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Welcome to Brisbane Times’ Queensland public sector column, Public Circus. This week: Right to Information answers (and questions) from the Redlands, how to move 584 boxes of sensitive docs, plum jobs from City Hall to 1WS, and more.
A still-unresolved question hangs over the most senior appointed job on Brisbane’s bayside: what happened in the closed-doors meeting of Redland councillors on February 3 last year?
After that meeting, then acting (now actual) chief executive Louise Rusan was parachuted in from outside the selection panel shortlist for council’s second crack at filling the $500,000 gig.
Thanks to the magic of Right to Information, we have some heavily redacted answers.
Council policy dictates that all so-called workshops and briefings are recorded – with that footage and an associated transcript held by the office of the chief executive.
Circus used the information-release scheme to seek access to recordings and transcripts from that fateful meeting, and the follow-up a week later where Rusan fronted councillors.
We were initially knocked back entirely by legal services manager Peter Cardiff because the 46 pages and one video found were deemed “not in the public interest” and would reveal personal information about candidates. (We explicitly said we weren’t fussed if those obviously sensitive details were withheld.)
But wait – only one video for two meetings? We filed an internal review of the decision.
When that landed some time later, council’s principal audit and integrity services adviser Kailesh Naidu decided to release what were said to be “minutes taken by a council officer following the interviews of the unsuccessful CEO candidates”.
This is despite the guidelines also dictating formal minutes are not to be taken.
And while these were bizarrely redacted to withhold even councillor’s names, our news reporting on the issue helps fill in the black bars a touch.
The minutes don’t seem to negate any of the concerns raised about how the closed-door vote departs from the public recruitment process, or if there was political interference.
(The council has repeatedly rejected such allegations, insisting proper processes were followed. We don’t suggest otherwise, only that questions have been raised internally and by external figures.)
But we digress.
Contained in the internal review decision was another detail: no recording is said to have been taken of the February 3 meeting “because all councillors and the mayor were present”.
The guidelines certainly don’t place any such qualifications around the recording of the confidential meetings – though council backgrounding since has sought to suggest the guidelines didn’t apply to that type of meeting, and the notes weren’t formal minutes.
So, what does the council formally have to say for itself? A spokesperson reiterated the process was consistent with local government laws.
“The appointment of the current CEO was a decision of Council in a General Meeting held on Wednesday 19 February 2025,” the spinner said in a written response to questions. Helpful.
The recruitment matter is far from the only one being wrangled by the council at present, with leaks galore and mayor Jos Mitchell’s extended leave driving heated online debate among other councillors and political figures.
A pointed submission by Cardiff on behalf of the council to the ongoing parliamentary inquiry into councillor conduct said the council had seen elected figures “avoid accountability” by being absent and suggested those on extended leave be subject to a misconduct probe.
Police union and corruption watchdog discipline blue (again) goes public
The regular appearances of state corruption watchdog figures before their parliamentary oversight committee are almost always worth a watch.
If not for some actual new information, then for the sport of MPs trying to goad Crime and Corruption Commission chair Bruce Barbour into revealing something about any of the agency’s tightly held probes into their political opponents.
Last week, Barbour politely palmed questions around a handful of matters – think “Operation Cranberry” into the torpedoed recruitment of Krispin Hajkowicz as chief health officer, or former parole board president Michael Byrne’s alleged misuse of travel funds – into the private session of the hearing.
Another element emerging from the committee session was a days-long subsequent public tit-for-tat between Barbour and police union president Shane Prior in the paper.
Prior had taken umbrage with Barbour’s apparent “misleading” remarks about ongoing legal matters involving the watchdog’s disagreement with police about how it handles disciplinary matters where officers have unrecorded convictions.
Barbour has issued a rare public statement standing by his words.
More detail emerged on Monday, when a watchdog spokesperson said three of the matters it had initiated in the Queensland Civil and Administrative Tribunal involved officers guilty of domestic violence offences who had not faced disciplinary action by police.
How do you move 584 boxes of sensitive docs? Not in a ute – this time
Another detail from the session also caught Circus’ eye: what was being done with 584 boxes of papers from the mothballed Connolly-Ryan inquiry into the CCC’s predecessor?
Launched in 1996 by the fledgling Borbidge government, the inquiry was shut down by the Supreme Court a year later over a strong case of “ostensible bias” against its chair Peter Connolly.
Connolly had been accused of interfering with an independent probe being conducted for the then-Criminal Justice Commission into a memorandum of understanding between the police union and Coalition.
So it is that the parliament – via the watchdog’s watchdog, Parliamentary Crime and Corruption Commissioner Dr Daniel Morgan – ended up lumped with the load of docs.
“Previously I think Mr [Mitchell] Kunde and somebody from the parliament used a ute to do it [move them],” Morgan said of the efforts from the commissioner’s longstanding principal legal officer to get the trove to a strongroom at the front of Old Parliament House.
A document detailing a request to move them again (back in 2022) noted the records take up “six compactus bays and three locked storage cupboards” and would free up “many additional years’ worth of storage” if relocated.
And relocated they were due to be last Thursday morning. How? Circus feels Morgan’s description of last week’s plans is worth repeating in full.
“Obviously, we were concerned to maintain the integrity of the documents. We literally cannot have them falling off the back of a truck. I made inquiries about an appropriate firm that had the necessary security experience and equipment. This firm has previously acted for the parliament and for the police. They are sensitive. They are not particularly highly secured documents, but we just need to know that the integrity is there that what has been packed is what has been delivered. We will be supervising that. I think we can ensure there will be locks on lots packed.”
Parliamentary Crime and Corruption Commissioner Dr Daniel Morgan
Quizzed by parliament’s crime and corruption committee chair, Ferny Grove Labor MP Mark Furner, about whether the papers were digitised, or whether the shift to the archives at Daisy Hill meant they would be, Morgan said there was “no further step intended”.
Mermaid Beach LNP MP Ray Stevens then also jumped in, curious if this was out of cost concerns and seemingly confused as to why the boxes “which are not important apparently” are being retained but not digitised.
In Morgan’s assessment, he didn’t see any benefit in this “apart from history”, with no one having sought access to them for some time. Kunde put this period at 15 years.
Morgan also noted the “special circumstances” around the inquiry and the subsequent custody of the related documents given to his office.
Special circumstances indeed. And the kind that would probably make for some good (digitised) reading!
Jobs, jobs and more jobs, from City Hall to the Tower of Power
Readers looking for a change of scenery at work, look no further. This week has been a particularly lucrative one for job ads finding their way to the Circus tent. And what jobs they are.
For the administratively minded, there’s an assistant ombudsman gig going over at the Queensland Ombudsman office, responsible for managing the team probing local government matters.
While reporting to the deputy ombudsman, who knows whether still-outgoing big boss Anthony Reilly’s boots will have been filled before applications close next Friday.
Down at City Hall, the Olympic City council is apparently seeking to echo their Los Angeles counterparts by hiring an “international sports diplomacy project manager”.
That role will apparently be responsible for leading a related strategy, luring national Olympic and Paralympic committees, international federations and other groups to town and landing pre-Games training camps, global sporting partnerships and other related events. No pressure.
The headcount-happy Department of Premier and Cabinet are also chasing an executive director of economic policy and director of communication, digital and design.
Matt Dennien is a reporter at Brisbane Times covering state politics, parliament and the public sector. He has previously worked for newspapers in Tasmania and Brisbane community radio station 4ZZZ. Contact him securely on Signal @mattdennien.15Connect via email.From our partners
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