At the same time as the Turnbull Government is endangering the Great Barrier Reef via its support of Adani’s mega coal mine in the Galilee Basin, the Prime Minister personally approved $444 million in funding for the tiny Barrier Reef Foundation without receiving an application and without going through proper processes. From The Guardian:
Malcolm Turnbull was at the meeting where $443.8m in funding was offered to a small not-for-profit foundation without a competitive tender process or any application for the money, an inquiry has heard.
Anna Marsden, the managing director of the Great Barrier Reef Foundation, told a Senate inquiry on Monday the organisation was offered the funding at a meeting in Sydney in April between Turnbull, environment and energy minister Josh Frydenberg, the foundation’s chair John Schubert and environment and energy department secretary John Pratt.
The inquiry is examining the process by which the foundation, which had just six full-time staff at the time, was awarded the funds and whether it has the capacity to deliver work required under the government’s reef 2050 plan.
“I’d like to state for the record that the foundation did not suggest or make any application for this funding. We were first informed of this opportunity to form a partnership with reef trust on the 9th of April this year,” Marsden told the hearing.
“And who was it that contacted you about that and who did they speak to?” said Greens senator Peter Whish-Wilson.
“That was a meeting between the prime minister, minister Frydenberg, the secretary of the department and our chair,” Marsden said.
Later in the hearings, Labor senator Kristina Keneally asked the environment and energy department about its role in the awarding of the funds.
“It’s still not clear to us how it came to be that the prime minister felt that he could meet with this foundation and offer them $443m of money,” she said.
Officials said the decision happened in “the confines of the budget process” and the government decided to approach the foundation.
Irrespective of your political allegiances, this stinks. What more can I say.
