They claim they didn’t know the rules. So why go to such absurd lengths to hide the cash?

July 30, 2026 — 6:16pm

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In politics, where players often spend more time tearing down those on their own team than the opposing side, branch stacking is a time-honoured tradition. All parties do it. All factions engage in it. A hostile takeover of a branch, which allows the victors greater power to pursue their own agenda, can be an ugly and divisive business.

But it’s not necessarily illegal. During her opening address at the Independent Commission Against Corruption’s blockbuster Operation Rosny inquiry, counsel assisting Dr Peggy Dwyer, SC, pointed out that providing political donations for the purpose of branch stacking does not meet the definition of corrupt conduct.

But what the ICAC is interested in is the means used to pull off a stacking attempt. If funding used to capture branches has come from prohibited donors or been made without proper disclosures, that can absolutely constitute corruption. There is also evidence that some memberships were paid by others, which is a big no-no in internal party rules.

Amid a major rupture over the future direction of the NSW Liberal Party, a group of right-wing conservatives known as the Reformers in 2018 embarked........

© The Sydney Morning Herald