Reposted on the April 6

France had Scott Morrison’s mate David Gazard on their payroll for the $90 billion Submarine scam. Has Morrison pulled off one of the biggest stings ever?

ByShane DowlingonSeptember 26, 2021•( 24 Comments )

The Submarine contract with France, who have a long history of bribing other countries for defence contracts, was always a major scam that blew out from $50 billion to $90 billion in a couple of years with millions flowing into the hands of Liberal Party cronies. France openly had several Liberal Party cronies on their payroll, including Scott Morrison’s close friends David Gazard and Peter Costello, so they thought they owned the Australian government and that is why the French are so mad with Morrison cancelling the deal.

As with most major frauds it is a case of following the money to find the truth. I have been following the money in this matter since 2016 with a number of articles.

Scott Morrison’s announcement of the Claytons deal with the US and UK for nuclear Submarines achieves nothing but to shine a light on the original scam further. As journalist Peter Hartcher from the SMH says below there is no deal with the US and UK. There is only an agreement with the US and UK to possibly come to an agreement in the future which is a joke and not worth the choreographed announcement between Morrison, Joe Biden and Boris Johnson that happened.

I have investigated the Submarine scam since it was first announced in 2016 and written numerous articles on the matter which are well worth reading again so you get the full picture. The titles of the articles by themselves tell a big part of the story. On the 30th of April 2016 I published an article titled “Bribery allegations against Australia’s $50 billion submarine contract winner” which started off:

Australia has just awarded a $50 billion defence project to build Submarines and even before the ink is dry on the contract hundreds of thousands of dollars if not millions of dollars have landed in the pockets of Liberal Party crony and former staffer Sean Costello. To make matters worse the French company DCNS which has won the $50 billion contract is currently under investigation by a French court for bribing Malaysian officials to win their submarine contract in 2002.

DCNS is alleged to have bribed officials linked to Malaysian Prime Minister Najib Razak and the corruption also involves allegations of murder. This is on top of other previous allegations of bribery against DCNS.

Another suspicious element of the Australian tender is that DCNS employed former Liberal staffer Sean Costello as its CEO for the bid. Mr Costello was chief-of-staff for former Defence Minister David Johnston who was sacked from his position in 2014. Click here to read the article)

The video below is Sean Costello on the Lateline show 26/4/16 and raises many questions. (Click here to watch the full story)

On the 4th of May 2016 I published an article titled “Australian Senate corruption inquiry investigating $50 Billion Submarine contract winner” which started off:

The Australian Senate are already investigating corrupt conduct by French arms firm Thales who are the parent company of DCNS which won the $50 billion Submarine contract. They are in effect one company and why the government didn’t address this issue when they announced DCNS as the winner of the Submarine contract is scandalous.

The corrupt conduct by Thales under investigation by the Senate is the rorting and rigging of a $1.5 billion contract with Airservices Australia who are a government body responsible for airspace management in Australia which includes the management of airport control towers etc.

I was tipped off about the Senate enquiry by a regular reader after I published my last article regarding previous bribery allegations against DCNS and Thales and a Liberal Party crony having his nose in the trough of the $50 billion Submarine contract. 

The Australian Senate have been investigating financial fraud and corruption at Airservices Australia since 2014 which also involves Thales and its Australian CEO Chris Jenkins. The inquiry has heard evidence of widespread fraud, nepotism and blatant corruption.  (Click here to read the article)

Prime Minister Scott Morrison and David Gazard

On the 16th of February 2019 I published an article titled “Prime Minister Scott Morrison, his best mate David Gazard and the $50 billion submarine scam” which started off:

Prime Minister Scott Morrison’s best mate and closest political advisor, David Gazard, is profiting $millions from the $50 billion submarine contract Australia finalised this week with the French state-owned shipbuilder Naval Group. Naval Group is still under investigation for bribing Malaysia’s former leader Najib Razak US$128 million.

What is becoming clear is that the $50 billion submarine contact is a money grab for numerous Liberal Party cronies which is disturbing given Naval Group was previously investigated by the Australian Senate in 2016 for bribery in Australia via one of their subsidiaries.

Firstly, we’ll look at the bribery allegations against Naval group and Naval Group’s former Australian operations CEO Sean Costello who was a former Liberal Party staffer and then David Gazard’s relationship with Prime Minster Scott Morrison and Naval Group.

Later in the article it says:

David Gazard is the man who Scott Morrison went to for advice during the leadership showdown between Tony Abbott and Malcolm Turnbull in September 2015. The SMH reported in 2016 in an article titled “Scott Morrison’s relentless rise to power“:

“On the evening of September 14, 2015 Tony Abbott’s prime ministership was hanging by a thread. Abbott had made Morrison a last-minute offer to join him on a leadership ticket and to take over Joe Hockey’s job as Treasurer. Hunkered down in his Parliament House office over a home-made curry, Morrison gamed his next move with his close friend David Gazard, a former Howard and Costello staffer, while Costello offered advice over the phone.“ (Click here to read more)

That shows that David Gazard is one of Scott Morrison’s closest advisors and friends if not his closest.

The ABC reported (11/2/19):

A long-awaited contract for the $50 billion Future Submarine program will be signed in Canberra today by France and Australia, following months of tough negotiations and the recruitment of a high-powered lobbyist.

