The Rhodium debacle was a very Canberra tale.
A group of ACT public servants with delusions of competence convincing the Government to corporatise them and then offer salaries and perks suitable for the world class company they’d like to be. Only instead of using world class salary packages to lure world class personnel they hired themselves.
While they were indeed world class at indulging in lavish perks they failed miserably to grow the business to anything remotely capable of sustaining their level of entitlement.
After the bubble burst on the asset solutions company (mostly car leasing) it’s taken the ACT Government years to clear the brown stuff from the whirling blades.
Today the Canberra Times reports that MAXimus Solutions has trousered a further near $8 million to clean up the mess.
We can hope lessons have been learned from the sad and sorry business. But without much in the way of consequences the real lesson seems to be that the ACT taxpayer is a mug and easily taken for a ride.