Carl Scully

Patrick Carl Scully (born 4 April 1957), Australian politician, was Minister for Police in the New South Wales state government, until his resignation on October 25 2006.

Scully was born in Sydney and educated at state schools. He graduated in law from Macquarie University, Sydney, and has been active in the Australian Labor Party since his student days. He practiced as a solicitor before being elected to the New South Wales Legislative Assembly as member for the safe seat of Smithfield in 1990. He is a member of the dominant right-wing faction of the New South Wales Labor Party.

Scully was Minister for Small Business and Regional Development in 1995, Minister for State Development 1995, Minister for Public Works and Services 1995-97, Minister for Roads and Transport 1997-2003 and Minister for Housing 2003-05, and Minister for Police from 2005-2006.[1]

Scully was considered a possible candidate to succeed Bob Carr as Premier of New South Wales, and announced his intention to run for the position after Carr announced his resignation in July 2005. But he withdrew from the contest on 29 July when it became clear that Health Minister Morris Iemma had majority support in the Labor Caucus. Although Scully publicly blamed the party machine for working against him, it seems that Labor MPs feared that his record as Transport Minister during the Waterfall train disaster and other problems would have worked against the Labor Party at the next State election if he was Leader.[2]

Carl Scully resigned as NSW Police minister on Wednesday 25 October over the consequences of the riots in December 2005. He misled the parliament saying he had not seen the report when he had. This came after repeated calls for him to resign by Peter Debnam.

Carl Scully was regarded as the most unpopular minister by many people in NSW.