The taxpayer-funded Darwin Waterfront Corporation, which was thrust into the public spotlight earlier this year for unresolved governance failures, mismanaged conflicts of interest, and nepotistic hiring practices, ran a record $3.3 million deficit last financial year, while the DWC board’s chair appears to have ignored key recommendations to improve the corporation’s governance, according to its annual report.

The 2024-25 DWC annual report was tabled in Parliament late last month, disclosing the ‘Key Management Personnel’ (KMP) transaction of hiring then-board member Andrew Kirkman’s wife Susan Kirkman for the unadvertised role of chief financial officer in October last year, just six months after Mr Kirkman advocated a pay rise while acting head public servant for his mate and DWC chief executive Alastair Shields, that saw his salary increased for just two days a week worth of work.

The KMP disclosure appears to contradict previous comments made by Mr Shields about the hiring of Ms Kirkman, while the annual report also highlights questionable expenses for “consultants” that nearly tripled in costs over last year for a “masterplan” project that was reportedly completed in 2022.

A public inquiry led by the CLP-controlled Public Accounts Committee into the DWC was held in June, following the NT Independent’s investigative series into alleged misconduct at the Waterfront Corporation involving Chief Minister Lia Finocchiaro’s husband and DWC deputy chief executive Sam Burke, Mr Shields and former board member Mr Kirkman.

But the committee’s narrow terms of reference meant it mostly focused on Mr Burke’s higher duties allowances, which it found no issue with, while not requiring the DWC to produce proper evidence, including audited financials that would show how much Mr Burke was paid for his part-time job and the other jobs he was awarded that were not advertised but paid through the corporation, estimated to be worth hundreds of thousands of dollars.

The inquiry also did not examine other potential conflicts of interest involving Mr Shields and the Kirkmans, nor did it examine Mr Burke’s directorship of a company called Place Leaders Asia Pacific that received public money from the corporation over many years. Chief Minister Lia Finocchiaro has still not explained why she failed to disclose that directorship on her register of members’ interests for two years in breach of the Disclosures Act.

The committee provided recommendations for improved governance at the DWC, including that the Waterfront Corporation bind its hiring practices to the Public Sector Employment and Management Act (PSEMA); publish all conflict of interest registers and meeting minutes; and allocate designated hearing time at Budget Estimates to explain its spending.

But those recommendations appear to have been ignored by DWC board chair Patrick Bellot, who wrote in the annual report that the Public Accounts Committee’s inquiry had merely “reaffirm[ed] our commitment to strong governance and transparency”.

He added the corporation would be “implementing enhanced reporting on our operational efficiencies and cost-sharing arrangements” in order to “further build public confidence”, but there was little evidence of that in the annual report.

There was also no commitment to ensure employment practices follow the PSEMA. The conflict of interest register was not published in the annual report.

Mr Bellot, Mr Shields and Mr Burke have all refused to comment on how much money Place Leaders Asia Pacific received while Mr Burke was a director and what oversights were in place to manage the perceived conflict of interest.

The annual report also failed to acknowledge or explain how the corporation manages the potential conflict of interest for Mr Burke with the DWC leadership’s stated goal of relying on a “critical” new hotel development at the waterfront to provide enhanced income, while the CLP Finocchiaro Government has backed the hotel by changing laws to enable its construction near an Aboriginal sacred site and appointing friends to high profile positions.

The corporation has also repeatedly refused to explain the fringe benefit tax implications of Mr Shields using at least two car spaces at the Waterfront multi-level carpark for his collection of old Mercedes cars for at least five years.

Cost of consultants nearly tripled last financial year for already finished ‘masterplan’

In 2024-25, DWC received $24.6 million in publicly-funded grants from the NT Government. It raised $5.52 million in “self-generated revenue” and $750,000 in “interest revenue”, according to the annual report.

But it spent $33.81 million, leaving a $3.28 million loss for the year, which is up significantly from last financial year’s $250,000 deficit.

The government’s contribution declined by nearly $1 million last financial year.

A large part of the DWC’s costs were for “contractual payments for the Darwin Convention Centre”, which it pays on behalf of the NT Government and claimed consumed 37 per cent of its budget, while property maintenance and buying “goods and services” accounted for a third of all spending, with employee expenses contributing four per cent of total expenditure.

According to the financials, the corporation spent triple the amount of money on “consultants” last financial year compared to the year previous, costing $750,000. Another $51,000 was spent on “training and study” and $1.5 million on marketing and promotion.

The DWC’s board members cost taxpayers $352,000 for 2024-25, according to the financial statement – $42,000 more than the 2023-24 financial year. This continues a long-running trend of paying the majority of board members as private members where it previously was run by public servants with no additional cost to taxpayers.

Notes in the financial statement indicated the high costs of consultants was due to paying Ernst and Young – a company with ties to Mr Shields’s mate and former public servant colleague Michael Tennant – $572,000 to develop a “detailed business case” for the Darwin Waterfront Masterplan that it said will be used to “attract Commonwealth funding”.

However, the DWC’s $200 million masterplan was heralded as nearly finished in 2022, that included a proposed surf park and tropical lagoon for the precinct. The annual report did not explain why the corporation was paying a consultancy company half a million dollars a year to continue work on the masterplan three years after it was released.

The 2024-25 annual report was the first time the corporation publicly disclosed it had hired former DWC chief executive and board member Andrew Kirkman’s wife Susan Kirkman to the role of chief financial officer, while also assigning her to undertake “a review of the corporate structure” that has not been released.

Mr Shields previously claimed that it wasn’t a KMP-related hire, but the annual report shows it was, due to her relationship with Mr Kirkman. The DWC unusually claims the CFO role is not a KMP role, while most other corporations consider a CFO to be a key role.

“Given that the role is not a Key Management Personnel role, the Corporation will not disclose information about an individual’s remuneration,” Mr Shields told the NT Independent in an email on February 18, in which he also claimed not to have a conflict of interest in hiring Susan Kirkman despite working with her for decades in other public service roles and a long-time personal relationship with all of the Kirkmans, including Mr Kirkman’s sister and former head public servant Jodie Ryan.

The annual report claims Susan Kirkman was paid $68,599 in remuneration from October 7, 2024 to March 7, 2025 – a figure Mr Shields previously said could not be released.

Mr Shields and Mr Kirkman threatened to sue the NT Independent in March for reporting on an internal memo that showed Mr Kirkman recommended a $16,000 pay rise for Mr Shields in April 2024, while he was a DWC board member and acting chief executive of the Department of Chief Minister and Cabinet. His wife was hired for the acting CFO role six months later.

Mr Shields and Mr Kirkman denied any wrongdoing.

In August, Ms Finocchiaro ruled out a proper independent investigation into the Darwin Waterfront Corporation despite her serious conflict of interest in the matter.