Now, the Great Barrier Reef is the Shane Warne of natural wonders.
Loved by Australians
famous around the world and bleach to within an inch of its life.
But fortunately this year the federal government came to the rescue -
of the reef. Warnies too far gone.
With the federal budget just over a week away the Turnbull government has pledged half a
billion dollars to help preserve the Great Barrier Reef.
This is the single largest investment in reef restoration and management in
Australia's history.
Yes! Environmental Power move. Nice one Frodo Money Baggins
So who do we give this single largest investment to? Do we give it to the
government's own Great Barrier Reef Marine Park Authority with its hundreds
of employees and decades of experience or the experts at the CSIRO they could
probably invent us a whole new reef. Who got the cash?
The Turnbull government announced it would give the little-known Great Barrier Reef foundation four
hundred and forty four million dollars to improve the health of the reef with
only six full-time staff and ties to big resources companies the donation was
done without a legal tender which has raised questions
Now in fairness they actually had nine full-time employees when they got the money but don't let
that distract you from the real issue here - which is that's barely enough
people to run a taco truck. That's about fifty million dollars per employee
That's a lot of salsa!
Now they must have made one hell of an application for all that funding.
Yeah. No wonder you were surprised. Normally to win the lotto you at least have to buy a ticket first.
So why, why these guys? Or to put it in a more Leigh Salesy way -
How do we know that for the use of this money, which is an enormous investment in the reef
how do we know that they are the best organisation to spend half a billion dollars?
Well that's because that's the judgment when we took as government.
But what why wouldn't you put that to a competitive tender?
Because they were clearly the best, the best team to do it.
So to summarize, how do we know they're the best?
Because we chose them.
why did we choose them?
Ah, because they're the best.
So there was no tender, the foundation didn't ask for the money. There must have
been some reason they went with these guys.
Well we chose the most appropriate
organization to partner with to leverage off the private sectors philanthropic efforts.
Oh I think we all admire their leverage. I mean they leveraged half a
billion dollars from you without even asking for it. And look at the foundation
Chairman's panel they've got representatives from AGL, BHP, Orica, Rio Tinto, Shell
a whole bunch of experts in leveraging profits for fossil fuel companies.
But whatever, as long as we can all agree and be clear on the biggest
threat to the reef.
I've always said the biggest threat to the reef is climate change.
There is no doubt that the number one threat to the Great Barrier Reef and
in fact coral reefs around the world is climate change.
Yeah well, I guess its hard to strategically view anything over the top of that massive pile of money.
So, all that questions have been answered
oh except for where is all their money and what are you actually going to do
with it?
No, sure they're taking more care in deciding how to spend that money than the government did. Kudos
But while they're trying to work out what to do with a half a billion dollars
they didn't ask for - how's the reef going?
A new report is saying the Great Barrier
Reef has suffered a catastrophic die off after marine heat waves killed much of
its coral in recent years and researchers at Australia's James Cook
University say it's unlikely to ever recover.
In the meantime the foundation is still inviting donations at its website.
Alternatively you could just keep paying tax.
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