07-26-2017, 07:39 PM
(This post was last modified: 07-26-2017, 07:51 PM by thorn bird.)
An Airports tail....or how many ways can you screw an Industry.
Lets have a look at this entirely fictitious story.......or is it?
A certain prime minister decided one day that instead of borrowing money on the "books" if he flogged off the airports he was in effect creating an artificial debt, on someone else's books and the aviation Industry would pay the interest.
A Murky Mandarin and his Mandarin mate Beaker were charged with setting up this fraud on the Australian People and they solicited a Murky Bank to set things up.
Bankstown Airports as an airport was not worth much, but it was owned by the Australian public and paid a modest return to the taxpayers. As realestate however it was worth billions. It was an inconvenience that a small industry relied on that airport for its existence, but no matter, the same Murky Mandarin controlled the entity that controlled the industry so regulating it out of existence was not too hard, just time consuming.
A deal was struck and the Murky bank picked up realestate potentially worth Billions for a couple of hundred Million.
So Far so good, they very neatly avoided paying the NSW Guvmint any stamp duty on any of the transactions, allegedly about thirty Million or so, and interestingly all the state Documents connected to the airport disappeared from the State archives.
Not long after a premier resigned to take up a post as a director on the Murky Banks board, allegedly where turning up for board meetings was optional, then somehow ended up with a farm in New Zealand at the end of it all. Nice work if you can get it.
Another inconvenience was the Airport Act which required Secondary Airports to be reserved for Aviation Use. The head lease for the airports in fact required ALL airport infrastructure, i.e. runways and taxiways be maintained in their original condition at the time of lease signing.
Literally overnight rents and charges at the airport went up by thousands of a percent, driving most of the industry off what had been their airport.
Over time as the Industry that had once thrived at the airport diminished to a shadow of its former self as insidious over regulation drove up costs and massive increases in charges made operating there untenable.
The airport head lease holder, with the blessing of the Murky Mandarin, set about quietly subverting the intention of the Airport Act and the terms of their lease, shutting taxi ways and a whole runway, then dumping thousands of ton's of contaminated fill on already contaminated flood plain on the Southern side to facilitate the development of DFO factories by an equally Murky development shark, even writing their own EPA approval on Commonwealth letter head to head off any green objections.
Good things come to them that wait.
The end game is rapidly approaching.
Badgery's Creek is now in development. The existing runways at Bankstown will be unable to accomodate IFR traffic as Badgery Creek traffic management plans would preclude an IFR approach to Bankstown from the West, same to the East with Mascot in the way. The only chance for IFR operations at Bankstown would have been on the North South runway, now buried under thousands of ton's of contaminated waste busily leaching into the Georges river. A runway closed contrary to the Airport Act and contrary to the lease signed.
I doubt K would give odds on Bankstown surviving as an Airport for another ten years.
One has to wonder what Murky's reward will be, a few years on directors fees and a free farm somehow doesn't seem enough for handing such a prize to a Murky Bank.
Lets have a look at this entirely fictitious story.......or is it?
A certain prime minister decided one day that instead of borrowing money on the "books" if he flogged off the airports he was in effect creating an artificial debt, on someone else's books and the aviation Industry would pay the interest.
A Murky Mandarin and his Mandarin mate Beaker were charged with setting up this fraud on the Australian People and they solicited a Murky Bank to set things up.
Bankstown Airports as an airport was not worth much, but it was owned by the Australian public and paid a modest return to the taxpayers. As realestate however it was worth billions. It was an inconvenience that a small industry relied on that airport for its existence, but no matter, the same Murky Mandarin controlled the entity that controlled the industry so regulating it out of existence was not too hard, just time consuming.
A deal was struck and the Murky bank picked up realestate potentially worth Billions for a couple of hundred Million.
So Far so good, they very neatly avoided paying the NSW Guvmint any stamp duty on any of the transactions, allegedly about thirty Million or so, and interestingly all the state Documents connected to the airport disappeared from the State archives.
Not long after a premier resigned to take up a post as a director on the Murky Banks board, allegedly where turning up for board meetings was optional, then somehow ended up with a farm in New Zealand at the end of it all. Nice work if you can get it.
Another inconvenience was the Airport Act which required Secondary Airports to be reserved for Aviation Use. The head lease for the airports in fact required ALL airport infrastructure, i.e. runways and taxiways be maintained in their original condition at the time of lease signing.
Literally overnight rents and charges at the airport went up by thousands of a percent, driving most of the industry off what had been their airport.
Over time as the Industry that had once thrived at the airport diminished to a shadow of its former self as insidious over regulation drove up costs and massive increases in charges made operating there untenable.
The airport head lease holder, with the blessing of the Murky Mandarin, set about quietly subverting the intention of the Airport Act and the terms of their lease, shutting taxi ways and a whole runway, then dumping thousands of ton's of contaminated fill on already contaminated flood plain on the Southern side to facilitate the development of DFO factories by an equally Murky development shark, even writing their own EPA approval on Commonwealth letter head to head off any green objections.
Good things come to them that wait.
The end game is rapidly approaching.
Badgery's Creek is now in development. The existing runways at Bankstown will be unable to accomodate IFR traffic as Badgery Creek traffic management plans would preclude an IFR approach to Bankstown from the West, same to the East with Mascot in the way. The only chance for IFR operations at Bankstown would have been on the North South runway, now buried under thousands of ton's of contaminated waste busily leaching into the Georges river. A runway closed contrary to the Airport Act and contrary to the lease signed.
I doubt K would give odds on Bankstown surviving as an Airport for another ten years.
One has to wonder what Murky's reward will be, a few years on directors fees and a free farm somehow doesn't seem enough for handing such a prize to a Murky Bank.