The email is uncomfortable for the Andrews government because it points to a senior government or party figure promising to sign off a rezoning process which is at the core of the biggest probe of planning-related corruption in Victoria for decades. The investigation by the Independent Broad-based Anti-corruption Commission is focused on issues central to stories by The Age and Sunday Age around local and state planning for Casey as far back as 2011, including major revelations in October and November 2018. Who exactly Mr Woodman is referring to in his email when he says the ‘Labor party’ is not clear. In the email he also says he needs to report the council decision to “Judith” an apparent reference to then local backbench Labor MP Judith Graley, who retired at the 2018 election. In what seems to be a move to progress state approval of the zoning, Mr Woodman also explains how he plans to email the council resolution to “our good friend”. It is unclear who the ‘good friend’ is. Last week Mr Woodman told the IBAC hearing he thought it was a reference to Ms Graley but he wasn’t sure. The email goes to the heart of the IBAC probe: the influence Mr Woodman has at both local and state levels of government, including both over major political parties, and especially over Casey council.

An Age investigation combined with evidence tendered to the IBAC public examination reveals that Mr Woodman and his political and planning consultants regard the majority of current Casey councillors as belonging to what they call their “team”. A September 2016 email from Mr Woodman to his lobbyists, including ALP life member Phil Staindl and former Liberal MP Lorraine Wreford, includes a list of candidates for the November 2016 council election. The candidates are colour-coded according to whether they are “friendly” or not. While the list was not a final one, it shows that at least 44 of 86 candidates were “friendly” to Mr Woodman’s interests. Of the 11 elected in 2016 and now on the council, eight are identified as “friendly”. The group includes former Liberal state candidates Susan Serey (the current mayor), Geoff Ablett and Amanda Stapledon, former Liberal MP Gary Rowe, and ex-mayor and Liberal Sam Aziz, the councillor who left Australia for the Middle East in September after his house was raided by IBAC. Other “friendly” candidates, now councillors, include Cr Wayne Smith and Liberal activist Cr Damien Rosario. Last week IBAC heard how Mr Woodman had financially supported candidates at the 2016 council election through the funding of campaign material and mail-outs. He confirmed he had outlaid more than $50,000 on the council election. Sources involved in the campaign have told The Sunday Age the figure is higher.

It is not yet fully clear which current councillors benefited from the campaign funding. In the case of Crs Ablett and Aziz the financial links with Mr Woodman run much deeper than donations, with IBAC revealing direct and allegedly corrupt personal payments estimated to be worth more than $1.2 million. Last week Mr Staindl confirmed that Mr Woodman had given him funds to support first-term councillor and ALP member Tim Jackson, to the tune of several thousand dollars, and other Labor-linked candidates. First-term councillor Tim Jackson benefited from Mr Woodman's funding. Credit:Internet All councillors approached for this story either refused to comment or did not return calls and messages. In early 2014 when the property’s owners Leighton - since renamed CIMIC - first proposed the rezoning it was rejected by council which had earmarked the site as a future employment precinct.

But over months the council’s position changed as Mr Woodman showered some councillors with donations and, in the case of councillors Aziz and Ablett, allegedly corrupt payments.

Last week counsel assisting the IBAC public hearings Michael Tovey QC said Mr Woodman’s strategy for winning planning approvals also appeared to include influencing decision-making, through donations at the state, as well as local, level. Mr Tovey QC the inquiry Mr Woodman treated some councillors like "puppets". “So, his reach it is apparent is not limited to local council, but appears to extend to state government,” Mr Tovey said. Woodman-related companies have donated $400,000 to the Labor and Liberal parties over the past decade, including at the last two state elections, in 2014 and 2018, as the rezoning scheme was being hatched and working its way through the planning system. Loading Mr Woodman also donated $80,000 on unsuccessful state election campaigns by councillors and Liberals Ablett and Stapledon in 2014. He confirmed at the IBAC hearing that he also spent about $15,000 on mail-outs for Cr Serey’s unsuccessful state campaigns as a Liberal in 2014 and 2018.

Among the Labor MPs in Melbourne’s south-east to receive campaign funds were Andrews government frontbbenchers Luke Donnellan and Martin Pakula, backbenchers Judith Graley and Jude Perera (2014) and newcomer Pauline Richards in 2018. Loading Last year The Age revealed how Mr Perera had pressed the office of Planning Minister, Richard Wynne, on multiple occasions about the rezoning. On Friday Ms Graley, who retired from politics in 2018, denied knowledge of a Labor promise about the Cranbourne West project or why Mr Woodman may have referred to her as his “good friend”. “Where does he (Mr Woodman) get that idea from … there was never an ALP position on this I knew of,” she said. “Who has he been talking to? I don’t know.”

But Ms Graley confirmed she had met Mr Woodman and lobbyist Phil Staindl several times and discussed the rezoning, despite the fact that the Cranbourne West site was not in her electorate. Last week Mr Woodman told IBAC he believed the government was preparing to sign off the rezoning when The Age reported concerns about it shortly before the 2018 state poll.

After the story was published, Mr Wynne announced he had deferred a decision until after the poll. That decision has still not been made. Last week The Age sent questions to both Victorian Premier Daniel Andrews and Mr Wynne, including about who may have promised Mr Woodman the Cranbourne West rezoning. Both refused to comment.