Bundaberg council votes against refusing free tickets to sponsored events
Bundaberg councillors have been asked to vote on whether or not they should accept free tickets - some worth $500 each - to ratepayer-sponsored sporting events. This is how they responded:
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A proposal that Bundaberg councillors should not accept complimentary tickets to events sponsored by ratepayer funds was overturned on Tuesday.
The question of whether it was ethical for councillors to accept free tickets to ratepayer-sponsored events came to a head in Tuesday’s Bundaberg Regional Council when councillor Vince Habermann tabled a motion for council to allocate $12,000 towards sponsoring the Netball Queensland Primary Schools Cup in Bundaberg in September 2024.
Councillor Greg Barnes proposed an amendment including a resolution that the council should decline complimentary tickets to this event as part of any sponsorship arrangement using ratepayer funds.
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While the Primary Schools Cup is free entry, Mr Barnes said he believed there should be a general policy of council refusing complimentary tickets to any event sponsored using ratepayers funds.
“It just seems to me that … for us to sponsor events using ratepayer funds, and then individual councillors to receive VIP seats or free admission … to that event raises a number of questions and I really don’t know whether it would withstand the pub test,” Mr Barnes said.
Mr Barnes said he was “quite uncomfortable” with accepting complimentary tickets in his capacity as a councillor, and had donated tickets to previous events to members of the public to avoid the ethical dilemma.
“I just think that in the public eye, it’s incumbent on us to be quite open about it and just say we’re not going to take it,” he said.
“And if we are offered free tickets that we should thank the donor, and just make it clear that the council does not work in that manner.”
Other councillors spoke against Mr Barnes’ amendment, saying it was irrelevant to the motion at hand since it was a free event.
“(The Primary Schools Cup) has been going for many years and it’s free admission,” Mr Habermann said.
“This amendment is totally irrelevant to this particular event, so I oppose it.”
Councillor Steve Cooper concurred, saying “it’s silly and would be rude of us not to attend under invitation to an official opening”.
Mr Barnes reiterated that his amendment was intended for events “where there was an admission charge or charge for VIP admission”.
“If there’s a potential gain for any particular councillor then I think that we should refuse it,” he said.
Mr Barnes’ amendment was defeated, with all councillors apart from himself and Mr Honor voting against it.
The original motion to sponsor the Primary Schools Cup event was passed, with only Tanya McLaughlin against.
Under council’s gifts and benefit policy, all council employees are bound not to accept gifts that may be seen to influence the decision-making of the employee in the donor’s favour.
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The CEO and councillors are required to list any gifts of value greater than $500 in their register of interests within 10 days of receiving them.
Councillors Bartels, Habermann and Cooper have listed VIP tickets to the Bulldogs NRL game at Salter Oval in July in their register of gifts valued at $500 or more.
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