WEST Australian Premier Colin Barnett’s bureaucrats have held...

WEST Australian Premier Colin Barnett’s bureaucrats have held meetings with associates of controversial Sydney entrepreneur Roland Frank Bleyer as part of Padbury Mining’s bid to win backing for a botched $6.5 billion plan to revive the Oakajee port and rail project.
The revelation that senior West Australian public servants held seven meetings with both Padbury Mining and Mr Bleyer’s associates between April 2013 and April 2014 shows that Mr Barnett’s office was being regularly briefed on the plan to revive Oakajee, which is aimed at opening up iron ore mining in the state’s Mid-West region.
Mr Barnett, who has championed the Oakajee project for years without success, said in April that he had never met Padbury to discuss its plan — which has since been abandoned — and knew little about it. He later distanced himself from the company when Mr Bleyer’s colourful life and history of failed business deals was revealed.
Mr Barnett has now confirmed to the West Australian parliament that three of the most senior executives in his Department of State Development met Padbury chief executive Gary Stokes, along with Mr Bleyer’s associates Ken Grimmond and Jeff Perrey, on numerous occasions.
Mr Grimmond and Mr Perrey are directors of Alliance Super Holdings, which is owned by Mr Bleyer’s Superkite.
Alliance and Superkite were the entities that promised to stump up the $6.5bn needed for Padbury to build Oakajee. Padbury told the ASX on April 11 that 100 per cent of the funding had been secured and negotiations with the state government were under way to finalise development agreements.
The four meetings with the Department of State Development took place between April last year and February and involved director-general Stephen Wood, then deputy director-general Gail McGowan and the department’s Oakajee executive director, Brett Sadler.
In separate talks, Mr Barnett’s resources adviser, former Woodside Petroleum executive Geoff Wedgwood, and another senior adviser, John Hammond, met Mr Stokes and Padbury chairman Terry Quinn on three occasions. Those meetings took place on January 9, March 13 and April 2 in the lead-up to Padbury’s April 11 announcement that it had secured funding.
Mr Barnett told parliament Padbury had given his bureaucrats an outline of its plan to develop port and rail infrastructure in the Mid-West as well as updates on its development plans and funding, though not on the source of the funding.
Labor leader Mark McGowan said yesterday Mr Barnett’s staff would surely have briefed him on Padbury’s plans.
“It’s unthinkable that the Premier was not aware of the negotiations taking place,” he said.
Padbury terminated the funding deal last month after being unable to secure evidence that Mr Bleyer’s companies had the capacity to find the money.
Many were sceptical that a company with a market value of less than $70 million would ever be able to build a project worth $6.5bn. The announcement sparked scrutiny of Mr Bleyer’s past business dealings amid revelations of a string of failed business deals as well as civil and criminal cases that have been brought against him in the US.
Padbury later admitted it would have still have had to find 20 per cent of the funding package. The company is now the subject of an investigation by the Australian Securities and Investments Commission for allegedly misleading the market. Padbury investors are also briefing class action law firm ACA Lawyers in readiness for possible litigation.
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http://www.theaustralian.com.au/bus...adbury-meetings/story-e6frg9df-1226951229244#