Hawthorn presidential hopeful Andy Gowers has accused outgoing president Jeff Kennett of leaving the club with a $25 million funding black hole for the delayed new Dingley home with “late night tweets” criticising the state government.
Gowers said Kennett’s behaviour had meant the state government had withheld a $15m funding commitment and had deterred wealthy benefactors from contributing a further $10m to the club’s funding for Dingley, leaving Hawthorn with a shortfall of $25 million.
Andy Gowers, right, with 1991 Hawks premiership teammate Gary Ayres. Ayres endorsed Gowers for president at the online rally on Sunday. Credit:Getty Images
Gowers, who is standing with former Andrews government deputy premier James Merlino, said Kennett had damaged the club’s relationship with the state government and cost the club funding.
Gowers said in an online Hawks For Change rally for his presidential push that his campaign opponent and Kennett’s replacement as president, Peter Nankivell, had been Kennett’s vice president for five years and would continue to be Kennett’s proxy as president.
In his first comments to The Age last week launching his campaign for president, Nankivell insisted he was “no Kennett”.
“Let’s start with the facts, the concept of Dingley was committed to when I was still on the board, so five years ago in 2017. We fast-forward to now and there was a recent announcement of Dingley not being ready until 2025, so that is a further delay,” Gowers said.
“We are unfortunately in an environment where inflation is running rampant, construction costs are rising rapidly, labour is hard to get to deliver projects, and we have a Kennett black hole in our Dingley plans in terms of the funding.
Outgoing Hawks president Jeff Kennett.Credit:AFL Photos
“So why is that the case? Every single person listening today would understand that late-night tweets from our outgoing president Jeff Kennett criticising government officials does not help our cause when we look to the state government for funding.
“In addition, I personally know of several prominent Hawthorn people who simply won’t be giving us money for Dingley until the outgoing president and his proxies are out of the club.
“It stands to reason, then, that Jeff Kennett’s hand-picked successor and my opponent, Peter Nankivell, and let’s remember Peter has been Jeff Kennett’s vice president for the past five years, is linked to this issue we are now facing as a club. We should receive funding based on our funding, not on our late night social media activity.”
‘We should receive funding based on our funding, not on our late night social media activity.’
Andy Gowers
Gowers told The Age after the online rally that the club had announced it had been granted $15m in state government funding, but this money was still listed as in “contingency” and had not been released.
“In addition I am advised from a number of club benefactors that the Time to Fly campaign is under-funded by in excess of $10m,” Gowers said.
In the online rally, Gowers strongly criticised the handling of Alastair Clarkson’s removal from the club, committed to spending 100 per cent of the soft cap on football spending, and hiring a full-time general manager of Indigenous affairs.
“The release of the Egan report into our relationship with our First Nations players and staff was, and is, deeply painful and damaging, for everyone involved,” Gowers said, adding that during his previous stint as football director on the board he had no knowledge of the issues raised in the report.
“The contents of that report are shocking, and the issues raised are incredibly complex. At the same time, I’m deeply uncomfortable with the fact that those accused of the allegations have not had the opportunity to speak.
“So I support the AFL’s independent inquiry so that there can be healing for all involved. We can’t be content with being ‘culturally safe’, Hawthorn should be the benchmark, not the bare minimum.
“It’s a very low bar to aim to be culturally safe. Surely, that’s the minimum. We want to be leaders, not doing the minimum.”
“We saw Clarko being treated like a stranger, rather than the successful coach, who guided us out of an era in the footy doldrums, and onto four flags, the most of any coach in our history.
“We tuned in with despair seeing Clarko sitting on one side of a hastily convened, very awkward media conference, and listened to Jeff begin with the words, ‘The board has decided not to renew Alastair’s contract’ and it stirred up a hornets’ nest of emotions.”
Gowers said the timing might have been right for Clarkson to move on, but it was badly handled and lacked respect.
“We watched on in disbelief, and the financial settlement [to Clarkson] has meant that we were
unable to pay the full soft-cap in the football department this year, which hinders our football program,” he said.
Keep up to date with the best AFL coverage in the country. Sign up for the Real Footy newsletter.
