Tasmanian Greens - Media Release - AS HYDRO GOES DOWN,TRANSEND GOES UP (FOR SALE?)

AS HYDRO GOES DOWN,TRANSEND GOES UP (FOR SALE?)

The Tasmanian Greens today said that it was clear that the Lennon government was sizing up Transend for sale to offset the cost of a new Royal Hobart Hospital as Minister Llewellyn responded to questioning at today’s GBE hearing
Greens Shadow Energy spokesperson Kim Booth MHA said that the attractively low debt to equity ration of Transend, currently at around 17% compared with an allowable industry standard of 50%, meant that the government might well be also considering transferring a sizeable amount of Hydro debt to Transend.
“In response to the potential sale of Transend the Minister immediately raised the necessity of funding a new hospital so it would appear that even if the ‘For Sale’ sign is not yet up t it looks like the government is preparing to put some or all of this public asset up for sale,” Mr Booth said.
“No doubt Lennon Labor is preparing to spin the line that selling Transend isn’t going back on their promise not to sell ‘the Hydro’ as it is the transmission section of the old conglomerate however that’s just semantics.”
“With Transend having an asset base of around $800 million and investors prepared to pay multiples of around 1.4 when purchasing assets then this might put a market value of around $1.2 billion on Transend.”
“This makes it low hanging fruit for the government to cherry pick and sell as a short sighted option for funding their hospital treasure chest.”
“The Greens already have an unequivocal position of not selling Aurora, Transend or the Hydro to fund any hospital construction as we would prefer the government to consider other strategies for raising the money.”
“Transend is a vital and valuable public asset and the Lennon government must not go down the route of a public asset fire-sale to get themselves out of financial predicaments.”
“Transend is a profitable business in its own right that was built by past generations and will provide dividends to future generations.”
“Premier Lennon’s financial mismanagement from Basslink to Elwick has created this situation and profitable, public assets such as Transend should not be sold off due to the incompetent actions of this present government.”