JUST over a week after receiving almost $3 million in a federal government grant, Shoalhaven Starches, a member of the Manildra group of companies, has been fined $107,000 in the Land and Environment Court.
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Shoalhaven Starches was convicted for failing to disclose political donations when making applications to modify a major project approval for works at its Bomaderry operation.
Shoalhaven Starches was convicted in the Land and Environment Court on March 2, for failing to disclose four political donations and fined $107,000.
Shoalhaven Starches pleaded guilty to failing to disclose a total of 12 political donations, totalling $23,355, made by one of its directors to various political parties between January 2013 and February 2016.
Shoalhaven Starches was required by section 147 of the Environmental Planning and Assessment Act 1979 to declare relevant political donations at the time of lodging each of the modification applications.
In his judgment, Justice Tim Moore said although omitting to declare the donations made by its director, Shoalhaven Starches did declare political donations totalling $847,372 when making these applications.
The Manildra Group of companies (which includes Shoalhaven Starches) has changed its internal processes for the reporting of political donations in the future but the court did not agree these changes would sufficiently prevent such failures in the future.
The court has proposed changes for the Manildra Group to consider, noting Shoalhaven Starches had not adopted a company policy that it was inappropriate for the company or its directors to make political donations.
The court also ordered Shoalhaven Starches place and pay for an advertisement in the South Coast Register and Australian Financial Review declaring the outcome over four of the offences as an additional penalty.
As well as having to pay $107,000 in fines imposed by the court, Shoalhaven Starches is also ordered to pay the prosecutor’s costs of $40,000.
The legal requirement to report political donations when making development applications has applied in NSW since October 1, 2008.
Disclosure of political donations is intended to increase transparency and protect the integrity of the land use planning system.
The decision to approve each of the modification applications was made by the Planning Assessment Commission and there was no suggestion made by the prosecutor that these decisions were influenced by the making of any political donation (whether disclosed or not).
On February 21, Shoalhaven Starches was one of 23 local projects across the South Coast to benefit by close to $20 million in grants, under the federal government’s Regional Jobs and Investment Package (RJIP), of which $13.8m were Shoalhaven based.
The company was granted $2.950 million to install and operate advanced robotics and develop logistics and sorting for flour milling to increase flour packing capacity to 50 tonnes per hour.
A spokesperson for the company said Manildra’s donations, including these in question, had always been on the public record.
“This was how the Department of Planning and Environment was able to discover the administrative error on application forms to upgrade existing infrastructure,” the spokesperson said.
“The department cross-referenced the declared donation records with the applications, which related to amendments to previous approvals.
“When the department made Manildra aware of the administrative error, the company co-operated fully with the department throughout the process to rectify the error.
“Manildra has taken corrective steps to ensure these administrative errors do not reoccur.”