Government agency threatened with court action for overseeing Kingscliff squalor

A government agency accused of allowing a disabled pensioner to live in squalor faces a deadline to waiver $25,000 in commission fees or face court action.

The kitchen in the Kingscliff home of the late Steven Colley.

A GOVERNMENT agency accused of allowing a disabled pensioner to live in squalor faces a deadline to waiver $25,000 in commission fees or face court action.

The Bulletin yesterday revealed how Steven Colley spent the last months of his life living in a Kingscliff home that fell apart around him.

His body was so decomposed when discovered in July last year that a Coroner could not determine the cause of death.

Kingscliff resident Steven Colley who had a dispute with the NSW Trustee Guardian before his death.

Mr Colley had been in an almost decade long battle to get the NSW Trustee and Guardian to approve repairs to leaking roofs and compensation for excessive water bills at the home inherited from his late father.

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Attwood Marshall Lawyers estate litigation solicitor Lucy McPherson said yesterday the government agency had until Friday week to respond to a request to waiver fees of $25,000.

“If NSW Trustee and Guardian continue to refuse to release the title of the Kingscliff home to the executor, they are unlawfully holding assets funds in trust, and our client will commence legal proceedings against the Government agency in the Supreme Court of NSW,” she said.

A builder inspected the shed at the Kingscliff home of disabled pensioner Steven Colley and recommended it needed replacing.

“It is absurd and insulting in the context of the conduct of the trustee that they have failed to allow the finalisation of the deceased’s estate to his family.

“Our experience is that all NSW Trustee and Guardian offices, in regional NSW and in Sydney, have the same problem — they do not deliver services they are obliged to provide as the State Government.

“They are entrusted to look after the affairs of the young and the disabled and they are failing miserably.”

The NSWTG declined to comment on whether it would waiver the fees and told the Bulletin the estate was being administered by a private executor and trustee.

Attwood Marshall Lawyers Wills and Estate solicitor Debbie Sage in January wrote to the agency saying it was indisputable how its conduct had caused heartache for Mr Colley’s family.

The floor of the Kingscliff home of disabled pensioner Steven Colley.

In an attempt to find closure, the family asked that the fees be waived.

Ms Sage wrote that it was “insulting” for family members to be asked for $25,000 which included a $15,000 commission based on the value of the property despite relatives having to handle the auction and clean-up.

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Ms Sage said the agency had advertised its values as “Integrity, Trust, Service,

Accountability, Respect”.

“There is a myth in the general public that the NSW Trustee and Guardian is to be trusted

because they are a government body. Our continued experience with the NSW Trustee and

Guardian is the opposite,” she told The Bulletin.

“The experience of the deceased in dealing with the NSW Trustee and Guardian during his lifetime was one of distrust, delay, disservice and loss.

“They are a rogue organisation, and there is a need for more stringent policies for disclosure

and transparency of their fees and charges to the public.”