TAXPAYERS FORK OUT $10 MILLION TO PAY FOR AWB SCANDAL

Saddam Hussein’s regime profited to the tune of $300 million in kickbacks from the wheat exporter AWB and it cost taxpayers $10 million to discover how this was permitted to occur.  Figures released on July2, 2007 show last year’s Cole Commission investigation into the wheat for weapons scandal cost the public $9.95 million.

The Commissioner Terence Cole, QC, was paid $852,865 whilst the four counsel assisting him received a total of $2.45 million, an average of $610,000 each.  The figure was comparatively small given the Government spent $39 million on the Royal commission into the collapse of the insurance company HIH, and $66 million on the Royal Commission into the building and construction industry.

The latter Commission, which lasted almost 2 years, was also headed by Mr. Cole and for what he was paid $1.05 million plus $250,000 in travel, accommodation and other expenses.  Shadow Foreign Affairs spokesman Robert McClelland said the $10 million cost of the AWB inquiry was in addition to the cost of the AWB being able to claim the Kickbacks as tax reductions.

This amounted to another potential $90 million cost to taxpayers.  “Bad enough that the Australian public had to swallow an inquiry into the scandal that was deliberately designed within terms of reference that ensured ministerial competence would never be compromised,” he said.  Mr. McClelland said the AWB scandal was the greatest outrage of the Howard Government’s reign yet no minister or senior public servant was held accountable.

“Even without the (skewed) terms of reference, the whole concept of ministerial responsibility, where the minister is responsible for errors that occur on his watch, has in no shape or form been applied here.”

The commission found no wrongdoing on behalf of any minister or senior public servant but Labor said this was because the terms of reference were limited.  This is one of the rare occasions that “Voice of the People” support the Labor party’s opinion.

The truth of the AWB scandal can be found on our website Link >>>> Update October 2007 part one.