NOTES FROM UNDERGROUND

The Old Convent School—How James Best and Graeme Simpson Stitched Us Up Good and Proper

A member of the York Consortium has received advice from a senior Treasury official regarding the purchase of the Old Convent School.

This is the advice as I interpret it.

1.     Treasury has no role in determining whether or not a local government, like the Shire of York, can borrow money.  The Shire’s submission to borrow money is not made to Treasury but to a separate entity independent of Treasury, namely, the WA Treasury Corporation (WATC).

2.     WATC are not interested in the merits of what the local government is planning to do with the money.  Their job is to borrow the funds for the applicant at the lowest possible rate.  In effect, they act as a broker. 

3.     It follows that James Best stitched us up good and proper by arranging in secret to buy the Old Convent School and borrow the money to do it.  The fact that the property probably isn’t worth anything close to what the Shire will now have to pay for it is apparently quite beside the point.  So, it seems, is the fact that this arrogant fellow and his accomplice, Acting CEO Simpson, were too reckless and/or stupid to take the obvious precaution of obtaining a sworn valuation from a licensed land valuer before agreeing on a purchase price.

4.     Is there anything we can do about it?  Not a lot, but we could petition Minister Simpson to object to the transaction on the grounds that the Shire can’t afford it.  On present showing, the Minister and his department seem determined, for inscrutable reasons, to make life as hard as possible for the Shire of York.  Best’s treachery (for that is what it is) would be grist to the Minister’s mill.  (I think a petition is a good idea, but I’m sure the Minister has already decided that James Best can do no wrong.)

5.     The building is heritage listed, so another option might be to write to the Heritage Council seeking a review of the listing, citing its condition and the unsustainable burden the proposed purchase will place on the Shire’s finances.  In doing this, the Treasury man says, ‘It may also be prudent to request the reasons why the building was listed in the first place and who proposed its listing’.  When the building was listed, the Heritage Council may not have known or been informed that there were ‘serious structural issues’ or that there may have been ‘foul play or ulterior motives’ on the part of persons seeking the listing.

Sounds like a job for our elected Council.

Should we roll over and accept the inevitable, as Best, Simpson, Minister Simpson and the Minister’s puppet masters in the DLGC would have us do?  I don’t think so.  Never say die.

Let’s do everything we can think of to overturn this transaction.  All ideas (or ‘ideations’) welcome. 

Meanwhile, we must contemplate the awful possibility that James Best is being groomed for a place alongside Minister Simpson in the state legislature.  As a conservative, I despair for the future of conservatism in Western Australia. 

I’d say it’s firmly in the hands of morally deficient people of mediocre intellect who wear sharp suits and drive Mercedes. 

I don’t see much to hope for in the other mob, either.  They don’t seem to give a damn for the people of York.  If they care, they haven’t shown it or said so.

I have this recurring nightmare that at the next election I shall be left with no alternative but to vote for the Greens.  God help us all.

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"I've never known the York river so choppy at this time of year".