Brisbane charity Street Swags has crashed into administration after wrongdoing by founder exposed

A Brisbane charity has collapsed just two months after its award-winning founder was denounced for improperly spending huge amounts of donated money.

Street Swags founder Jean Madden. Picture Annette Dew

STREET SWAGS COLLAPSES

Mortally-wounded Brisbane charity Street Swags has collapsed just two months after its award-winning founder was denounced by a tribunal as a liar and trickster who improperly spent huge amounts of donated money.

The two remaining directors of the charity, which launched in 2005 and provided durable and waterproof sleeping bags to the homeless, appointed Worrells operative Michael Griffin this week as administrator.

Records show it owes nearly $300,000 to creditors, including $84,598 to the tax man for super contributions. Another $151,162 remains outstanding to two law firms, Boss Lawyers and Hopgood Ganim.

Sadly, its only asset is listed as “two sewing machines needing repair work’’ valued at just $500.

Street Swags founder Jean Madden.

Griffin told City Beat on Thursday that a lack of assets and working capital had forced the hand of the directors, formerly Nudgee College teacher Brian O’Reilly and his colleague Adrian De Maria.

“They just reached a point that they’re not going to be able to recover from this,’’ Griffin said.

The first meeting of creditors will be held on April 6. De Maria is listed as the only employee and priority creditor, with a claim lodged for $194,143.

With a “deed of company arrangement’’ unlikely to be proposed as a way to keep things going, Griffin said he will most likely recommend liquidation of the charity, which has already suspended its website and Facebook page.

Neither O’Reilly nor De Maria could be reached for comment.

A SAD ENDING

It’s a sad ending for a worthy cause kicked off by Jean Madden, who was named Queensland Young Australian of the Year in 2010 for her efforts, which have seen more than 50,000 swags handed out.

But Madden was sacked as CEO in May 2016 for allegedly piling up unauthorised expenses and police charged her with fraud two months later over allegations she misappropriated more than $154,000.

Those charged were dropped in late 2019 and Madden, who denied any wrongdoing, then launched an unfair dismissal claim with the Fair Work Commission.

A man with a swag made specifically for homeless people by Street Swags.

That turned out to be an enormous tactical error, with Commissioner Jennifer Hunt handing down a blistering denunciation of Madden in January.

Hunt described the 41-year-old former schoolteacher and mother of two as a “bamboozler’’ whose “appalling conduct’’ may have broken the law.

It emerged that Madden had used $14,400 of the charity’s money to pay her personal lawyer and gave her then-broke boyfriend a $130,000 a year job. He was also handed a $528,000 contract to build cabins for the homeless without board approval.

Given the litany of wrongdoing, Hunt said she was gobsmacked that Madden ever lodged her case.

“It is difficult to understand Ms Madden’s motivation in pursuing this application when the light has been shone on potential criminal conduct that might not have earlier been before the court,” she wrote in her decision.

“Ms Madden is, in my view, a trickster and has the capacity, audacity and gall to have fooled many around her.”

While the charity welcomed the failure of the unfair dismissal action, now-departed director Paul Daly said in January that the negative publicity had decimated the donor base over the past five years.

Madden, who told the court she was now unemployed, could not be contacted.