Mr Mason suggested the complaint should be taken up with Simon McInnes, the party agent with whom the commission has been dealing. Mr McInnes had been provided with a draft copy of the summary of facts on February 26, Mr Mason said. Cabinet Secretary Arthur Sinodinos has said the Liberals are philosophically committed to performance pay for public servants Credit:Alex Ellinghausen In a statement also released on Thursday afternoon, the commission said that since Mr McInnes had resigned as party agent, Tony Nutt, the current federal director, would be the interim party agent. Electoral commission staff will meet with Liberal party officials on Friday in an attempt to resolve the impasse. Last week the NSW Electoral Commission announced it was withholding $4.4 million in public funding to the NSW Liberals until the party formally disclosed who donated an amount of $693,000 via an entity, the Free Enterprise Foundation (FEF), before the 2011 state election.

Mr Sinodinos has also denied fresh allegations the NSW Liberals were pursuing banned political donors before the 2011 state election. Questioned about this on Thursday morning, Mr Sinodinos claimed that despite its title – "State campaign 2011 potential donors" – a list which he helped draw up, was used to target donors for both federal and state election campaigns. But Fairfax Media can reveal the list was created on November 9, 2010, almost three months after the August 21 federal election. Emails tendered at a landmark inquiry by Independent Commission Against Corruption in 2014 reveal that Mr Sinodinos, at the time the party's state treasurer, was personally involved in drawing up the list and assigning party officials to "solicit" potential donations. Also on the list of targeted donors was Australian Water Holdings.

The entry puts into focus his testimony before ICAC that he had no knowledge of AWH donations to the party. "Does that suggest to you that you did not know that the company of which you were deputy chairman was making donations to the political party of which you were treasurer?" Mr Sinodinos was asked."It was not a process I involved myself in," he replied. On the targeted donor list, Paul Nicolaou, the party's chief fundraiser, was assigned to ask AWH for money. Less than a month later AWH donated $30,000. Mr Sinodinos told the ICAC inquiry he was not aware that Mr Nicolaou's private lobbying company had received almost $200,000 in fees from AWH while Mr Sinodinos was on AWH's board. The only source of AWH's funds came from Sydney Water, which was in a bitter dispute with AWH over its refusal to provide details of exorbitant costs.

The corruption commission heard evidence that Mr Sinodinos had been warned by the head of Sydney Water, Dr Kerry Schott, that AWH was an organisation of 'dishonest' people. Mr Sinodinos told the corruption inquiry he did not recall either Dr Scott's warning or that of AWH shareholder Rod de Aboitiz who said that AWH's spending was out of control and that the company was in danger of collapse. "Arthur, you know that solvency is a big issue for a director." Mr de Aboitiz also pointed out that AWH, which had one contract and ten employees, was struggling to pay its tax bills yet was still paying money to the Liberal Party. Only months before drawing up the donor list, Mr Sinodinos had been lobbying then Opposition leader Barry O'Farrell to support granting AWH a lucrative government contract. Mr Sinodinos did not inform the soon-to-be premier that he stood to make as much as $20 million if the deal went through.

"These issues were dealt with extensively in the evidence given to the ICAC. That evidence has been on the public record for over 18 months," Mr Sinodinos said in reply to a list of questions sent to him by Fairfax Media. On Wednesday night Mr Sinodinos was the guest speaker at a federal fundraiser organised by the Rose Bay branch of the Liberal party. "The elephant in the room was not spoken about," said one guest about the donation imbroglio. Another was very put out about being a banned donor due to being a pub owner: "I can't donate to the NSW Libs but any brothel owner can? Who's more reputable?" he said. with Kate Aubusson