Former New South Wales Labor ministers Eddie Obeid, Joe Tripodi and Tony Kelly are facing criminal charges.

The trio will face court charged with criminal offences after a 2014 NSW Independent Commission Against Corruption (ICAC) inquiry into infrastructure company Australian Water Holdings.

It comes after ICAC made corrupt conduct findings against the former ministers and Kelly’s former chief of staff Gilbert “Laurie” Brown in 2017.

The NSW Office of the Director of Public Prosecutions has confirmed late that “Mr Obeid, Mr Tripodi and Mr Kelly have each been charged with an offence of misconduct in public office”.

The matters are listed at Downing Centre Local Court on 25 August.

Mr Brown is also facing a charge of misconduct in public office.

ICAC’s probe of Australian Water Holdings found the then-Labor MPs and Brown engaged in serious corrupt conduct in relation to a lucrative public-private partnership proposal by the company.

In 2017, investigators found that in 2010 Kelly, a cabinet minister, his chief of staff Brown, and Tripodi doctored a cabinet submission in favour of Australian Water Holdings and to the potential benefit of Obeid and his family.

The doctored cabinet minute was never put to the government.

It is the first time that Mr Tripodi and Mr Kelly have faced criminal charges after the corruption findings made against them by the ICAC, but Mr Obeid is currently serving a jail sentence after being found guilty of a mine licence conspiracy involving the Obeid family farm in the Bylong Valley between 2007 and 2009.

The licence gave the Obeid family a $30 million windfall. Mr Obeid has also served a jail sentence for misconduct involving cafe leases at Circular Quay, and strenuously denies the allegations contained within the latest ICAC report.