Two government water reform chief executives have taken redundancy payouts of $355,000 apiece, while a third has “transitioned” to another water reform job within the Department of internal affairs, now under review.
Jon Lamonte and Colin Crampton both left their posts on December 15 with redundancy packages worth six months' of their $710,000 “establishment chief executive” base salaries. They were each on the job for just 10 months.
Bizarrely, a third chief executive, Vaughan Payne, took up a new post, focused on the last iteration of the labour-era reforms, on December 20, six days after the new Cabinet formally decided to legislate to repeal and replace that plan.
A department spokesman said Payne's new job, regional establishment director, was agreed to in September, before the October 14 election, under the water reform law of the time.
Signing such a contract a few days before the election was wrong. The responsible thing would have been to delay any significant contractural obligations.
David Farrar runs Curia Market Research, a specialist opinion polling and research agency, and the popular Kiwiblog where this article was sourced. He previously worked in the Parliament for eight years, serving two National Party Prime Ministers and three Opposition Leaders.
4 comments:
Everyone who signed off these contracts, unless it was under direct instruction from a government Minister, should be fired (no redundancy) for irresponsible and negligent behaviour and gross wastage of tax-payers money.
That should set a good precedent for other departments about what will and won't be tolerated.
As the recipients of this gross excess of wasted public spending have been named , why are the supposed "public" servants who awarded these contracts not also publicly identified ?
Very bad look for the Coalition - be tough.
Make a token settlement -as a clear lesson to others.
When will these rorts stop?!
I supect that in choosing positions to apply for, the prospect of early termination is now for many an overiding attraction. Can go with a fat cheque and no stigma, however little acheived. Unlike early Oranga Tamariki where non success in an impossible task, and not being brown, leaders were pilloried.
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