Strategic Airlines
Was looking at some hard copies of the old posts on the former SA thread before it was pulled and noticed one of the protagonists is now banned. Was wanting to send him a PM but can that still be done to someone who is banned or will it bounce back?
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I think you might need more than $50 for that lawsuit shell has against heavylift.
Try a multiple of 10000 and you should get close.
Try a multiple of 10000 and you should get close.
Shall be an interesting week this week one would think.
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VCJ seems to be a lost soul and the only one supporting SA now. Where has evilC (where's my mirror) gone?
Last edited by witwiw; 31st Aug 2010 at 05:28. Reason: spelling
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So without being nasty as I do feel for the staff affected but where does this leave Strategic in the future. The loss of revenues from the ADF contract must be a severe blow, the possible loss of Solomons,JB stating he won't be using them for Virgins work, Norfolk government staying with OA and there contact in NLK JB suffering a severe loss in the courts re his appeals to stay financial. I hope Port Hedland and Bali are performing or they have some new work commencing or SA's prediction about laying off staff may come true.
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I know this has been posted elsewhere however I believe it has far more relevance here
Congratulations to the clever indivdual at Strategic who decided it would be a good idea to use the media to wage a war that could not be won. 
You would have to expect the odds of Strategic ever securing any government work from now on would be extremely long.
Defence bidders had inside help
Richard Baker
September 2, 2010
TENS of millions of dollars in Australian government aviation contracts have been awarded to companies that secured their bids with inside information about tenders provided by senior public servants.
Confidential emails obtained by The Age reveal two Defence Department officers working in the unit responsible for a $30-million-a-year contract to fly Australian troops to the Middle East were providing information during the tender process to the company later declared the winner.
The two Defence officials, Army Reserve captain and aviation consultant David Charlton and army warrant officer John Davies, were then given senior management jobs by the 2005 contract winner, Strategic Aviation, which has provided the troop flights to Kuwait since then.
The Age has also received allegations from well-placed sources that public servants in another government department have leaked commercial information to an aviation firm allowing it to undercut rival bids to win lucrative contracts.
In a series of emails written during the 2005 Defence tender process, Strategic Aviation directors refer to being ''fed'' information by Mr Charlton, and to Mr Davies being ''very handy to get information to us''.
At that time, the pair were working in Defence's Joint Movements Group, the unit responsible for troop deployment and overseeing the Middle East flight tender process.
In one case, Mr Davies used his official Defence email to send a document to a Strategic Aviation director in February 2005, well before the tender process had closed.
He also sent an email from his private account to the same director titled ''007'' and addressed to ''Mr Bond''. Other emails show Strategic Aviation directors discussing information provided by Mr Charlton and Mr Davies about key tender dates and Defence's preferred aircraft for the Middle East flights.
''I turned on the phone and Dave Charlton was just itching at the bit to tell me we have seven days to prepare this work. Short timeframe which I really do believe is favourable to our needs,'' wrote director Shaun Aisen in a March 2005 email.
A Strategic Aviation business plan written shortly after the firm was founded in early 2005 lists Mr Davies as its manager. He was he working in Defence's Joint Movements Group at this time.
Mr Charlton joined Strategic Aviation as general manager on a $174,800 job package, according to his December 2005 employment contract. By 2007, he had left to set up his SkyAirWorld airline venture and Mr Davies followed him to take up a senior management role.
Mr Davies yesterday denied any role in the 2005 Middle East tender and said he had informed superiors in Defence that he intended to take a job with Strategic Aviation.
He could not explain why directors had written he would be ''handy'' in getting information for them during the tender period. Mr Charlton could not be contacted.
In a statement, Strategic Aviation said it was in regular dialogue with members of the Defence unit responsible for troop movements in 2005.
''We have no regrets about the interaction with Mr Charlton and Mr Davies. At all times we have acted ethically,'' it said.
''In both cases, we made direct contact with [Defence], advised them of our intentions to recruit these individuals and received no objections.''
The revelation of the confidential emails comes a week after Defence cleared this year's Middle East aviation tender process of any irregularities, following allegations information had been leaked by Mr Charlton - who was back working in the Joint Movements Group after the $93 million collapse of his private airline last year - to winning firm Adagold Aviation.
The complaint was lodged by Strategic Aviation after losing the lucrative contract it held for five years. But Defence's chief audit executive, Geoffrey Brown, found no wrongdoing by the department, Adagold or Mr Charlton, despite his placement in the Joint Movements Group and Adagold consultancy role.
