Phil Dowthwaite’s GPH Projects collapsed this month with $2.44m owing to unsecured creditors
More details have emerged about the crash of a Queensland builder who went bust this month after 15 years in the game.
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BIGGER PICTURE
We now have a much clearer understanding about the collapse of a Queensland builder who went bust after 15 years in the game.
You’ll recall that Phil Dowthwaite pulled the plug on his solely-owned company GPH Projects Pty Ltd earlier this month, closing offices in both the Gold Coast and Townsville.
Brisbane-based liquidator Mitchell Herrett, with accounting mob RSM Australia Partners, was exceptionally tight-lipped when we rang for a chat, divulging precisely nothing to us about the firm’s demise.
Phil Dowthwaite’s GPH Projects collapsed this month with $2.44m owing to unsecured creditors
But City Beat has obtained his report to those owed money, which shows the company went down owing $2.44m to unsecured creditors and had just $5784 in the bank at the time.
The tax man is out of pocket and by more than $127,000, while NAB has a secured stake over all the company assets.
It’s unclear how much is owing to employees and what kind of return, if any, creditors can expect.
BLEMISHED RECORD
After launching GPH on the Gold Coast in 2005, Dowthwaite oversaw a wide spectrum of projects, including a Sanctuary Cove spread that sold for $7 million a few years ago.
He expanded to Townsville in 2014, where he worked on several unit developments for now-defunct Blue Sky Alternative Investments and a coastal precinct for the city council.
But a review of a Queensland Building and Construction Commission file reveals that GPH had a rather blemished track record.
It shows that the company was ordered to fix seven structural problems since 2018 but failed to comply with three of those orders last year.
That triggered a number of demerit points on the license, as well as three separate infringement notices carrying fines totalling just over $8,000.
The report also shows that the number and value of jobs GPH completed fluctuated wildly from year to year.
They varied from a high of 166 projects worth $32.8m in 2014-15 to a low of just two projects worth just $50,500 in 2010-11.
Dowthwaite could not be reached for comment on Wednesday.
STRAWBERRY BREW
While the Ekka has become another sad casualty of the pandemic, the show’s iconic strawberry sundaes will still be sold around Brisbane at various pop-ups next month to raise funds for charity.
But there’s a new twist on that effort, with award-winning brewery Stone & Wood surfing in on the action.
The gang down at the Fortitude Valley pub have taken steps to make their very own “strawberry and cream’’ brew, with all sales proceeds set to go to The Common Good, a fundraising arm of The Prince Charles Hospital Foundation.
Common Good boss Michael Hornby and a few of his research associates rocked up to the pub on Wednesday to join head brewer Mick Barnes as he dumped 60kg of fresh strawberries into a big vat to start the process.
They Berliner Weisse-style brew, which will be on sale only between August 12 and 16, has already been dubbed “Strawberry Sundae Kisses’’.
“When the physical Ekka show was cancelled, we kept thinking of the delicious strawberry sundaes and all the money they raise for the Foundation,’’ Barnes said.
“Then we said to ourselves, well, we can’t exactly make ice-cream…but what about beer?’’
Hornby said the sundaes have been a key money-spinner for more than 30 years and he’s keen to have a taste of the latest variation of the classic treat as soon as it’s ready.
“With Ekka cancelled, we’ve had to completely change the way we go about the program so having an amazing effort like this special brew from Stone & Wood is fantastic for us and will make a genuine contribution to life-changing medical research,’’ he said.
Launched in 1986, the Foundation raises more than $5m a year for medical research grants.