Qld minister under fire over A1GP farce

Queensland premier Anna Bligh should immediately sack sports minister Phil Reeves
over his handling of the A1GP debacle, the state opposition says.

The A1GP component of next weekend's Gold Coast SuperGP race meeting was cancelled
on Saturday because of financial problems, with the popular domestic V8 series
expanding its program to fill the gap.
Opposition leader John-Paul Langbroek accused Reeves of lying to parliament, and
said both the sports minister and event chairman Terry Mackenroth, a former deputy
premier, must go.
"The best way to get people coming to the V8 Supercars next weekend is to show the
door to the people who presided over this financial bungle," Langbroek said.
He said international participation in the event was key, and after failing to keep
the Indy series and now the apparent collapse of the A1GP, Queensland's bid to host
the Commonwealth Games on the Gold Coast in 2018 must now be in jeopardy too.
Acting Premier and Treasurer Andrew Fraser said the government funded the weekend of
motor sport to the tune of $11.6 million, of which $1.8 million had been paid to
A1GP.
Legal action to recover the latter payment is now likely despite A1GP chairman Tony
Teixeira stating the money will be repaid, with an additional donation to charity.
"They've said publicly that they will refund that and obviously the state will be
making its efforts to get that money back," Fraser said.
"It's going to be a challenge to recover that money but nevertheless the state will
undertake every effort to do so.
"I think they've (the A1GP administration) behaved disgracefully, unprofessionally
over the last number of days."
He said it is doubtful the A1 category will be invited back to future events.
Instead of its planned two 200km races, the V8 series will now stage four 150km
races - two next Saturday and two next Sunday.
An Australian Legends race was on Sunday also added to the SuperGP roster.
However, the event is set to be a multi-million dollar loss following the open
wheelers' withdrawal.
Ticket and corporate sales have been affected and Gold Coast hotels will also take a
hit, with more than 1,000 rooms booked for A1GP teams and officials that will
reportedly now be empty.
Both the government and opposition have urged people to support the amended program.