Source: Taxpayers Union
MBIE freezes taxpayer dollars for billionaire boat race
3 JULY 2020FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
The Ministry of Business, Innovation and Employment (affectionately known as MBIE) has stopped taxpayer payments to the America’s Cup Events Limited (ACE) until its investigation of potential misuse of public money is concluded. This decision has been welcomed by New Zealand Taxpayers’ Union, a long-time critic of public money getting thrown at this elitist and frankly boring event.Union spokesperson on Expensive Hobbies Jordan Williams says: “Stopping taxpayer funding at this time is absolutely the correct course given the seriousness of the allegation swirling around the company. It is hard to have trust in a venture whose main line of defence is that they were the victims of a million-dollar Hungarian bank scam. There are clearly many other issues of finance and management which need to be investigated and it is pleasing to see MBIE taking the potential waste of taxpayers’ money seriously.”“During the investigation it is timely to reflect on whether any taxpayer money should be given to a race between multi-millionaires backed by multi-billion-dollar sponsors like Emirates, Omega and McDonalds. The America’s Cup boasts constantly about being the oldest continuous sporting competition. running since 1851. It is time taxpayers turned off the $136m money tap and let Team New Zealand stand on its own two foils.”“Hopefully this will be the last America’s Cup campaign supported by hard-working taxpayers. Most New Zealanders do not even watch the Cup these days, far less see any return on their involuntary investment in it.”
