Deported pedophile costing $221,000

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THE woman who helped raise the alarm about disgraced former NSW Aboriginal affairs minister Milton Orkopoulos has been sacked by the state parliament from her electorate office job.

Orkopoulos was found guilty of 28 pedophilia and drug charges yesterday.

However Gillian Sneddon, Orkopoulos`s former electorate officer in the Hunter seat of Swansea, who helped collect evidence from his office for police, had her employment terminated last month - the day she began to give evidence at the Orkopoulos trial, The Sydney Morning Herald reports.

She had been on stress leave and is fighting a workers` compensation claim against parliament.

Premier Morris Iemma has said her situation is a matter for parliament.

Ms Sneddon told the Herald: "If I had have kept my mouth shut, it would have been covered up.

"(The) treatment of me the whole way down the line, from the parliament, from my colleagues, from Labor politicians, (has) been a disgrace``.

Ms Sneddon has been on workers` compensation since being locked out of the office in late 2006 while assisting police retrieve evidence in the case, the Herald reported.

NSW Opposition Leader Barry O`Farrell said that standing up for the truth should not have cost Ms Sneddon her job.

"Gillian Sneddon deserves the public`s thanks, but more importantly, she should either be offered alternative employment or a compensation package,`` Mr O`Farrell told reporters.

"It`s simply not acceptable that Gillian Sneddon or other whistleblowers have to fight through the courts to get compensation when all along they`ve simply done the honest thing.``

He said Premier Morris Iemma`s failure to act over the sacking indicated his preparedness to put the interests of the Labor Party ahead of those of the public.

Local Government Minister Paul Lynch today said Ms Sneddon could pursue future compensation claims through the processes already in place.

"She`s employed by the parliament and they`re the ones that are in an appropriate position to make comment about that or there would be the normal legal avenues that employees can pursue if their employment has been terminated,`` Mr Lynch told Macquarie Radio.

"Electorate staff are employed by the Speaker of the Parliament so the terms of their employment are a matter for parliament,`` Ms Meagher told reporters in Sydney today.

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