Leanne Cover, the disgraced CEO of the CIT, was paid more than $465,000 when she resigned from the position on the eve of the Integrity Commission report being tabled last month.

The payout was disclosed in Estimates Hearing on Friday morning.

Canberra Liberals Leader Elizabeth Lee said this figure was on top of the two years of full salary she was paid while being stood down from the position, which cost Canberra taxpayers an additional $373,000 a year.

“It is disgraceful that Ms Cover who was found by the Integrity Commissioner to have engaged in ‘serious corrupt conduct’ has been paid over $1.2 million by Canberra taxpayers,” Ms Lee said.

“Canberrans have every right to be absolutely outraged by this; whilst at the same time the minister has thrown his hands in the air and said he and his government have no accountability.

“No one has taken any accountability for the massive waste of taxpayers’ money and erosion of public trust – not the minister, not the CIT board and certainly not Ms Cover, who was allowed to remain on fully paid leave and then received a massive payout; all funded by ACT taxpayers.

“Despite the strong talk from Mr Steel that the Integrity Commission findings regarding the dodgy CIT contracts should serve as a warning to public servants, the reality is that his complete and utter lack of action shows he is once again refusing to take these issues seriously.”

Ms Cover resigned on June 18, two years after she was “temporarily” stood down on full pay ($373,061 a year) until the investigation into more than $8.5 million awarded to “complexity and systems thinker” Patrick Hollingworth was complete.

In his Special Report, of the Integrity Commission’s Operation Luna, Integrity Commissioner Michael Adams says: “The integrity of the legal frameworks that provide for governance of public entities such as the CIT, depends on the due performance of their responsibilities by the officials who are charged with its management including, in particular, the CEO.

“Her corrupt conduct adversely impacted the exercise by the Board of its supervisory function… in connection with the program of organisational change of which a major part at considerable cost was the procurement of the Hollingworth contracts.

“Accordingly, this conduct was ‘likely to threaten public confidence in the integrity of government or public administration’. It follows that Ms Cover was guilty of serious corrupt conduct within s 10 of the IC Act.”