I see the PGDB have got it wrong again. The Info Brief Word from the Chair states Wal Gordon, on behalf of the PGDF had laid a complaint with the Charities Commission which has lead tothe Board receiving notice that it is to be deregistered as a Charity. Shame on Mr Bickers for getting a basic fact such as this wrong. Whom ever is informing him needs to be talked to. My understanding is that Mr Gordon did not lay the Complaint with the Charities Commission at all. It is interesting to see the Board Chair state that the current Board members do not know the historical background as to how the Board became a registered Charity - you'd think with all the outside help they get from barristers, solicitors and KPMG that they might have asked them how they qualified for this status wouldn't you, given that they rush to sign the form necessary to keep current and are shown as officers for the Charity. Who do you know that signs things such as this without knowing what it means?
The Board may see no possible advantage for tradespeople in them losing their charitable status, and oh how it tugs at my heart strings that they are so concerned. I don't see any possible advantage for tradespeople "buying points" to stay licensed either. I guess we all just have to live with what is dished up to us. The Board is meant to be, I believe, a not for profit organisation, so why have they accumulated such a profit in the last licensing year? And what is the unexpected revenue they got last year that put them in surplus - they never outlined that at the recent consultation meeting on fees reviews despite being asked at the meeting I attended - anyone with any iota of a brain knows where the surplus came from - unexpended disciplinary levies and offences fees - you know all that money you paid for that specific purpose that never got used for that specific purpose. And the promise of the surplus offsetting fees in coming years - bullshit - they've never done it yet and they were busy telling us they need to have "reserves" to last four to six months - with the Minister's approval. We don't need fees offset in years to come, we need it now. AND did anyone get told that the 2012/2013 fees were going down with the surplus accumulated from last year - no way - in fact we got told the opposite, so why should we believe them when they tell us this now?
Tell us Mr Bickers where this unexpected revenue came from? And tell us what cost cutting you did? And tell us what cost cutting you are going to do? The PGDF didn't write the rules for the Charities Commission - they are what they are - and if someone has complained and now they are being enforced, well it seems to me you are just getting some of your own medicine back. Don't you tell us you that you are there simply to enforce the Act - you don't write it - well there you go this scenario is very similar.
Don't try to blame the Federation for your problems, be brave enough to say that you have been working the system and diddling the taxpayers of NZ for years. Surely the minister must be losing confidence in this Board who keep making blunder after blunder after blunder. And you even admit spending $24k in legal costs responding to the Charities Commission inquiries. Shame on you!
I haven't heard any rumours of Board members or staff receiving some form of tax free perks through the Board's charitable status - and thanks for telling us that is quite simply untrue. I also hadn't heard the rumours that it was illegal for the Board to make a surplus - what I had heard is that you should be budgeting for expenditure, you shouldn't be accruing huge surpluses and that the disciplinary levy money and the offences fee money should be used for what they are collected for and NOTHING else. Memorandum accounts will no doubt sort that out and will tell us for how many years you have been misusing the disciplinary levy to prop up other expenditure.
Linkback: https://www.plumbers.nz/rant-or-rave/5/pgdb-october-info-brief/1276/
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Topic: PGDB October Info Brief (Read 5307 times)
August 23, 2011, 09:16:25 PM