Section:
2.4.1.
Political Donations.
Part:
(a)
An
election was held in October, 1983. Up until then, the National Party
and the Liberal Party had been in government in coalition for
more than 25 years, but that year bitter divisions had arisen.
Bjelke-Petersen was determined to crush his erstwhile associates and
achieve sufficient seats for the National Party to govern alone.
Ultimately, he succeeded after two successful Liberal candidates
defected to the National Party and continued membership of Cabinet in
November after the election. But in the period leading up to the
election, there was need for a concentrated and expensive advertising
campaign. A large amount of money was required.
That
year, the Bundaberg Hospital Board had called tenders for the
construction of the Bundaberg Maternity Hospital
and had received 20
tenders.On
8 September, the Board’s architects recommended a fixed price
tender which had been submitted by Evans
Harch Constructions Pty. Ltd.. One of the other tenders had been
submitted by a member of the Citra
group of companies, and had included rise and fall provisions.
On
13 September, the Board advised the Under Secretary of the Department
of Health that it recommended acceptance
of the Evans Harch tender.On
3 October, the Minister for Health, the Hon. Angelo Pietro Dante
Bertoni, M.L.A., recommended that the
contract be awarded to Evans Harch subject to the approval of the
Department of Works, which was urgently
reviewing the tenders but was expected to endorse the recommendation
of the Board. Cabinet deferred
its decision for a week.
On
the same day, 3 October, Citra gave Lyons $150,000 in cash to be paid
to the National Party.
Lyons
delivered the cash to Sparkes, the President of the National Party
since 1970 and a knight since 1979.
At
the time, Lyons was a trustee of the National Party as well as
Bjelke-Petersen’s principal confidant and a
fund-raiser for the party. Sparkes
said that he had no knowledge of the identity of the donor, although
Lyons said that Sparkes was told
the name on this and on other occasions.
Both
Bjelke-Petersen and Lyons denied that Bjelke-Petersen was told of
this and other donations which Citra
made.
However,
the representative of Citra, whom Lyons knew well, had been
introduced by him to Bjelke-Petersen and, according to Lyons,
from time to time he conveyed the “best wishes” of Citra to
Bjelke-Petersen, who also received advice from Citra “.
. . on certain matters .
.
.”.
On
7 October, Bertoni publicly announced that the contract had been
awarded to Evans Harch.On
10 October, Cabinet had before it a Works Department appraisal
recommending the Evans Harch contract,
and there had been a comment by the then Minister for Works and
Housing, the Hon. Claude Alfred
Wharton, M.L.A., that “fixed price is better”. However, Cabinet
again deferred its decision.
On
17 October, Cabinet determined that officers from the Premier’s,
Treasury, Works and Health Departments should meet to discuss the
evaluation of tenders, and a meeting took place the following day.
The
representative of the
Premier’s Department questioned whether the Evans Harch tender
complied with requirements
which had been specified. Others, including the representative of the
Department of Works,were
then and subsequently consistently of the view that the practice
which had been followed was customary and that it was appropriate for
the contract to be awarded to Evans Harch.
On
23 October, Citra gave Lyons another $100,000
in cash, which was again
passed on to Sparkes.
On
24 October, on Bjelke-Petersen’s oral submission, Cabinet awarded
the contract for the construction of the
Bundaberg Maternity Hospital to Citra.It
has been estimated that the cost of the hospital paid to Citra,
approximately $2,562,000, was $65,000 more
than would have been payable had the Evans Harch tender been
accepted.
The
Bundaberg Hospital Board sought an explanation for the decision to
award the contract to Citra without avail.
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