Updated ,first published
Subpoenas will be used to force the world leader of the Exclusive Brethren and his son to answer questions before a parliamentary inquiry about the church’s covert, multimillion-dollar “influence campaign” supporting the Coalition at the last federal election, if they refuse to give evidence voluntarily.
The committee wants answers from the Plymouth Brethren Christian Church’s most powerful leaders over secret payments to far-right agitators to harass Anthony Albanese and other left-leaning MPs on the campaign trail.
Parliamentary committees have the power to compel witnesses to appear, and those who refuse or mislead parliament with false testimony can be found in contempt of parliament.
Labor and crossbench MPs have called on the Liberal Party to explain its entanglement with the wealthy sect’s secretive operation, after this masthead revealed church elders were working behind the scenes with neo-Nazi associates to disrupt campaign events.
Parliamentary records show former Peter Dutton staffer Sam Jackson-Hope, who was previously named by Liberal sources as a key “point person” within Dutton’s election campaign for co-ordinating the Brethren’s involvement, is now working in Opposition Leader Angus Taylor’s office as an advisor.
Multiple sources in the party said Jackson-Hope had helped coordinate the thousands of church members campaigning undercover for the Liberals at pre-polling booths. There is no suggestion he was also involved in the covert stunt operation with the far-right, which was known to very few in the party.
Taylor has joined other senior Liberals in defending the church and its charity work, attending a charity bike ride sponsored by the church the day after news of the Brethren’s far-right plot broke.
Jackson-Hope and Taylor’s office did not respond to requests for comment.
This week in parliament, a chorus of Labor MPs called on the opposition to “come clean” about any “deals done” with the Brethren in exchange for the sect’s support, after this masthead published leaked messages showing that the election influence plot led all the way to the top of the church. Gareth Hales was among the senior elders in co-ordinating chats with far-right figures, and his company Sante Global, was identified in the paper trail of payments and meetings.
Brethren elders tracked MPs in cars and fed “private intel” on their locations to agitators with a history of white supremacy association, in more than a dozen scripted stunts designed to embarrass the Coalition’s opponents. Senior Brethren figure Lester Sharples confirmed to this masthead that the stunt operation was organised by himself and other elders.
Home Affairs Minister Tony Burke has called the ambushes “physical intimidation”, and teal donor Climate 200, founded by Simon Holmes à Court, who was himself targeted in a stunt, has referred the church to the charity regulator for investigation.
Key far-right figures were also paid tens of thousands of dollars to serve as middlemen in the church’s undisclosed advertising campaign, endorsing Brethren posters and buying ad space.
Speaking to the media on Wednesday, committee chair Jerome Laxale said Sharples and the Hales would be among the Brethren members formally called to give evidence, but he challenged the Liberals to front up to the parliamentary inquiry, too.
“It’s time that the Liberal Party fess up about this group that they themselves describe as a support group [in their election review]. Defending democracy should be above politics,” he said.
The church has repeatedly denied any involvement in the secret stunts operation, which was first reported by this masthead last month. Questioned by the parliamentary committee, church spokesman Lloyd Grimshaw insisted the Brethren had nothing to do with the election at all.
Laxale told parliament on Monday he found Grimshaw’s evidence “shallow, inconsistent, and, at points, laughable”.
After Grimshaw’s testimony last month, a dissenting group of seven Coalition MPs issued a statement defending the Brethren, and calling the inquiry a witchhunt and religious discrimination.
Across the aisle, other MPs have expressed alarm at the aggressive, MAGA-style tactics of Brethren at polling booths.
The Labor MP for Chisholm, Carina Garland, told parliament on Tuesday the Brethren “swarming” on the campaign trail was a “a disgraceful assault on our democracy”.
“I was personally attacked by notorious characters almost daily,” Garland said. This included “vile abuse and intimidation” of volunteers, she said.
Teal independent Monique Ryan, who was also targeted by a stunt in the Brethren operation, called the dirty tricks campaign “chilling to democracy” on Wednesday. She said the committee was “asking Bruce and Gareth Hales to explain … the nature of agreements or contracts between the church and the Liberal Party, neo-Nazi groups and far-right activists” including former Proud Boys deployed on the campaign trial.
Some Brethren members told this masthead they were horrified to see their church using neo-Nazi associates as guns-for-hire to disrupt an election.
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