Jean-Claude Perrottet, brother of former NSW premier Dominic Perrottet, admitted before a corruption inquiry on Wednesday he tried to recruit new Liberal members while on a tax-payer funded salary.
The NSW Independent Commission Against Corruption (ICAC) is investigating alleged illicit political donations and branch-stacking spearheaded by the Reformers - a conservative Christian faction among state Liberals.
Jean-Claude Perrottet was a staffer for former finance minister Damien Tudehope, who is still a senior MP in the opposition, while finishing his university degree.
The commission was told how he was determined to bolster the new sub-faction's influence but he felt his peers were not adequately financially compensating him.
"I've been screwed here," he wrote in a message aired at the probe.
"My point of view is I left my job under the pretence I would get paid. That was agreed and it's been nearly 10 months."
When pressed by counsel assisting Juliet Curtin, Jean-Claude Perrottet explained leaving his job with Mr Tudehope in late 2019 did not result in more opportunities.
"When I think back at this message that I'm sitting there getting frustrated, that I'm working hard, I'm doing all of this stuff, I'm volunteering ... and my friends are doing well,'' he told the commission on Wednesday.
But he also used more profane terms when claiming how some MPs were not as dedicated as him when it came to doing factional work while at parliament.
"These c***s have gone soft," he wrote in November 2018 to Christian Ellis, a lobbyist who has refused to front the probe.
"Getting scared about ICAC."
It was a breach of the code of conduct for taxpayer-funded staffers to do recruiting and renewal work during working hours, the inquiry was told.
When asked whether he had known it was against the rules, Jean-Claude Perrottet described it as "frowned upon".
"I probably would have been aware in some notion that ... you shouldn't do factional work during office hours," he said.
The now 29-year-old was approached by Reformers co-founders Mr Ellis and Robert Assaf in 2018 and asked if he wanted to join them, the commission heard.
Drawing on the zeal of the younger Perrottet, the Reformers organised events around social issues intended to attract like-minded people to the Liberal Party.
These lightning-rod issues included abortion, euthanasia, religious freedom and government-mandated vaccinations.
Part of the Reformers' strategy was to sign new members to specific branches over which they wanted to get control.
Ms Curtin suggested to him that his singular focus on factional growth prompted him to pay for Liberal Party memberships out of his own accord.
"Because of the pressure that you felt in relation to ramping up recruitment in the Hills, you from time to time, did pay for memberships?," she asked.
"Due to the pressure. I mean probably, yes on occasion. Maybe," Jean-Claude Perrottet said.
"I felt pressured, I guess, to make people proud to do a good job."
The Hills Shire is the local government area in northwest Sydney where the alleged branch-stacking deals were taking place and where fugitive property developer Jean Nassif built his empire.
Jean-Claude Perrottet agreed the group wanted to increase Christian policy in government by influencing pre-selections.
In another text message to a staffer who worked for another Liberal MP, Jean-Claude Perrottet wrote "We need more Christian members of parliament".
He admitted he would spend a portion of his work hours doing recruitment and renewal tasks for the Reformers.
His obsession even became a topic of conversation between another Reformer Jeremy Greenwood and Mr Ellis.
"Claude either needs a Valium or a break from the faction work," Mr Greenwood wrote in a message to Mr Ellis.
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