Bernardo Fraser Monday:
It was an innoccuous mention on some late page of the Mercury last week … but surely it is a dark angel heralding bad, bad news. the report said:
THE Motor Accident Insurance Board has been hit hard by turmoil in world financial markets, suffering an investment loss of $95 million. The loss in investment follows four years of double and triple digit returns, during which the MAIB was one of the strongest performing Government Business Enterprises. Taking into account revenues from premiums, of $118 million, the final operating result after tax was a loss of $22.6 million, down on a $113 million profit in 2006-07 and $96 million in 2005/06. Despite the massive loss, the dividend paid to the State Government last financial year was $43 million, along with a special dividend of $10 million. Just $22 million was paid in 2006/07.
Which begs the question. What about all the other Government Business Enterprise investments; particularly that of the Hydro, already infamous for its botched handling of Basslink and associated hedge fund investment, as forensically examined by former Sunday Tasmanian investigative journalist Simon Bevilacqua The energy disaster
