Broke Liberals now facing a fine for their late disclosures

Schadenfreude.

It wouldnt surprise me if there is more to come. The Canberra Liberals appear to be a rolling disaster area.

What happened to the disclosure of their enormous debts. Lets hope the electoral commissioner is having a look at that one too.

Would the government level the same penalties against its own agencies for doing similar things? Me thinks not..

The amazing things is that members of the Canberra Liberals have been ringing alarm bells for months about the chaotic administration of the party. Those courageous enough to warn about what was going on were hunted out of the party (Gary Kent) or turfed off the Management Committee (James Daniels and Anne Ryan). Similarly, those who raised these concerns at last month’s AGM were ridiculed.

Even more disturbing are the roles of Liberal Leader and Deputy Leader Jeremy Hanson and Alistair Coe. They quite happily negotiated through the Assembly new electoral disclosure laws that gave the Liberals $160,000 in taxpayers’ funds a year to help comply with these laws. Yet they are also key members of the Canberra Liberals’ Management Committee which has been fined by Phil Green for breaching those very laws. And Hanson and Coe have allowed Young Liberals to stack out branch meetings to replace with Liberal Assembly staffers any branch chairs who dare question the party’s administrative quagmire. Even worse, Hanson now has Tio Faulkner on his staff, the party president at the time of the problematic disclosures.

The other intriguing aspect of this story is the role of the General Secretary of the Canberra Liberals, David Miles Connolly, former Federal MP and High Commissioner to South Africa. It would be interesting to know what he has done to ensure the party complies with the law.