Stuart Ayres is asked why he said in an internal email that the multimillion-dollar government-funded upgrade of a Wagga Wagga gun club was “legit”.

“Project is legit,” he said in a December 2016 email after the expenditure review committee approved a conditional $5.5 million grant to the Australian Clay Target Association, contingent on a satisfactory business case.

Mr Ayres, now the Trade and Industry Minister who was then the Sport Minister, told the ICAC he believed that was related to the business case. He is giving evidence at the inquiry and has not been accused of wrongdoing.

A bureaucrat said that someone needed to talk “Daryl”, the then NSW Liberal MP for Wagga Wagga Daryl Maguire, “off the ledge”.

Mr Ayres said this was a “standard observation” that the local MP wanted to know what he could and couldn’t do in making an announcement about the funding, because it was not unconditional.

He also wrote that “perhaps Gladys and I need to write to Daryl”.

Asked at the ICAC whether Gladys Berejiklian, the then NSW treasurer, had a “particular ear” to the concerns of Mr Maguire, Mr Ayres said: “Not out of the ordinary course of events.”

As noted throughout the blog, the ICAC is examining the circumstances in which the association was awarded $5.5 million in conditional funding in December 2016, when Ms Berejiklian was in a secret relationship with Mr Maguire.

Mr Maguire was a vocal proponent of the project in his electorate.

The ICAC has previously heard the Berejiklian-Maguire relationship started in 2015 and continued until 2018. Ms Berejiklian has denied any wrongdoing and has said history will show she acted in the best interests of the people of NSW.

She is slated to give evidence at the inquiry next week on Thursday and Friday.