Qld LNP wants Trad ‘extortion’ probe
Trad has told miners she won’t raise coal royalties for three years if they volunteer to put $70 million into a new regional infrastructure fund.
Opposition leader Deb Frecklington wrote to the Crime and Corruption Commission, saying the circumstances ‘may constitute an offence of extortion under section 415 of the Criminal Code 1899’. Frecklington says the deputy premier’s proposal is essentially a $70 million ransom note. ‘This is extortion, it is blackmail, no matter how you look at it’. ‘This is a shakedown of the resources industry…’.
Premier Palaszczuk said the fund was just another way to help resource-based communities and there was nothing particularly unusual about it. ‘I don’t think the deputy premier or the government has done anything wrong there. It is a voluntary scheme’, she told reporters in Bundaberg.
Source: Western Magazine
Right. So it’s voluntary but if you don’t donate, they’ll raise the royalties. That’s known as ‘extortion’.
Queensland Treasurer Jackie Trad referred to the CCC
A spokeswoman for Ms Trad, who is also the Deputy Premier, said the Opposition’s referral was a cheap political move and would waste the CCC’s time.
Source: Queensland Country Life
So the CCC has a lot of other work?