Backdoor emails put Speaker on silent

FORMER Treasurer Curtis Pitt was secretly lobbied by union bosses over a workplace dispute at state-owned power companies in 2016 using his personal email.

Mr Pitt, who is now Speaker, had back-channel discussions with ETU boss Peter Simpson at the same time as the union leader was lobbying then Energy Minister Mark Bailey using his “mangocube” yahoo email in breach of ministerial guidelines.

The secret talks are revealed in a raft of new documents released to The Australian under Right to Information laws.

The revelation came as Mr Pitt excused himself from making a ruling on whether Mr Bailey misled parliament over his email use and instead delegated the decision to deputy speaker Scott Stewart, who found the minister had no case to answer.

Mr Stewart told parliament Mr Pitt “decided while these matters raised do not directly relate to his previous duties as the treasurer, he decided out of an abundance of caution approach to delegate the functions of Speaker in relation to the matter ... to me, as Deputy Speaker.”

New documents also reveal Mr Simpson wrote directly to Premier Annastacia Palaszczuk in January 2016 using an official email to ask her to intervene in the dispute.