Last week The Guardian reported on Professor Peter Coaldrake’s landmark Queensland integrity report.  In the report, Coaldrake found that people were more likely to trust their governments if decisions that affect their lives and spend taxpayers’ funds are “made in the open and subject to scrutiny”.

Here in the Southern Downs our Council is still not releasing any details of the terms on which they’ve agreed to sell a public asset – the Stanthorpe town water allocation – or how much they’ve sold it for.  I’d say they are seriously mistaken about how much our community trusts this Council to do the right thing.

It was a quote in the article from the opposition leader, David Crisafulli MP, however that really raised my eyebrows.  The Queensland government has tried to claim that “commercial in-confidence considerations” prevent it from letting taxpayers know the details of its contracts for the Wellcamp Covid quarantine facility.  Crisafulli said

There is nothing in the Wellcamp deal that should remain under lock and key, so if you believe in lock, stock and barrel reform … we will know how much it costs and when it will end.

Maybe next time Mr Crisafulli catches up with Mayor Pennisi he could have a chat with him about the benefits of openness and transparency.  Because – what a coincidence - the details of the Emu Swamp Dam deal are also being kept secret due to “commercial-in-confidence” issues.

SDRC say it cannot reveal any details of the deal it has done with Granite Belt Water because they have both signed a confidentiality agreement.  

But why did SDRC sign such an agreement? SDRC WERE IN A VERY (VERY) STRONG NEGOTIATING POSITION and so were under no pressure to enter into a confidentiality agreement at all.   

Council could easily have explained to Granite Belt Water that the local government principle, under the Local Government Act, of TRANSPARENCY meant that they could not agree to sign a blanket confidentiality deed.  At the least they should have ensured that they were allowed to disclose those key terms which ensured TRANSPARENCY, particularly the sale price, to ratepayers.

Of course a cynic would say that a better negotiated clause would not have allowed them to use “commercial-in-confidence” to hide the deal from ratepayers.

What this perfectly illustrates is how easy it is for any Council to get around the Local Government principles simply by including a confidentiality clause, or deed, with any party when they want to keep a deal secret.  Quite frankly it makes a mockery of the Local Government Act. 

The sale of a public asset should never be “commercial in confidence”.  It should be transparent and subject to public scrutiny.  Otherwise the public has no ability to challenge a sale until after the event.  This is a serious restriction on the rights of residents and ratepayers to ensure that our public assets are not sold at an undervalue, or on otherwise unacceptable terms.