Embattled Liberal MP Warren Entsch gave wife $1000 NAIDOC week grant for Indigenous excellence

Warren Entsch gave his non-Indigenous wife’s company a grant from his electorate, which take in most of Qld’s remote Indigenous communities.

Yolonde and Warren Entsch at a fundraising ball. Picture: Sandhya Ram

Liberal MP Warren Entsch gave his non-­Indigenous wife’s private company a $1000 taxpayer-­funded NAIDOC Week grant from his electorate, which takes in most of Queensland’s remote Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander communities.

The Liberal National Party MP for the far north Queensland seat of Leichhardt ­announced $16,420 worth of grants in a press release on ­November 4, 2020, saying the cash had been provided to “help celebrate Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander excellence”.

One of the 11 recipients in Leichhardt selected to receive a slice of the Morrison government’s $1.4m allocation for local organisations across the country to celebrate NAIDOC Week that year was Mr Entsch’s wife Yolonde’s private company, YLE Enterprises, which received $1000.

Ms Entsch was confirmed in March as the LNP candidate for the seat of Cairns, an electorate Opposition Leader David Crisafulli says he must win to claim victory at next year’s state election.

On Tuesday, Mr Crisafulli said he was confident he had the right candidate and described Ms Entsch as a “great humanitarian”.

Ms Entsch did not return calls from The Australian, but in an interview last week Mr Entsch said he wasn’t the decision-maker.

“That wasn’t from me, there was a series of grants that were done for not-for-profits or something or other,” he said. “It wasn’t me that made those decisions.”

Mr Entsch said his wife’s company had done a “sensational job” and put on an “outstanding event” at the Cairns Villa and Leisure Park, which was attended by a “huge number of Indigenous kids and women” who came to celebrate. “What’s the problem with that?” he asked.

Asked whether it was a conflict of interest for his wife’s company to receive a grant from his ­electorate, Mr Entsch said “she got that because of the work she did there”. He later said the grants were assessed and recommended by “a totally independent panel, as would be appropriate”.

“I did, of course, declare my conflict of interest with regards to (YLE’s Empowering Women Empowering Communities) project and my only involvement with the process was to make the announcement,” Mr Entsch said.

Yolonde Entsch kisses her wife Warren as they vote at the 2022 federal election, at which he won the seat of Leichhardt. Picture: Brian Cassey

The latest revelations come after Queensland Health referred allegations to the state’s Crime and Corruption Commission that Mr Entsch had organised for a property developer friend and LNP donor to jump the queue in July 2021 and fly to the Torres Strait to receive a ­Pfizer jab for which he was ineligible.

Mr Entsch – a former Coalition government chief whip – denied there had been a “quid pro quo ­arrangement” between him and Soviet-born businessman Alex Sek­ler, who had made a $13,000 ­donation to the LNP in January 2019 and gave $304,000 to the party for Mr Entsch’s federal election campaign in April 2022.

The Australian also revealed on Tuesday that Ms Entsch received a $213,725 two-year grant from the Morrison government’s Indigenous Languages and Arts program to teach pottery and run a pottery studio in the remote Queensland Aboriginal community of Doomadgee, in the Gulf of Carpentaria, despite Ms Entsch and her pottery teacher friend being non-Indigenous.

Queensland Child Safety Minister Craig Crawford – who is based in Cairns and is the government’s “champion” of the Indigenous community of Doom­adgee – called on Ms Entsch to front up and answer serious questions about the grants.

Ms Entsch did not need to ­declare her relationship with Mr Entsch as part of the grant ­application.

LNP candidate for Cairns, Yolonde Entsch. Picture: Brendan Radke

“I’m the ministerial champion for Doomadgee, I know that community quite well, and one thing I get all the time from remote communities is they are absolutely sick and tired of people coming in from outside, taking money to run programs inside remote communities,” said Mr Crawford, who until May was the minister for Aboriginal and Torres Strait ­Islander partnerships.

“Mrs Entsch is a political candidate so she needs, like me or like any other politician out there, when you put your hat in the ring to run for politics, you have to be accountable, and you have to allow yourself to be scrutinised. She needs to step out, do a press conference, and talk about it.”

Corporate records show Ms Entsch is the sole director, ­secretary and shareholder of YLE Enterprises.

On the Doomadgee grant, Mr Crisafulli threw his support strongly behind Ms Entsch.

“You’re dealing with someone who is Cairns citizen of the year, a humanitarian, someone who has done so much for Indigenous ­communities, has been praised, awarded, supported by the Palas­zczuk government … the only thing that’s changed is she’s put her hand up to serve her community as an elected official,” he said. He accused the Labor Party of running “some sort of whispering campaign” against Ms Entsch now that she was a political ­candidate.

Mr Entsch’s NAIDOC grants press release in November 2020 did not declare any connection with YLE, nor that it was his wife’s company.

In the same announcement, four grants were given to the Queensland Indigenous Family Violence Legal Service Aboriginal Corporation, one was awarded to the Gudjalbara Indigenous Corporation, another to the Torres Shire Council, and three went to local schools.

“We are privileged to have one of the world’s oldest continuous cultures and through NAIDOC events we can share in this proud history and contemplate our ­future,” the veteran MP said in his statement at the time.

On Ms Entsch’s website, she says her organisation, the Women’s Yarning Place, hosted the 2020 event at the Cairns Villa and Leisure Park. “This event received an ­incredible amount of community support and it is hoped that this will become an annual event,” she wrote.

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