Interim chief Max Donnelly says Parramatta Eels will be fixed but not privatised
The temporary administrator of Parramatta has allayed concerns the club will be privatised, as he prepares to review the sacked board's decision to fight the NRL's sanctions for salary cap rorting.
Max Donnelly of Ferrier Hodgson – the former voluntary administrator of the North Sydney Bears – is again working in the NRL sphere after being tasked by the Independent Liquor and Gaming Authority to bring stability to the club.
Tuesday marked Donnelly's first official day on the job, but it's unclear when will be his last, although he flagged the prospect of his tenure spanning "months rather than weeks". One of the fears of the previous regime was a supposed push to sell off the club, with sacked director Paul Garrard telling Fairfax Media as late as Monday night: "The common thread through all of this has been a very strong privatisation bid."
Former Macquarie Bank executive Bill Moss is a staunch proponent of privatisation, although he has recently stated he had no intention of attempting the deed himself. While there was a feeling any threat may have been less real than imagined, Parramatta Leagues Club members indicated they wanted more say in whether the club would be sold off when the issue was put to them at the most recent annual general meeting.
In theory, the football club could be sold off without member approval, but Donnelly ruled out the prospect of it happening during his watch. "No, it's not on my radar," he said.
Donnelly immediately inherited a number of pressing football matters that have been left to fester while there has been a leadership vacuum at the Eels.
The sanctions against Corey Norman for drugs possession, whether to grant a release to troubled former captain Kieran Foran and the pursuit of Jarryd Hayne were among the many issues raised when he fronted the press for the first time.
But given he had been in the job for only a few hours – he was yet to meet coach Brad Arthur, the players or consultant Ian Schubert – he will require time to apprise himself of the situation. Officials at the Bears, where Donnelly stepped in after the foundation club was forced into an ill-fated joint venture with Manly, believe he is qualified to steer the most dysfunctional franchise in Australian sport out of the mire.
Experienced: Max Donnelly. Photo: Anna Kucera"He is the guy Parramatta need now," said Bears chairman Perry Lopez. "He understands the game, he's got a passion for the game and he is the right guy to ensure Parramatta clean their act up."
Before he turns his attention to football matters, Donnelly will determine whether to rescind the club's appeal against the NRL's penalties of a 12-point deduction and $1million fine.
No plan to privatise Parra: Max Donnelly. Photo: Anna Kucera"If it's going to be pursued, the leagues club is going to fund it," he said. "I don't want to fund something unless I'm comfortable it should be funded.
"What I want to look at is the legal merits of the appeal and get an understanding, a separate opinion, as to whether it is worth funding. So I could effectively stop it."
Donnelly has the power to change the football club's constitution, but will need the support of the members to change that of the leagues club. He foreshadowed a separating of the two boards so the same directors won't sit across both and said the PLC wouldn't revisit its decision to rule out three extraordinary general meeting proposals aimed at installing a new board. He also indicated he would review the money provided to Arthur's football department to ensure leagues club funds are spent prudently.
The man who handled high-profile bankruptcies including those of Christopher Skase, Robert Trimbole, Dr Geoffrey Edelstein and the estate of Lang Hancock said he was unsure whether next year's PLC elections would go ahead as planned.
"I don't know the answer to that. I would expect it, but I don't know," he said.
Replies
Spartan who are you calling trolls and why?
Lets not forget history - we're not saying Max is lying but let's not forget how such scenarios like GST were played out.
Let's have the honest truth, once and for all
By Alan Ramsey
Six years ago, I wrote in this newspaper: "Telling a lie is easier than killing it, even for a prime minister. A lie is a lie, and once it is out on the street no amount of passing traffic can ever truly skittle it. John Howard told a lie on May 2, 1995. Then he told more lies to reinforce the first lie. To protect himself from what he judged a serious threat to his last chance to be prime minister, Howard lied and went on lying. Now, three years later, he is telling still more lies to hide that first lie."
That was the lead to an article published on Saturday, May 30, 1998. I wrote it to show why Howard was a serial liar when it suited his political interests. In recent months, in an increasingly difficult election year, Howard has written twice to the Herald to challenge assertions by me.
His press secretary, at Howard's direction, has written once. All three letters were published, the latest in today's letters column, concerning his wife. Six years ago, when I set out the case history of one of the Prime Minister's more notorious lies, Howard said nothing. Neither did his office. The article went unchallenged.
In May 1995, eight months before the general election in March 1996 that made him prime minister, what Howard lied about was his commitment to a goods and services tax (GST). That was his infamous "never ever" pledge. How it happened, and how Howard ignored his pledge once he'd become prime minister, is open and shut. At a Sydney bankers' lunch, where he spoke about the Keating government's coming budget later that month, Howard referred briefly to John Hewson's losing GST policy in the 1993 election and how "nothing remotely resembling it" would be Coalition policy in the 1996 campaign.
But when a businessman asked why, if a GST was so economically sound, Howard wouldn't again support it, he gave a long answer which included, in part: "... We would occasionally like to win, you know. The fact is the last election was a referendum on the GST. There is no way we can have it as part of our policy for the next election. As to what happens some years in the future, I don't know. But the GST cause was lost in the last election ..."
Every news outlet ignored it except The Australian. It ran a single-column story on its front page next morning, saying Howard had "left open the possibility of the Coalition reconsidering a GST some years in the future". Howard panicked. He'd told the truth in answering the businessman's question. Now he felt he had to lie if he wasn't to sabotage, after 22 years in politics, his last opportunity to be prime minister.
He issued a four-sentence statement saying, "Suggestions I have left open the possibility of a GST are completely wrong. A GST or anything resembling it is no longer Coalition policy. Nor will it be policy at any time in the future. It is completely off the political agenda in Australia." Later that day, confronted by a clamouring press pack, he compounded the lie. Asked if he'd "left the door open for a GST", Howard said: "No. There's no way a GST will ever be part of our policy."
Q: "Never ever?" Howard: "Never ever. It's dead. It was killed by voters at the last election."
Nothing equivocal about that. But 27 months later, in August 1997, less than 18 months after becoming Prime Minister, Howard told the truth by telling more lies. He announced a "great adventure" in tax reform he wanted to "share with the Australian people".
Six months later, we learned the heart and soul of this "adventure" was to be the introduction of a GST. And how did Howard rationalise his "never ever" pledge? He didn't. He simply lied again. Howard told Parliament in April 1998: "I went to the 1996 election saying there would not be a GST in our first term. I go to the coming election saying we are going to reform the tax system ... The Australian public are entitled to be told before an election what a government will do after the election. They do not deserve to be misled. They do not deserve to be deceived."
Nothing could be more bare-faced. Howard lied about the GST before the 1996 campaign. He lied about these lies during the 1998 campaign. He lied about the reasons he took Australia into the Iraq travesty, now such a part of this election. Now we are told by someone at the centre of events that he lied about the children overboard affair.
The central truth is, however grave the charge, that John Howard's prime ministership has been a lie from the outset.
Link: http://www.smh.com.au/articles/2004/08/17/1092508474312.html
And then there is good ole Paul Keating..........
Before March 13, 1993
Paul Keating Debates John Hewson On A Current Affair.
No better than the master.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KtkixGuCwaY
max said one of hes first jobs was go after hayne, today i see max has said hes not sure yet if he can fit hayne under the cap, guess thats why foran still not released by the eels.
guess this will happen sooner then later as foran has walked out on the eels,
So just how many fucked coordinated arseholes does it take to create the shit they eschew as in the shit thrown at our club over the past 12 months or so, particularly this year????
NO GST - NO PRIVATISATION
-
1
-
2
of 2 Next