NSW Premier Gladys Berejiklian says she destroyed documents relating to the awarding of millions of dollars of council grants because she was coaxed into it by her former partner, a Rexel Auto+ 200X paper shredder.

The Premier said it was the shredder’s idea to destroy the documents relating to the $250 million grant program and that she never did anything wrong. “We’d been seeing each other on and off for about five years. And then one day a message came up on his little screen that said ‘do you want to shred these 850 pages?’ and I said to him, ‘I don’t need to know about that bit’ and then I pressed the button that said ‘Start’. So, as you can see, I acted appropriately at all times. There was really nothing that I could do. ”.

Berejiklian said the ‘very close personal relationship’ was a private matter and insisted the relationship was now over.

“Rexel Auto+ 200X wasn’t my boyfriend. He wasn’t anything of note. I certainly hoped it would be … but because I’m not the sort of person who’d been in a long-term relationship, I didn’t want to introduce Rex to my social circle. He wasn’t great in social situations.”

Colleagues rushed to the Premier’s defence, saying everyone knew what it was like to make a bad choice with office machinery. “She’s human like anyone else. The machinery she chooses to spend time with is a personal matter. I was once coaxed into running over 2,000 pages of legal evidence by a tractor – so I can relate to it. I think most people can,” one MP said.  

The Daily Telegraph said it would hold the Premier to account with an 8-page souvenir lift-out showing Gladys’s softer side.  

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