Sentence delay for ex-Fortescue boss Nev Power

Businessman Nev Power will have to wait another month to learn his fate over breaches of Western Australia’s Covid border restrictions after a Perth court adjourned his sentencing.

Nev Power. Picture: NCA NewsWire / Damian Shaw

Businessman Nev Power will have to wait another month to learn his fate over breaches of Western Australia’s Covid border restrictions after a Perth court adjourned his sentencing.

Mr Power, a former chief executive of Andrew Forrest’s Fortescue Metals Group and the one-time head of the federal government’s now-defunct National Covid-19 Co-ordination Commission, was scheduled to be sentenced in the Perth Magistrates Court on Thursday morning.

The matter was adjourned after his son Nick - who was also part of the helicopter flight from Queensland to Perth that landed the pair in trouble - was unable to make it to the hearing for reasons not disclosed in open court.

Magistrate Elizabeth Woods said the matter would be adjourned, as Mr Power and his son should be sentenced together.

Mr Power and his son both pleaded guilty earlier this month to charges stemming from their decision to fly one of Mr Power’s helicopters from Queensland back to WA last October.

Neither Mr Power nor his son had completed the G2G pass required for all travellers entering WA at that time.

Ahead of the sentencing, Mr Power quit his chairmanship of Perth Airport and took a leave of absence from his directorships of ASX-listed Strike Energy and APM Human Services International. He quit his role as chairman of the Royal Flying Doctor Service Federation last week.

In the lead-up to Mr Power’s guilty plea, his legal team filed 13 character references - including one from Mr Forrest - as well as a psychologist’s report describing “cognitive distortions” that affect him at times of stress.

Most of those convicted of failing to adhere to WA’s Covid border rules have received fines, with notable exceptions.

Asher Vander Sanden was originally given a six month and one day sentence after she snuck into WA from Victoria in the boot of a car on the back of a truck but later successfully appealed it as manifestly excessive and was resentenced to a six-month community-based order, but spent three weeks behind bars while the matter was considered.

Victorian men Hayden Burbank and Mark Babbage served three months in prison in WA after they travelled there via the Northern Territory to attend the 2021 AFL grand final. And Melbourne man Daniel Jovanovski spent more than three weeks in jail before he was fined $7000 over his attempt to travel into WA for the Grand Final.