised\u201d if Taylor made any contribution.<\/p>\n

After initially declining to refute the allegations, Taylor told a press conference<\/a> on Wednesday that \u201cno payment was made\u201d.<\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019m not going to give a running commentary on all of this. I\u2019m not a party to the proceedings, but no payment was made,\u201d Taylor said.<\/p>\n

If that response was supposed to put the matter to bed \u2013 and reassure his colleagues \u2013 it didn\u2019t work.<\/p>\n

On Thursday, Taylor was asked again about any potential donations during a press conference in Logan, Queensland.<\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019ve answered these questions yesterday. I\u2019m not going to give a running commentary on it,\u201d Taylor said.<\/p>\n

\u201cYou can ask the question 100 times,\u201d he repeated. \u201cI\u2019ll give you the same answer.\u201d<\/p>\n

Guardian Australia spoke with several Liberals on condition of anonymity, who believed Taylor must provide a more comprehensive answer, if indeed he had no role in bankrolling Reformers\u2019 operations.<\/p>\n

Unsurprisingly, the Labor treasurer, Jim Chalmers, expressed the same view.<\/p>\n

\u201cYou know, I don\u2019t want to interfere with the Icac process that his political allies are involved in at the moment \u2026 but there are a number of questions to be answered here, and he should front up and explain any involvement he\u2019s had in this,\u201d Chalmers said.<\/p>\n

There were further questions for the opposition leader after Whitelaw was asked at Wednesday\u2019s hearing if the $3,000 monthly payments that Taylor had allegedly agreed to were connected to a similar amount that Catholic Schools NSW was paying to the Reformers-linked lobbying firm Beckington.<\/p>\n

There is no evidence that Taylor donated to the Reformers \u2013 only text messages suggesting payments would be sought or had been received.<\/p>\n

He has not yet clarified what involvement \u2013 or even knowledge \u2013 he had of the Reformers and their alleged branch-stacking operation.<\/p>\n

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At Thursday\u2019s hearing, Reformers witness Robert Assaf wasn\u2019t sure what Taylor knew of their work but said he \u201cdefinitely wasn\u2019t opposed\u201d.<\/p>\n

Among the troves of text messages released by Icac is one from Whitelaw in which he told Reformers that \u201cAngus Taylor is locked-in\u201d for an event in Goulburn in September 2020.<\/p>\n

An \u201cAngus\u201d is mentioned in several other text messages although the context is unclear.<\/p>\n

There are, at this stage, more questions than answers. But the evidence so far has been enough to cause anxiety among his colleagues because of Taylor\u2019s close ties to McInerney.<\/p>\n

The pair are friends and factional allies. McInerney, one of the most powerful backroom operators in the NSW Liberal right faction, has helped Taylor with campaigns and was influential in his overthrowing of Sussan Ley<\/a>.<\/p>\n

\"JimJim Chalmers accuses Angus Taylor of trying to \u2018out-One Nation One Nation\u2019 \u2013 video<\/p>\n

The deeper Icac delves into McInerney\u2019s dealings the more dangerous the inquiry becomes for Taylor, whose leadership is already tenuous given the Coalition\u2019s dire position in the polls.<\/p>\n

Liberals are surprised Taylor has not been quicker to distance himself from McInerney, who stepped down from Catholic Schools NSW after the inquiry was announced.<\/p>\n

The opening days of evidence have elicited another emotion among Taylor\u2019s factional enemies in NSW: anger.<\/p>\n

The Reformers\u2019 recruitment drives targeted, among others, branches in the federal seats of Berowra, Lindsay and Farrer, with the aim of dislodging Julian Leeser, Melissa McIntosh and Sussan Ley respectively.<\/p>\n

McIntosh and Ley were only saved after an intervention from then prime minister Scott Morrison ahead of the 2022 federal election.<\/p>\n

The notion that Taylor might have been supporting the plotters \u2013 potentially even financially \u2013 would amount to a level of treason well beyond what\u2019s tolerated in the messy blood sport of factional politics.<\/p>\n

The inquiry has more than seven weeks of hearings to go. Taylor might not be a target of Icac but he\u2019s unlikely to emerge completely unscathed.<\/p>\n

Dan Jervis-Bardy is Guardian Australia\u2019s chief political correspondent<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"After the opening days of an inquiry exposing a dark underbelly of the New South Wales Liberals, the…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":834137,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[64,63,44],"class_list":["post-834136","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-australia","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/834136","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=834136"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/834136\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/834137"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=834136"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=834136"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=834136"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}