Charity accounts in need of clarity; McInnes buys before he tries

Grace Tame, whose foundation has now lodged its accounts with the Australian Charities and Not-for-profits Commission. Picture: Chris Kidd

The Grace Tame Foundation finally lodged its accounts with the Australian Charities and Not-for-profits Commission on Tuesday, coming in four months late (for a second year running). No shortage of questions now that we’ve taken a glance under the hood.

For starters, the foundation ended FY22 with most of its money still in the bank. Barely anything was spent. The accounts for FY23, however, see the charity with a net loss for the year. Of the $250,000 raised in donations, the bulk of it was spent on survivor legal expenses and psychological support ­payments.

These are noble pursuits. But it marks a sharp and unexpected detour from the Foundation’s purpose as a campaign and ­reform outfit, as stated on its website.

“We work with political and societal leaders and help fund peak bodies to advocate for and drive meaningful change,” the website states. There is no mention, anywhere, of donations being used to fund legal cases or pay for psychological support.

“The Grace Tame Foundation is not a support service,” it says.

The accounts reveal that the foundation paid $107,033 on survivor legal costs to June 2023, with another $66,016 for psychological support. Together they amounted to 70 per cent of the $249,168 the charity raised during the year.

Donors might not know, or mind, that their funding was used in this way, but we can only wonder who might have had their legal fees paid out from these donations. Was it one person or more? We went to the foundation for a response but received no reply.

We also learn from the latest accounts that the spending on psychological support for survivors actually began in 2022, although few people would have known at the time.

It’s because those payments ($15,040) were filed under “campaign expenses” in the P&L for FY22. None of which is to say the foundation hasn’t achieved success in its work. It’s run campaigns to adjust the law and the wording of laws around sexual abuse in multiple states; a separate campaign targeted the Bankruptcy Act so pedophiles couldn’t hide assets in their superannuation (to avoid paying compensation to victims).

If the foundation is pivoting into funding assistance for abuse survivors, then the website remains strangely silent on that purpose.

Good corporate governance demands at least some transparency around this new-found ambition. Donors wouldn’t have a clue what they’re paying for, otherwise.

Meeting the market

Retail guru Mark McInnes bucked the conservative path of selling one’s castle before purchasing another.

Unlucky for him. The newly installed chief executive of Brett Blundy’s BBRC now has something like $55m worth of prestige Toorak real estate on his hands.

Not surprisingly he’s reducing the price on his original pile to get a deal over the line, if only to lighten the burden.

McInnes and wife Lisa signed on the line in February to buy the Clendon road mansion for $36m.

Soon after they listed their nearby home with an indicative price tag between $19.5m and $21m, with the sale to be conducted through an expressions-of-interest campaign.

Alas, on Monday a pragmatic McInnes moved to meet the market and put an asking price on the home of a lesser $18.95m.

Just goes to show: sometimes even the savviest guys in the room take a hit.

Birthday gift

And it looks like Lindsay Fox wasn’t the only person toasting success last Friday during his 87th birthday celebrations at an Essendon Fields Airport hangar. The party was Scottish-themed, again, a riff on last year’s event at the National Gallery of Victoria. Still, fewer people were spotted in Highland garb this time and some had no respect for the dress code at all. Looking at you, Gill McLachlan, Dan Andrews, Dr David Connell and Ciaran Carruthers. (We earlier named Eddie McGuire as one with this rat-pack but it turns out he was wearing a tartan tie!)

Paul Scurrah, CEO of Pacific National, clearly received the memo, turning up in a kilt and enjoying a scotch after receiving a substantial gift from the host that week: the renewal of a hotly contested 10-year logistics contract with Linfox, worth in the order of $1bn, according to industry sources.

Radiologist Dr David Connell arrives at Lindsay Fox’s 87th birthday celebrations. Picture: Wayne Taylor

PacNat went into the bidding with Linfox as the incumbents but faced off against Aurizon, Qube and CTC Logistics. We hear Scurrah received news of Linfox’s decision a day or so before the party, so the celebrations clearly had dual purpose – at least for him.

And it couldn’t have arrived at a better time for the Catherine Livingstone-chaired PacNat, either – just as Scurrah prepares to pitch a large slice of the business, the 50 per cent that’s owned by Global Infrastructure Partners.

Albanese no-show

Meanwhile, Opposition Leader Peter Dutton managed to stay for an hour at the function (no more than what he gave Gina Rinehart for her 70th birthday last month in Perth). Anthony Albanese was a conspicuous no-show, and that’s after sending back an RSVP.

A bad week to be photographed partying, or a line in the sand on partying with billionaires? We’ll see how long it lasts. The Prime Minister did, however, show up at The Alfred Hospital for a ribbon-cutting earlier that day. That was to open the Paula Fox Melanoma and Cancer Centre.