WA government ministers appear in defamation stoush involving Perth property developer
Two Western Australian government ministers have appeared in court to give evidence in a libel case involving journalists and local business owners, among other politicians.
Perth property developer Greg Poland has sued former journalists on this imprint over the publication of two stories based on a secret recording of a meeting held at the Subiaco Hotel in 2019.
In the recording, which has since been heard in court, Poland is heard advising a businessman on a way to acquire a Myalup sand mining operation in exchange for the provincial government giving it a place to dump between two and eight million tonnes of “toxic” soil from one of the Metronet projects.
Poland is also heard to have claimed responsibility for a plan to increase its share of WA’s lobster catch, which then Fisheries Minister Dave Kelly botched.
Kelly was one of the politicians in court Thursday.
In the recording, Poland can be heard claiming that he brought the idea to the minister’s office and wrote a plan, but “the minister messed it up by changing what I wrote.”
“He needs to step back now and fix the problem. I just got a message, come see him right away. Because now they’re working on how to get out of this hole that he buried himself in,” Poland says.
“Okay, damn it. If you had stuck to what I said in the first place, you wouldn’t have had to crawl out of a hole.”
“This is absolutely not true, absolutely not true,” Kelly said Thursday afternoon.
“He didn’t put the idea in the office or write it down.”
Kelly said he received a letter from Poland about the availability of lobster, but it was about his hospitality business, not the industry as a whole.
“A lot of people, especially accommodation providers, wanted better access to lobster; I think they still do,” he said.
Polish lawyer Martin Bennett questioned Kelly about his meeting with Poland over lobster allocation, with Poland claiming he used his personal business as a proxy for the meeting before heading off to discuss the tourism industry as a whole.
That meeting was when Poland claimed he gave the idea to Kelly when giving evidence last week.
But the former Western Australian minister said they worked on the policy for more than a year before it was announced in December 2018.
“When I had the meeting with Greg Poland, we were getting final approvals to release this publicly,” he said.
“The claim that the meeting was the birth of policy makes no sense.”
He also said it would be “completely inappropriate to discuss the restructuring of the sector” but wanted to hear Poland’s thoughts as an accommodation provider on reserving some of the catch for the local market.
Former Regional Development Minister Alannah MacTiernan also appeared in court on Thursday.
In recordings of the meeting, both MacTiernan and Poland’s then Transport Minister Rita Saffioti (now deputy prime minister) can be heard asking him to find a solution to the problem of disposing of “toxic soil” resulting from the redevelopment of the Forrestfield Airport Link.
Poland also suggests that if you do any minister a favor they will “get everything done quickly”.
“The government, Rita and Alannah and all, are pretty good at making deals, but really [sic] reach out to them. In the recording, Poland says: They are not offside.
“What I’m going to do is, I’m going to go to Alannah first, and then I’m going to go to Rita. Alannah’s probably going to want to pry. And that’s okay, because [sic] “Alannah is fine.”
MacTiernan said he did not recall discussing “poisonous soil” disposal with Poland in any official capacity.
“I would be extremely reluctant to get involved in a matter that falls within the transport minister’s jurisdiction,” he said.
MacTiernan said he spoke to Poland on the phone after taking questions from a journalist about what was said at the meeting.
“I was of the opinion that he spoke in a very inappropriate way indeed,” he said.
“From what I understand Greg, I know this wasn’t any kind of misconduct. But… I said there was a freight train heading your way and it would be in your best interest to resign.”
“He agreed to do it, but he was hurt. He went into business to do the right thing.”
Poland testified earlier in the trial that when MacTiernan called him, he said: “If this is policy, they [journalists] Keep coming after him.”
“He said to me, ‘I have already accepted your resignation.’ [from the Peel Development Commission]that will stop it,’” Poland claimed.
When Bennett questioned him on the stand, MacTiernan said: “I completely reject the suggestion that I said I have already accepted your resignation, I will not talk to someone like that.”
The trial continues.
Holly Thompson is a journalist at WAtoday specializing in education and the environment.Connect with: X or email.
