Question – UTAS Borrowing Approvals?
The Hon Meg Webb MLC placed the following Question on Notice on Thursday the 10th of April 2025.
Question on Notice
Thursday, 10 April 2025
I (Ms Webb) tomorrow to ask the Honourable Leader of the Government —
In relation to the request made by the Public Accounts Committee Inquiry into the University of Tasmania (UTAS) Financial Position, to the Treasurer, the Hon Guy Barnett MP, to “provide a full reconciliation between the terms and conditions of UTAS’ $350 million Green Bond borrowing” and the two borrowing approvals issued by the then-Treasurer Peter Gutwein, upon which UTAS relied for that borrowing, and the subsequent response by the Treasurer that UTAS’ “current Bond Program is consistent with the approvals issued in March 2021”; can the Government:
- Confirm there was only one Treasury issued borrowing approval in March 2021 which was for $200 million, not the $350 million or $400 million claimed to be the borrowing limit of UTAS;
- Explain why Treasurer Barnett failed to detail in his response to PAC the November 2019 UTAS’ borrowing approval for $200 million issued in November 2019, on which UTAS must also have had reliance for the Green Bond borrowing;
- Confirm an assertion of compliance or consistency, on the part of the Treasurer, is not the same as demonstrating compliance; and
- Provide “a full reconciliation between the terms and conditions of UTAS’ $350 million Green Bond borrowing” and the terms and conditions of UTAS’ two borrowing approvals, issued in November 2019 and March 2021, for $200 million each?
