It really didn't take the STATE Labor Party long to go back to their old ways.
It's not only the waste of funds, but the choosing of a candidate that the actual recruitment agency recommended was highly unsuitable.
It's time for Haylen (The puppet of the RTBU) to go, just months into the job.
Premier admits taxpayer funds were wasted on Transport secretary recruitment
NSW Premier says the state government shouldn’t have forked out $125,000 on the recruitment of Josh Murray as the new Transport secretary in NSW.
William Tyson
Daily Telegraph, August 28, 2023 - 11:45AM
https://www.dailytelegraph.com.au/n.../a1f4f5d11200077bdb5e579e73a87951#share-tools
NSW Premier Chris Minns admits the state government shouldn’t have forked out $125,000 of taxpayer funds on a recruitment process that saw former Labor staffer Josh Murray appointed as the new Transport secretary in NSW.
The appointment attracted widespread criticism after government documents tabled to parliament revealed Transport Minister Jo Haylen chose Mr Murray to be her department’s secretary despite an independent evaluation panel finding that he was not the best candidate for the $588,250 per-year job.
It was also revealed Mr Murray spoke to Ms Haylen’s chief of staff Scott Gartrell about the recruitment process before he got the job of Transport for NSW secretary.
“We don’t want to waste any money, any public money when it comes to recruitment of any official and it’s important that we get the right people for the jobs,” Minns said to Ben Fordham on 2GB on Monday.
“In this context, it’s important to lay out the reason for that independent process was to see who will apply from around the world from other jurisdictions, who was running rail operations for example.”
When asked by Fordham if the $125,000 put into the recruitment process was “a waste of money”, Minns conceded and agreed.
“Well given that Mr Murray was appointed to the job obviously we wanted to make sure that we don’t spend that money when we don’t need to,” he said.
“In retrospect it wasn’t required, that’s correct.
“If you know who you want for the position we want to make sure we’re in a position where we can appoint those senior public servants for those difficult jobs.”
Earlier this month Ms Haylen denied accusations she lied about how the state’s Transport boss was recruited.
She said her chief of staff Scott Gartrell “did not tell the independent panel who to interview”.
But the bombshell government documents revealed Mr Gartrell said “Josh Murray should be interviewed” for the $588,250 job as Transport for NSW Secretary.
Ms Haylen said Mr Gartrell “was asked for input … on an initial list of candidates”.
Opposition roads spokeswoman Natalie Ward accused Ms Haylen of telling a “blatant lie”. “Every time the minister opens her mouth the story changes,” Ms Ward said.
“Her statement today that her chief of staff did not tell the panel who to interview is a blatant lie.” Ms Haylen said her chief of staff was “making a suggestion” on who should be interviewed for the job but “it was not up to him”.