As he plans to leave politics, Stuart Robert faces more questions on conduct

Unisys brought its global president and chief executive officer, Peter Altabef, to Canberra for the briefing on November 30, 2017, along with its managing director for the Asia-Pacific, Tony Windever, and three other executives.

Robert was also named acting chair of the committee during part of the November meeting and moved a motion to accept the Unisys presentation as a tabled document.

Confidential emails obtained by this masthead show that Milo and his consulting firm, Synergy 360, were being paid by Unisys and were anticipating a significant payment if LineSight was bought by federal agencies.

In response to an email from a Synergy executive describing how Synergy made $100,000 in its first four months of operations, Milo wrote on October 21, 2017: “I thought we wanted a mil in the first year. Roll on LineSight.”

The membership of the committee has changed several times since the 2017 events, but members have discussed the Unisys briefing in recent months and checked the documents ahead of a meeting when federal parliament resumes this week.

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A spokesman for Robert said on Sunday: “Mr Robert again rejects any imputation or allegation of improper conduct you assert in your inquiry.”

Robert has denied giving any assistance to the companies that hired Milo and Synergy 360. Asked last November if he helped Synergy 360 and its clients win contracts, Robert said: “Of course not. What a load of rubbish. There’s no way a minister could do it. It’s just nonsense.”

Robert issued a statement on Saturday morning saying he would resign from his Queensland seat of Fadden in the coming weeks.

Despite a 3.6 per cent swing against him at the last election, Robert held the seat for the Liberal National Party by a margin of 10.6 per cent. A date for the by-election won’t be set until he writes to the speaker of the House of Representatives, Milton Dick, to formalise his resignation from parliament.

The chair of the committee, Labor backbencher Susan Templeman, said: “Unfortunately, I’m not able to comment on or pre-empt considerations by the committee, which will be meeting this week.”

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