NSW Premier Chris Minns has fiercely rebuffed calls for three of his senior staffers to appear before a parliamentary inquiry into the Dural caravan plot.
Independent Upper House MP and inquiry chair, Rod Roberts, will on Tuesday sign summonses urging Mr Minns’ chief of staff James Cullen and his two deputies – Sarah Michael and Edward Ovadia – to give evidence, the Daily Telegraph reports.
Should they refuse, the Upper House could instruct its president, Ben Franklin, to request that a Supreme Court judge issue arrest warrants.
But the premier made it clear he and his staffers would not cooperate, dismissing the inquiry as nothing more than a partisan attack.
‘This is a giant conspiracy being pushed by the Opposition, Greens, and Independents,’ Minns told 2GB radio on Tuesday.
‘It’s a conspiracy based on the false claim that we knew everything from the beginning and used it to push through laws to counter antisemitism.’
In February, NSW introduced tougher hate speech laws following a series of antisemitic incidents across Sydney.
One of the main triggers was a reported terror plot involving antisemitic threats and a caravan in Dural, a claim that was later revealed to be a hoax.
Chris Minns (left) and Yasmin Catley (right) refuse to appear before the Dural caravan inquiry
The Dural caravan, which was said to be a terrorist plot, was eventually uncovered as a hoax
Roberts said the inquiry would examine whether parliament was ‘morally bullied’ into passing the laws without knowing the full facts.
The showdown follows refusals by both Minns and NSW Police Minister Yasmin Catley to appear before the inquiry.
However, under parliamentary rules, Upper House inquiries cannot compel Lower House members such as Minns and Catley, to testify.
Minns said Opposition and crossbench MPs had had opportunities to question him about the caravan plot during Question Time and biannual Upper House estimates.
The premier said that claims he knew about the circumstances of the Dural caravan being a hoax from the very beginning were not true. He also denied claims that the incident was used to push through the anti-vilification laws passed earlier this year.
‘My sense is that Mr Roberts made this outlandish conspiracy claim early on, and is trying to find some back fill evidence to justify it, and there is none there,’ he said.
Daily Mail Australia has contacted Roberts for comment.
NSW Opposition Leader Mark Speakman told this publication that the inquiry was simply trying to get to the bottom of what happened.
Rod Roberts (pictured) has requested 3 of the Premier’s top staff to appear before the inquiry
‘This isn’t about targeting staff but getting to the truth,’ he said in a statement.
‘If the Premier and Police Minister won’t front up, the committee has a duty to ask those who might know the facts, as the former opposition have done when we were in government.
‘Staffers aren’t the decision makers, but they might hold key evidence. The Jewish community deserves answers and NSW deserves a government that’s honest and accountable.’
Liberterian MP John Ruddick, who is a member of the inquiry, told Daily Mail Australia that the cross party group was holding the government accountable.
‘The modus operandi of governments is to whip up fear and then rush in more laws to curb freedom so they appear to have done something,’ he said.
‘This needed to be reviewed by the parliament because if we just swept this under the carpet they’ll do it again.
‘There must be accountability and the inquiry is doing just that.’
In 2023, the NSW Upper House invoked the Parliamentary Evidence Act in an attempt to compel the brothers of then Premier Dominic Perrottet to give evidence to an inquiry regarding the Hills Shire Council, a move then backed by the Labor Party.
