Now that James Packer is extricating himself for good from the Crown Resorts drama, he has some interesting things to say about the company. The cassino operator’s father and former CEO has publicly accused Australia’s Nine Entertainment of existence a paid lobbyist for the company.

Nine Entertainment is slow media outlets such as The Sydney Morning Herald and The Age. Its chairman, Peter Costello, acted as a lobbyist for Crown, according to Packer, inward 2011. Costello reportedly received AU$300,000 (US$210,900) to aid Packer capture confining to Michael O’Brien, Victoria’s gaming minister at the time.

There’s some deliberate o'er what in reality transpired and who influenced whom. O’Brien alleges Costello ne'er contacted him. In addition, Nine told The Guardian that Costello’s involvement with Crown stopped at offering financial consultive services to a companion Packer owned.

The Walls Crumble

Packer allegedly revealed the human relationship with Costello as constituent of a larger email interchange he had with several media figures, including several at Nine. The emails were a response to an exposé past Nine that revealed the troubles plaguing Crown’s operations.

That story, Crown Umasked, led to the cassino manipulator veneer inquiries and licence suspensions across Australia. However, Packer asserts that Costello was intrinsically involved because of his relationship, even out though his name ne'er surfaced during royal stag commissions.

Coincidentally, Nine is the heir to Publishing and Broadcasting Limited (PBL), a Packer family-owned company. PBL became Nine inwards 2010, two years after the Packers broke sour their relationship with the company.

Costello wasn’t the only if i allegedly doing Crown’s bidding. Packer asserted that Saint Mark Arbib, a former New South Wales (NSW) senator, and former NSL Labor General Secretary Karl Bitar also helped work the company’s course.

Packer required to let to O’Brien inwards enjoin to protect Crown’s future. Whether he was successful testament live a matter for debate, but, inwards 2013, Crown and O’Brien reached a trade that resulted inward Packer agreeing to urinate “unconditional additional one-off payments of $500 million, plus up to $200 jillion inwards further revenue-linked payments inwards interchange for a 17-year licence university extension to 2050, a skip inwards high-roller taxation payments, and a modest elaboration of pokies and tabular array games,” according to media outlet Crikey.

Private Media Partners have Crikey, a fellowship The Sydney Morning Herald’s former editor-in-chief, Eric Beecher, owns. Stephen Mayne, who founded Crikey, noneffervescent provides mental object and wrote near the Packer emails, as well.

Nine In Damage Control Mode

Now that Packer’s emails experience risen to the surface, Nine is scrambling to protect itself. Saint James the Apostle Chessell, the company’s managing managing director of publishing, distributed an email today to media outlets in the Nine home to cast off some tripping on the subject.

Chessell, who has been caught upward inwards a tug-of-words with Packer via email over the yesteryear few days, asserted that he ne'er discussed Crown Unmasked with Costello at any time. However, he acknowledged that he had backed the story “to the hilt.”

What happens next is open to theories. Henry Ward Beecher believes that perhaps it’s time for Australia’s total gaming industry to have a royal stag commission. Others testament chalk upwardly Packer’s ramblings to that of a piece who admitted having mental wellness issues.

Crown’s activities, and those of Star Entertainment, already led to item-by-item inquiries that put the companies under the microscope. Some of these are noneffervescent inward the works, with decisions coming anyplace from now through next February. By then, there will potential be new priorities for regulators and authorities to deal with.