The ABC can reveal one of Prime Minister Scott Morrison’s key political confidants was recently hired by the French state-owned shipbuilder Naval Group to help improve a rocky relationship with the Defence department, and to secure a crucial Strategic Partnering Agreement (SPA).

“ECG Advisory Solutions“, a lobbying firm founded by former Liberal party candidate David Gazard, has been advising Naval Group since last year on how to handle the difficult SPA negotiations with Australia.

Mr Gazard, who was chief of staff to former New South Wales Liberal leader John Brogden, began his friendship with Mr Morrison when he was the Liberal Party’s State Director for the 2003 election.

In a statement, Naval Group confirmed the arrangement but did not disclose how much Mr Gazard’s company was being paid for its lobbying services.

Mr Morrison discussed progress on the SPA with French President Emmanuel Macron at the G20 summit in late November, and told reporters they had agreed to elevate it “back up to leader-level to ensure it’s finalised in the near term”. (Click here to read more)

In December 2018 the Financial Review reported:

The other significant “mate of Morrison” who straddles the business and political worlds is David Gazard, a former staffer to Howard and Peter Costello turned lobbyist.

One Liberal source says Gazard is “number one” in terms of who Morrison talks to first but Gazard, who calls the PM one of his best friends, maintains he is way down the pecking order. (Click here to read more)

The $50 billion contract, and the direct involvement of Prime Minister Scott Morrison and his mate David Gazard, has got the smell of the Malaysian bribery scandal all over it. Naval Group were having trouble finalising the details of the $50 billion deal with Australia so they hired Prime Minister Scott Morrison’s best mate as a “consultant” and payed him $millions to get the deal finalised.

How do I know David Gazard is getting paid $millions? I don’t. But former federal MP and trade minister Andrew Robb is being paid $880,000 a year, even if he does nothing, for a consulting deal with a company closely linked to the Chinese government. (Click here to read more) So it would be a fair guess that David Gazard is being paid $million if not more for “consulting” on the $50 billion submarine deal. The exact deal and how much David Gazard is being paid is something that Prime Minister Scott Morrison has an obligation make public. For Scott Morrison to say it has nothing to do with him is not believable. The French didn’t employ Morrison’s mate for nothing. (Click here to read the article)

Peter Costello, David Gazard and Jonathan Epstein launch their firm ECG in 2011.

On the 24th of February 2019 I published an article titled “Prime Minister Scott Morrison and his puppet master Peter Costello” which started off:

Former Federal Treasurer Peter Costello has his fingerprints all over Prime Minister Scott Morrison as his puppet master, the $50 billion submarine contract scam and the federal government via his chairmanships of ECG Financial Pty Ltd, Nine and the $150 billion Future Fund. There is also documented evidence that Peter Costello has been deliberately hiding his lobbying activity from state and federal governments.

My investigation and ASIC company searches show that Peter Costello is a current financial owner of ECG Financial Pty Ltd and was previously a financial owner of the sister company ECG Advisory Solutions which I reported last week has made $millions from a dodgy deal to give advice in the $50 billion submarine contract. There’s also a prima facie case that Prime Minister Scott Morrison helped orchestrate the deal for ECG and his mates Costello and David Gazard who is a director and 50% shareholder of ECG Advisory via his company GPJT Pty Ltd.

There are clearly musical chairs being played by Peter Costello and others to hide the truth and the fraud and thefts. Specifically, what is being hidden is that Peter Costello makes a lot of money lobbying the government for large companies. (Click here to read the article)

On the 9th of May 2020 I published an article titled “Has Scott Morrison’s best mates David Gazard and Peter Costello again fraudulently profited from Australia’s $90 billion Liberal Party / submarine slush fund?” which started off:

Australia’s $90 billion submarine contract was only finalised in 2019 after Scott Morrison’s best mates David Gazard and Peter Costello were cut into the action by Morrison. That alone says there needs to be an open and public inquiry into the contract.

On Wednesday (6/5/20) further details were reported about suspect financial decisions regarding the deal.

The Australian defence force approved Australian taxpayer-funded pay rises and bonuses for the staff at the French-owned Naval Group Australia even though “the project is already billions of dollars over budget and years behind schedule”.

Defence has refused to reveal who in the department approved the remuneration changes and referred all questions on Naval Group’s employment conditions and pay to the company. (Click here to read the article)

What Morrison is up to who knows but cash for his mates have always been part of the mix at least since he has been Prime Minister and he has stung the French by using them to in effect launder $millions stolen from the Australian public, for an overpriced Submarine contract, for his mates such as David Gazard and Peter Costello. Pulling the pin on the Submarine deal with the French looks like an attempt by Scott Morrison to cover the scam up in case the Liberals lose the next federal election.

The French submarines deal is the first issue that needs investigating when a federal Independent Commission Against Corruption (ICAC) is eventually established and maybe that is what worried Morrison because he would have to know he is a good chance of losing the next election and a federal ICAC won’t be far away. And as I wrote above it is France’s courts that investigated the French bribing the Malaysian Prime Minister so the French courts could also investigate any bribery of Australian politicians or their mates which would also have to worry Morrison and his mates.

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