Operation Credo, Operation Spicer. These investigations by the NSW Independent Commission Against Corruption (ICAC) sent shockwaves through NSW politics in 2014. The political toll exacted included the resignations of Premier Barry O’Farrell, Liberal Party ministers Chris Hartcher and Mike Gallacher; and the withdrawal of four MPs from the Liberal Party—Chris Spence, Darren Webber, Marie Ficarra and Andrew Cromwell.

These ICAC investigations starkly exposed unseemly aspects of fundraising by the NSW Liberal Party. These included allegations of flagrant breaches of election-funding laws (including illegal solicitation of donations by Chris Hartcher in exchange for favoured treatment of the funders) and allegations of legal loopholes being exploited through the laundering of donations by the NSW Liberal Party via the federal branch of the Liberal Party and its associated entity the Free Enterprise Foundation. The Expert Panel on Political Donations, chaired by Dr Kerry Schott, reflected the views of many when it expressed ‘feelings of shock and disgust at the brazen way in which some candidates and MPs have apparently sidestepped political donations laws for personal and political gain’.