This is the Commission's monthly update for August, providing visibility to the media and the public on our key activities and work underway.
As at 6 August 2025, we are conducting 37 preliminary investigations and 37 corruption investigations. Four of our matters are currently before the courts, and since our commencement 10 convictions have been secured as a result of investigations we have commenced or continued.
Key public highlights from the last month include:
Guide for parliamentarians and their staff
We have published a guide for parliamentarians and their staff, which provides advice on reporting obligations, corruption risks and vulnerabilities and how to avoid them. This guide formed the basis of an address by National Anti-Corruption Commissioner the Hon Paul Brereton AM RFD SC to new members of the House of Representatives and the Senate ahead of their swearing in.
The guide provides advice on managing specific corruption risks and vulnerabilities that parliamentarians may face, including grants, public sector appointments and the use of parliamentary resources and staff.
A printed version of the guide has been distributed to all members and senators. Read the guide for parliamentarians and their staff .
Operation Kingscliff and our use of pseudonyms
Since we published our investigation report into Operation Kingscliff in June, our decision to use pseudonyms in the report has been the subject of public comment.
The public interest in transparency weighs heavily in deciding what to publish. Our starting position is to name those who have engaged in corrupt conduct. However, we are required by our Act to provide individuals whose conduct is criticised in a report with a reasonable opportunity to make submissions, and we must take their submissions into account when deciding what to include in the report, and whether the names of individuals will be made public if the report is published. This is part of our procedural fairness process .
In the case of Operation Kingscliff, our reasons for not naming the individuals but including some information about them are set out on page 6 of the report. Those reasons include that naming the relevant individual would make other people involved and witnesses significantly more identifiable to a wider section of the public, and that the individual did not occupy a very high-profile position that would ordinarily call for greater public exposure.
Operation Kingscliff was a paradigm case of nepotism and undeclared conflicts of interest in recruitment in the Australian public service. While we understand the natural interest in the individuals involved, the public release of the report was intended to highlight these issues in public service recruitment and promotion, and by exposing it to deter others.
We will continue to make decisions on whether to name individuals involved in an investigation on a case-by-case basis, acknowledging there is an important balance between transparency, public interest and individual welfare and privacy concerns. This approach is consistent with state-based anti-corruption commissions.
Sentence handed down to corrupt former airport official
On Friday 25 July, the former executive procurement manager at Western Sydney Airport, Sajish Erasery, was sentenced for soliciting a bribe of approximately $200,000 during a contract procurement process.
Mr Erasery was sentenced to 2 years imprisonment to be served by way of an intensive correction order in the community, including the completion of 500 hours of community service.
The sentence stems from a joint investigation we conducted with support from the Australian Federal Police over a period of 10 days in March 2024. This is the first sentence resulting from an investigation we initiated, following 9 other convictions from matters commenced by the former Australian Commission for Law Enforcement Integrity that we continued. Read the media release .
In conversation at the Government Services Summit
On Tuesday 29 July, Commissioner Brereton participated in the Australian Financial Review's Government Services Summit, where public sector leaders gathered to discuss contemporary priorities and challenges for the delivery of government services.
In answer to a question from moderator Ron Mizen, Commissioner Brereton explained to the audience that investigating corruption takes time - due to the secrecy in which corrupt conduct takes place, and the need to use a range of covert techniques.
Commissioner Brereton also referred to the corruption risks and vulnerabilities that arise at the public/private interface - where government retains consultants and contractors to provide or deliver services. These risks include the misuse of government information for commercial advantage. He emphasised that consultants and contractors engaged in assisting a Commonwealth agency are within the Commission's jurisdiction .
Asked about public hearings, he explained that the law imposed a high bar of 'extraordinary circumstances' for holding a public hearing, and to date there has not been a private hearing that he felt would have been better conducted publicly, bearing in mind that the purpose of a hearing is to obtain evidence for an investigation.
Our participation in public engagements like these is part of our work to prevent corruption by providing education and information about corrupt conduct and building public and stakeholder awareness and understanding about corruption risks.
Deputy Commissioners appear on podcasts
Deputy Commissioner Nicole Rose recently appeared on Kickback: The Global Anticorruption Podcast, alongside Griffith University and Transparency International's Professor AJ Brown. They shared insights about the extent and nature of corruption in Australia and our role in tackling it. You can listen to this podcast on Soundcloud , Apple Podcasts and Spotify .
Deputy Commissioner Kylie Kilgour was also interviewed recently on Alvarez & Marsal's Conversation with podcast, in which she discussed our first 2 years of operation, challenges in tackling corruption and how we collaborate with other public sector entities.
You can listen to this podcast on YouTube .
