The brand new Australian Swimming League (ASL), whose inaugural season was slated for 2022, has already hit a bumpy road.
We knew the league delayed its originally scheduled October media blitz due to coronavirus. However, a more serious obstacle has been placed in front of the league prior to its official launch, as one of the ASL‘s principal investors has been convicted of tax fraud.
Per a report appearing in The Sydney Morning Herald (SMH), prominent Melbourne business owner and property investor David Brandi has been sentenced to a two-year jail term after having pleaded guilty to dishonestly obtaining a gain from the Commonwealth. He has also been disqualified from managing a corporation for five years. (SMH)
Regarding the offense to which Brandi pled guilty, they related to a ‘series of false invoices he created in 2010, while doing the accounts for a property developer, to fraudulently claim $135,248.46 from the Australian Taxation Office in GST refunds.’
Brandi then used the funds as loans to property development companies from which he sought a return. (SMH)
Swimming Australia, who originally was said to be working with the ASL in competition development and ongoing partnership, said today, “We have reached out to the ASL regarding recent developments and discussions are ongoing between the two organisations” in light of this legal situation. (SMH)
No information appears on the ASL website concerning this situation and we have reached out to the organization for comment.
First ISL and then this. Not the professional swimming everyone expected.
I mean it kind of is?
Our governing bodies are embarrassingly terrible, of course they will mess this up.
Swimming AUS certainly should’ve done considerably more “due diligence” before jumping into such a venture. As it is, this entire proposition never really looked anywhere near commercially sustainable given a revenue stream that was pie in the sky at best. A nice concept but that’s all …… wish it were otherwise.