Page 2216 - Week 08 - Tuesday, 4 June 2013
Next page . . . . Previous page . . . . Speeches . . . . Contents . . . . Debates(HTML) . . . . PDF . . . . Video
whether emerging artists or professional artists, are well supported, and our investment will continue.
ACTEW Corporation Ltd—executive remuneration
MR SMYTH: My question is to the Chief Minister. Chief Minister, the Canberra Times is quoted as saying yesterday that the ACTEW managing director was paid bonuses of over $1 million in the four years from 2008. When it was announced that the managing director’s salary was only $640,000 per year, you said you did not think that was unreasonable and you were confident that the ACTEW board was acting in the best interests of Canberrans. Chief Minister, where you aware of the $1 million of bonuses being paid to Mr Sullivan since 2008 when you said the salary was not unreasonable? If so, do you stand by that statement? If not, why were you not made aware?
MS GALLAGHER: Based on my understanding of the facts, in 2008, when we published that salary for the first time, he would not have been paid $1 million in bonuses. That is the cumulative impact, as I understand it.
Mr Smyth interjecting—
MS GALLAGHER: You asked me a question of when I said this in 2008 was I aware there was $1 million in bonuses. That is wrong; there was not $1 million in bonuses. But aside from that, the information, as I recall it, included information to the shareholders that there was a $100,000 performance bonus as a component of that $640,000. I think members would be aware that we were informed, I think, on or about 8 March this year that that was a different situation. For the first time I became aware that there was a short-term incentive bonus, a long-term incentive bonus and an additional bonus that was paid for the water security projects, which constituted $334,000 of the $852,000. So, no, the shareholders were not informed in 2008.
MADAM SPEAKER: Supplementary question, Mr Smyth.
MR SMYTH: Chief Minister, what steps have you taken to assure yourself that the million dollars paid in bonuses was justified, given the massive cost blowouts of the Cotter Dam project?
MS GALLAGHER: I have read the contract of employment that the managing director was engaged under, and he entered into those terms in good faith. I have also read the performance assessments that were conducted independently of the board and were submitted to the board, and I have read the board’s consideration of those.
MADAM SPEAKER: A supplementary question, Mr Seselja.
MR SESELJA: Chief Minister, what steps have you taken or will you take to ensure that all aspects of ACTEW remuneration are open and accountable, preferably to the public, or at the very least to yourself as a shareholder?
Next page . . . . Previous page . . . . Speeches . . . . Contents . . . . Debates(HTML) . . . . PDF . . . . Video