SHANE FITZGERALD & GM/CEO STRETTON & QVMAG ACCOUNTABILITY & TRANSPARENCY

From: Ray Norman Date: Tuesday, 9 May 2023 at 10:16 pm 

To: Contact Us , Mayor Danny Gibson , Deputy Mayor Matthew Garwood , Councillor George Razay , Councillor Joe Pentridge , Councillor Hugh McKenzie , Councillor Andrea Dawkins , Councillor Andrew Palmer , Councillor Lindi McMahon , Councillor Alan Harris , Councillor Tim Walker , Councillor Susie Cai , Councillor Alex Britton 

RESPONSE TO MR FITZGERALD"S RESPONSE

The City of Launceston administrative wing has turned BUREAUCRATICobfuscation into an ARTform but as it expresses itself at Launceston's Town Hall it something that is highly unlikely to win a BRASSrarzoo in a competition for a cultural grant. 

Asking a question and expecting a straight answer ... for those among us who remember YES MINISTER will remember well the hapless James Hacker asking: Will you give me a straight answer to a straight question? 

Sir Humphrey Appleby: Well, Minister, as long as you are not asking me to resort to crude generalizations and vulgar over-simplifications such as a simple yes or no, I shall do my utmost to oblige.

Albeit well versed in obfuscation and blighted by self belief Town Hall is unlikely 'to cut the mustard' anytime soon.

Mr. Fitzgerald tells us on the record that Council is already provided with financial performance relative to the QVMAG but it is just the case not on the record, and apparently far from fulsome. It is so too for the people who fund the operation as a cost centre. Ratepayers pay a compulsory levy via their rate demand and get obfuscation. They deserve the accountability and transparency relative to the institution's KPIs that Mr Fitzgerald and the GM/CEO, who on the evidence are disinclined to deliver on. Indeed what are they in the absence of a current Strategic Plan?

It is what it is! But why is it so?

Mr. Fitzgerald tells us that once a year is OK relative to the State Govt. and as likely as not he and the GM/CEO will call the Tasmanian Government out for underfunding the QVMAG when the funding it already receives is quite generous. Here, an element of 'obligation' rather than 'obfuscation' would go a very long way toward rewarding the QVMAG's Community of Ownership & Interest for their investment in the institution for well over a century. Indeed, in a 21st C context, what they are being delivered is extraordinarily thin.

Mr. Fitzgerald tells us that the QVMAG already reports to the Councillors who the GM/CEO deems not to be either Governors or Trustees but never in a timely way. The reports such as they are, are concerningly less than fulsome, apparently relying upon Councillors' lack of knowledge in regard to 'musingplace's' appropriate program delivery, research priorities and collection management. 

Currently, the Quarterly Report now due is already eight weeks overdue. On the evidence Councillors are being treated like mushrooms and by extension so too is everybody who delivers the institution with its recurrent funding that many argue might well be better spent elsewhere and that if so, it would deliver more appropriate outcomes.

A year ago the Status Quo was deemed to be unsustainable and nothing has changed in reality. It is time for a dynamic shift and more to the point for a shift well away from the unaccountable and opaque mess that prevails at Town Hall. Sadly, the QVMAG is apparently the fraction that represents the whole at Town Hall.