Daily Advertiser editorial: Daryl Maguire's ICAC findings closes chapter, but just the beginning

It closed the chapter on a five-year saga that started with an intercepted phone call where the man meant to represent the city of Wagga and the rest of the electorate was instead focusing on trying to make a buck out of a development that never ended up going ahead in western Sydney.

Operation Dasha was never about Daryl Maguire, but the damning words were enough for the long-serving Liberal to get an ICAC inquiry of his own - Operation Keppel.

For 19 years, four months and eight days, Maguire was the Member for Wagga.

The comfort he found in the seat that had belonged to his party since 1957 came to an end on August 3, 2018.

Over the next two years, Maguire's sordid but ultimately failed dealings were played out in public hearings, dragging friends, colleagues, Wagga institutions and business identities into the mix along with them.

The Wagga MP even managed to bring down the NSW Premier with him.

Kiss and don't tell wasn't just a saying, it was the bedrock of the relationship Maguire and Gladys Berejiklian managed to keep secret for years.

That it took two years after Maguire's fall from grace to come out is still mind-blowing, even after all this time.

Would it have ever been exposed if it weren't for the ICAC compelling Ms Berejiklian's testimony? We'll never know.

It took another two years to get the findings of Operation Keppel.

That in itself has become a whole issue of its own, with now-premier Chris Minns backing calls for the ICAC to develop its own time standards to measure against.

There were 605 days between the final public hearing and the delivery of the findings. The Minns government is suggesting a six-month timeframe could be a good start going forward.

As this chapter closes, with Maguire before the courts on charges relating to Operation Dasha and an alleged visa fraud case, the next one has already begun.

How long it lasts, with the ICAC's recommendations Maguire face prosecution for his serious corrupt conduct, remains to be seen.

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