Questions raised after mayor charged ratepayers for business course

Canterbury-Bankstown Mayor Khal Asfour claimed on expenses a Masters of Business Administration degree worth $48,000, raising questions about whether he breached the council’s expense policy.

Canterbury-Bankstown Mayor Khal Asfour. Picture: Tim Hunter

Canterbury-Bankstown council Mayor Khal Asfour claimed on expenses a Masters of Business Administration degree worth $48,000, charging it to ratepayers, raising questions about whether he breached the council’s expense policy in 2017.

Documents obtained by The Australian under NSW freedom of information laws reveal Mr Asfour, NSW Labor’s candidate for an eight-year upper house term, began his masters in early 2018, with the council reimbursing him for more than $10,500 for four semesters at Southern Cross University, including textbooks.

Despite the limit for professional development being set for councillors at just $3000, Mr Asfour submitted two separate reimbursement forms totalling more than $5000 – the cost of two semesters of the masters program – in the 2017-18 financial year

The total cost of a five-year online MBA at Southern Cross University is about $48,000. Mr Asfour did not deny expensing the degree back to the council, instead saying he had done “everything required of him” under the council’s policy.

The cap was subsequently changed in the 2018-19 financial year, with the council unanimously voting to lift the limit to $15,000 for mayors, with a councillor allowance for professional development amalgamated with previously separate funds for conferences and seminars.

NSW Labor leader Chris Minns. Picture: AAP Image/Bianca De Marchi

An Office of Local Government spokesman said while mayors were expected to undertake ongoing professional development over the course of their council term, an MBA was not required to be a mayor, nor was one needed to “effectively exercise their functions as mayor”.

“It is not clear on what basis a council would be able to justify to its community the costs of funding the mayor to complete an MBA,” the spokesman said.

Labor leader Chris Minns declined to comment.

One leading Sydney mayor told The Australian the expense was the first time they had heard of a council paying for a mayor’s university degree, saying: “Ratepayers should not be funding an alternative career for you.”

In response to questions from The Australian, Canterbury-Bankstown council declined to say what the total cost of Mr Asfour’s masters had been to the community, nor whether the council had specifically given the green light for the educational expense.

Instead, Mr Asfour said the courses he had undertaken had been of “great benefit … to the council and to the entire city”, taking aim at the “cowardly campaign” being mounted against him.

“It is very clear there is someone out there with an axe to grind against myself and the entire council, and that person needs to be called out,” Mr Asfour said.

Mr Asfour’s MBA was mentioned in the council’s 2018-19 annual report, listed under “training” and alongside the professional development courses of other councillors. Since then, the council has not itemised individual courses, simply labelling the total amount “Training and Study Assistance”.

There has been no mention of Mr Asfour’s degree or its ongoing cost to council since the 2018-19 annual report.

The questions surrounding Mr Asfour’s reimbursement come just weeks after he was the subject of an extraordinary political attack, under parliamentary privilege, from his Labor colleague, Tania Mihailuk.

Ms Mihailuk made a number of allegations, including linking Mr Asfour to corrupt former Labor MP Eddie Obeid.

Mr Asfour strenuously denied the allegations, accusing the Bankstown MP of “sour grapes” and trying to relitigate 10-year old allegations mentioned in her stunning late-night speech because she had been passed over for a spot on the party’s Legislative Council ticket.