Government saved face by cutting off head
WHAT COST GOOLENGOOK?
CROEG obtained documents under Freedom of Information (FOI), which shows tax payers helped fund the 5th March 2002 Goolengook raid and logging operation to the tune of over $1.5 million. Royalties gained from logs were estimated to be between $70 – 110,000.
Police costs included:
- Staff overtime $143,054
- Travel costs while in EG $2,082 (paid for by NRE)
- Accommodation $38,648 (paid for by NRE)
- Catering/food $11,418 (paid for by NRE)
- Satellite radio and mobile phone costs $328
They did not include: planning in the lead up, expense of taking staff from other duties, equipment hire or maintenance, training, office and admin costs, getting police to East Gippsland and so on.
This equals $195,202, which seems remarkably cheap considering it was a six week operation.
NRE costs included:
- Employee Related expenses : $1,084,476
- Other expenses $317,333
This did not include:media monitoring, legal expenses for prosecutions, training, and so on.
The items they included came to $1,401,809. We’re unsure if police costs were included with NRE costs supplied to us.
The cost of policing the Otways and Wombat forest protests could have doubled this figure. All for a handful of socially questionable jobs and to maintain a relationship with the union and overseas traders.