Fed: Tuckey defends use of ministerial letterhead

AAP General News (Australia)
12-28-2003
Fed: Tuckey defends use of ministerial letterhead

CANBERRA, Dec 28 AAP - Dumped federal minister Wilson Tuckey has defended his use of
ministerial letterhead to demand financial details about a failed company that reportedly
owed his son's business more than $100,000.

Prime Minister John Howard's office today had no comment on the latest controversy
involving Mr Tuckey's use of ministerial letterhead.

The Weekend Australian reported Australian Plantation Timber Ltd owed the son, Michael
Tuckey, a seedling supplier, more than $100,000 when it went into voluntary liquidation
in August 2001, owing $80 million.

The newspaper obtained documents under freedom of information that revealed Mr Tuckey
used his forestry minister letterhead to write to the insolvency managers that month to
glean details.

Mr Tuckey said he had not known his son was among the unsecured creditors who were
owed $10 million.

"I was not aware of their financial situation at the time," Mr Tuckey told ABC television
last night.

"However had I been so, I would have thought my responsibility to the $9.9 million
worth of creditors still required the sort of letter I wrote."

Mr Tuckey received a departmental briefing note on September 1, 2001 which told of
delays in the administration process, the paper said.

The note advised the delays meant many contractors and sub-contractors were owed money
and faced their own problems of insolvency.

Mr Tuckey was dropped to the backbench in September this year after repeated calls
over a month for his resignation over his use of ministerial letterhead in a controversy
surrounding the same son.

Mr Tuckey was forced to apologise for misleading the parliament with his explanation
of why he had used the letterhead to ask the South Australian government to drop a traffic
fine against his son.

Mr Tuckey had explained he had represented his son as a constituent, but later admitted
his son did not live in his West Australian electorate.

AAP rmg/jv/de

KEYWORD: TUCKEY

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