During Estimates Hearings today Head of Service Kathy Leigh was unable to provide any relevant information that explained how former Labor Minister Gordon Ramsay was selected as CEO of the Cultural Facilities Corporation, beating out 23 other candidates.

Canberra Liberals Leader Elizabeth Lee asked the Head of Service a number of questions about the appointment, many of them taken on notice, including the specific skills Mr Ramsay possessed that ensured he secured the plum role ahead of other candidates.

“There is no doubt this appointment does not pass the pub test,” Ms Lee said.

“It is hard to accept that the CEO whose only previous experience was a Church Minister, Labor Minister for one term and CEO of Alliance for Gambling Reform for six months was the preferred candidate following a national selection process.

“A number of questions were taken on notice, and we look forward to receiving those, but the Canberra community deserves full transparency when it comes to this high profile appointment.”

Ms Lee also asked a number of questions that went unanswered by Ms Leigh regarding the reporting of maladministration, corruption, and fraud under the ACT Public Sector Management act.

Like the Head of Major Projects the day before, Ms Leigh did not answer the question about how many times maladministration, corruption or fraud was reported to her as required under the Act.

“I am very concerned that of 5664 employees who responded to the ACTPS staff survey six per cent of staff indicated they had witnessed corruption,” Ms Lee said.

“The fact that 340 public servants said they had witnessed corruption rings alarm bells; if you extrapolate that representative sample size to the entire ACTPS, that’s 1505 employees who say they have witnessed corruption.

“We have seen a number of recent issues with procurements across the ACTPS including the Campbell Primary Modernisation Project and CIT contracts and looking at these numbers you need to wonder what is not being reported.

“This is very serious, and the Canberra community have every right to be concerned about the culture of secrecy that has been fostered by this Labor-Greens government that has been in power for over 20 years.”

“There are serious questions about the integrity over this government and Canberrans deserve answers,” Ms Lee concluded.