{"id":15031,"date":"2017-05-05T09:10:23","date_gmt":"2017-05-04T23:10:23","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.machines4u.com.au\/mag\/?p=15031"},"modified":"2017-05-16T09:10:39","modified_gmt":"2017-05-15T23:10:39","slug":"queensland-taxpayers-to-foot-1-7m-bill-over-stanwell-sub-contractor-payment","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.machines4u.com.au\/mag\/queensland-taxpayers-to-foot-1-7m-bill-over-stanwell-sub-contractor-payment\/","title":{"rendered":"Queensland taxpayers to foot $1.7m bill over Stanwell sub-contractor payment"},"content":{"rendered":"<p class=\"intro\">Liquidators are chasing $1.7 million from Queensland taxpayers after the government-owned power company <a href=\"http:\/\/www.stanwell.com\/energy-assets\/our-power-stations\/\" target=\"_blank\">Stanwell Corporation<\/a> used\u00a0coal ash company Coal Reuse after it was insolvent.<\/p>\n<h2>Liquidators threaten court action if financial demands aren&#8217;t met<\/h2>\n<p>While Stanwell continues to deny any knowledge that they were aware Coal Reuse was unable to fulfil its contract, liquidators Rogers Reidy are threatening court\u00a0action if $1,766,734.18 isn&#8217;t paid by Friday.<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"http:\/\/www.abc.net.au\/news\/2017-05-03\/coal-reuse-liquidators-seek-$1.7m-from-power-generator-stanwell\/8491978\" target=\"_blank\">Stanwell had contracted Coal Reuse\u00a0for the collection and sales of coal ash<\/a> from two coal mines, the Tarong Power Station and an associated mine located in South Burnett.<\/p>\n<p>In an ABC interview LNP Lockyer MP Ian Rickuss has voiced his disapproval of Stanwell&#8217;s lack of foresight in contracting Coal Reuse. He said, &#8220;Stanwell appointed this company (Coal Reuse)&#8230; and then put its head in the sand for the first two years and disadvantaged small businesses. It&#8217;s these inefficiencies at places like Stanwell that are costing every energy user in Queensland money and now they&#8217;re going to charge the taxpayer for their mistakes and for their poor business practice.&#8221;<\/p>\n<h4>Coal Reuse goes into court ordered liquidation last year<\/h4>\n<p>The coal ash company\u00a0was liquidated last year after receiving a court order. This left many <a href=\"http:\/\/www.abc.net.au\/news\/2016-11-28\/stanwell-executives-sham-bonuses-while-contractors-unpaid\/8059762\" target=\"_blank\">small businesses in South Burnett having to try to recoup their losses<\/a> from unpaid invoices by\u00a0filing a winding\u00a0up order.<\/p>\n<p>It&#8217;s come to light that Coal Reuse\u00a0didn&#8217;t have the money it needed to support it&#8217;s financial obligations when taking on the contract for the Tarong power stations. In conjunction with this Rogers Reidy reported to creditors last year that <a href=\"http:\/\/www.abc.net.au\/news\/2016-11-16\/coal-reuse-no-industry-experience-funds-hazardous-ash-liquidator\/8027840\" target=\"_blank\">Coal Reuse were unable to fulfil their contract <\/a>as it had no customer base for a specific type of coal ash called cenospheres.<\/p>\n<h4>Questions asked why Coal Reuse was given a\u00a0contract they couldn&#8217;t fulfil<\/h4>\n<p>Because of Coal Reuse&#8217;s inability to satisfy their contractual demands, Mr Rickuss revealed\u00a0that Stanwell were presently looking into why the contract had been awarded to them in the first place. &#8220;What I have managed to get out of the Stanwell board is that we now have Minter Ellison looking at the process to ensure proper probity was put in place,&#8221;he said.<\/p>\n<p>A spokeswoman has come forward from Stanwell in an ABC interview responding to the claims of mismanagement in procuring Coal Reuse for the job. She said, &#8220;Stanwell awarded a contract to Coal Reuse in 2014, following a competitive procurement process, which included a comprehensive process of shortlisting and evaluation. As part of this process, Stanwell secured a letter from Coal Reuse&#8217;s accountants confirming that it was capable of achieving the investment required to fulfil its proposed contract with Stanwell.&#8221;<\/p>\n<h4>Ministers for Stanwell are feeling the heat over\u00a0the issue<\/h4>\n<p>But Mr Rickuss believes that responsibility for the poor choice in\u00a0contractor procurement shouldn&#8217;t reside solely with Stanwell. As funding for the government owned power generator is\u00a0managed by Energy Minister Mark Bailey and Treasurer Curtis Pitt, blame should also fall on their shoulders.<\/p>\n<p>Mr Rickuss said, &#8220;I&#8217;m sure the ministers will want to be ready at (budget) estimates (hearings) this year because they will be questioned about this issue, I can guarantee you.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>But apportioning blame still doesn&#8217;t make up for the loss that tax payers and small businesses will have to foot if Stanwell has to meet\u00a0liquidators demands.<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Liquidators are chasing $1.7 million from Queensland taxpayers after the government-owned power company Stanwell Corporation used\u00a0coal ash company Coal Reuse after it was insolvent. Liquidators threaten court action if financial demands aren&#8217;t met While Stanwell continues to deny any knowledge that they were aware Coal Reuse was unable to fulfil its contract, liquidators Rogers Reidy [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":15111,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[7843,6442],"tags":[12753,9898,12759,12760,12758,12755,12756,12754,12757],"yst_prominent_words":[12748,12726,12718,12725,12716,12741,12719,12720,8318,12677,12742,12745,1040,12732,12738,12721,12722,12715,12728,12735],"class_list":["post-15031","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-mining","category-mining-news","tag-coal-ash","tag-coal-mine","tag-coal-reuse","tag-contract","tag-liquidators-threaten-court-action","tag-south-burnett","tag-stanwell-corporation","tag-tarong-power-station","tag-taxpayer"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.machines4u.com.au\/mag\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/15031","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.machines4u.com.au\/mag\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.machines4u.com.au\/mag\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.machines4u.com.au\/mag\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/4"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.machines4u.com.au\/mag\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=15031"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.machines4u.com.au\/mag\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/15031\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.machines4u.com.au\/mag\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/15111"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.machines4u.com.au\/mag\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=15031"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.machines4u.com.au\/mag\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=15031"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.machines4u.com.au\/mag\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=15031"},{"taxonomy":"yst_prominent_words","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.machines4u.com.au\/mag\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/yst_prominent_words?post=15031"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}