- Whitsundays Council Budget 2010/11: Mayor Mike Brunker (ALP candidate for Dawson) gives Tourism Whitsundays $350,000.
- 20 July 2010: QLD Tourism Minister, Peter Lawlor (ALP, Southport) gives Tourism Whitsundays $420,000 to develop a website.
“Unfortunately, rates bills across the Whitsunday region will increase due significantly due to the water and sewerage treatment plants that are required.”
So why has council got so much money to give to a private club? Is it to make up for the membership shortfall? Or the gap between insurance coverage and loss from the $350,000 fraud two years ago?
$350,000 - that's somewhere between $50-$200 per ratepayer notice. Tourism Whitsundays already charges membership fees, so why should the ratepayers, (and especially in Bowen where rates went up 14%) be subsidizing a private businessmens club?
In one months time, it will be the first anniversary of the conviction of Tourism Whitsundays' Financial Controller, who has to spend six & half years in prison, (but will probably end up less than half that). It is just two years since over $350,000 was defrauded from within Tourism Whitsundays.
Almost all the management and board of directors that were 'in charge' then, are still in charge at Tourism Whitsundays. Chairperson at the time, Lyn Gregson, resigned from her post almost a year ago, not to take responsibility, but to "pursue her business interests', however, within a couple of months, Ms Gregson was on the board of directors of Enterprise Whitsundays.
As part of the first anniversary of the Whitsundays' worse ever public fraud, we will be releasing correpondence between this office and the Queensland Premiers Department over the next few weeks, that led to the investigation and discovery of the biggest crime to hit the Whitsundays in a long, long time.
The giving away of $770,000 in taxpayers money, to a private club, with minimal local support*, with proven 'form' that it can not look after its own finances, and no ombudsman or higher authority to report to, and recently, allegations of bullying, are not only bad judgements but also an absolute waste of money.
The whole issue giving away public money to Tourism Whitsundays, and how it spends it, deserves further investigation, by a neutral party, as soon as possible. (And not the Auditors - they are members of Tourism Whitsundays - isn't that a conflict of interest?).
The Queensland and Whitsundays taxpayers and ratepayers deserve to get value for their tax dollars.
* Tourism Whitsundays represents less than 10% of the busineses in the Whitsundays Region.
If it wasn't for this blog expressing its concerns about Tourism Whitsundays to Premier Anna Bligh, the fraud would have probably continued and Tourism Whitsundays would probably not be here today. No, we have not recieved any correspondence from anyone for probably saving Tourism Whitsundays.
Our Dawson Election Special can be found here
Our Dawson Election Special can be found here
Sources:
Sigrid Brown - ABC News
Whitsunday Regional Council
Whitsundays News
2 comments:
Ok so how do I get in on this rort? I want some of that money I and my fellow Queenslanders have given them to go play pirate with! No accountability, no plans and no-one doing anything about it except this publication...there's more than the reef smelling fishy in the Whitsundays!
Whitsunday council provides nothing for rate payers in Mount Coolon except the rates bill. No collection of rubbish, no library, no water, no sewerage. They say they fix the roads between Belyando Crossing and Mount Coolon and Mount Coolon and Collinsville but the roads are used by roadtrains and are very dangerous. Its just a totally rip off - simple as that.
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