''The probity audit found no evidence that Mr David Charlton had any involvement in, or influence on, the Request for Tender or tender evaluation process … Mr Charlton immediately and appropriately, declared a potential conflict of interest noting his civilian employment as an airline industry consultant,'' Mr Brown wrote.
However, internal Adagold Aviation emails obtained by The Age reveal concern about its close ties to Mr Charlton - who worked with the company to win a 2008 Danish military contract - being publicly exposed.
In an email, an Adagold director told staff that if journalists called and asked for Mr Charlton, they were to say ''no David Charlton works for Adagold - nothing more''.
The Denmark contract has also been subject to a complaint by a Danish aviation firm that missed out on the contract. A member of the Danish Parliament's defence committee, Jens Lund, recently declared he would like to reopen an investigation into Adagold's contract to explore Mr Charlton's role.
Both the Defence Department and Adagold have declined to comment.
Greens leader Bob Brown said he was concerned by the Defence revelations. ''These are extremely serious allegations which warrant a parliamentary inquiry as soon as the next government is established,'' he said.
''They also indicate new rules to be required of people entering and leaving the public service to ensure there isn't a lucrative revolving door with the private sector that is against the public interest.''
Former Defence secretary Paul Barratt said public service guidelines were meant to ensure officials involved in tender processes did not take jobs with winning firms.
Richard Baker
September 2, 2010
TENS of millions of dollars in Australian government aviation contracts have been awarded to companies that secured their bids with inside information about tenders provided by senior public servants.
Confidential emails obtained by The Age reveal two Defence Department officers working in the unit responsible for a $30-million-a-year contract to fly Australian troops to the Middle East were providing information during the tender process to the company later declared the winner.
The two Defence officials, Army Reserve captain and aviation consultant David Charlton and army warrant officer John Davies, were then given senior management jobs by the 2005 contract winner, Strategic Aviation, which has provided the troop flights to Kuwait since then.
The Age has also received allegations from well-placed sources that public servants in another government department have leaked commercial information to an aviation firm allowing it to undercut rival bids to win lucrative contracts.
In a series of emails written during the 2005 Defence tender process, Strategic Aviation directors refer to being ''fed'' information by Mr Charlton, and to Mr Davies being ''very handy to get information to us''.
At that time, the pair were working in Defence's Joint Movements Group, the unit responsible for troop deployment and overseeing the Middle East flight tender process.
In one case, Mr Davies used his official Defence email to send a document to a Strategic Aviation director in February 2005, well before the tender process had closed.
He also sent an email from his private account to the same director titled ''007'' and addressed to ''Mr Bond''. Other emails show Strategic Aviation directors discussing information provided by Mr Charlton and Mr Davies about key tender dates and Defence's preferred aircraft for the Middle East flights.
''I turned on the phone and Dave Charlton was just itching at the bit to tell me we have seven days to prepare this work. Short timeframe which I really do believe is favourable to our needs,'' wrote director Shaun Aisen in a March 2005 email.
A Strategic Aviation business plan written shortly after the firm was founded in early 2005 lists Mr Davies as its manager. He was he working in Defence's Joint Movements Group at this time.
Mr Charlton joined Strategic Aviation as general manager on a $174,800 job package, according to his December 2005 employment contract. By 2007, he had left to set up his SkyAirWorld airline venture and Mr Davies followed him to take up a senior management role.
Mr Davies yesterday denied any role in the 2005 Middle East tender and said he had informed superiors in Defence that he intended to take a job with Strategic Aviation.
He could not explain why directors had written he would be ''handy'' in getting information for them during the tender period. Mr Charlton could not be contacted.
In a statement, Strategic Aviation said it was in regular dialogue with members of the Defence unit responsible for troop movements in 2005.
''We have no regrets about the interaction with Mr Charlton and Mr Davies. At all times we have acted ethically,'' it said.
''In both cases, we made direct contact with [Defence], advised them of our intentions to recruit these individuals and received no objections.''
The revelation of the confidential emails comes a week after Defence cleared this year's Middle East aviation tender process of any irregularities, following allegations information had been leaked by Mr Charlton - who was back working in the Joint Movements Group after the $93 million collapse of his private airline last year - to winning firm Adagold Aviation.
The complaint was lodged by Strategic Aviation after losing the lucrative contract it held for five years. But Defence's chief audit executive, Geoffrey Brown, found no wrongdoing by the department, Adagold or Mr Charlton, despite his placement in the Joint Movements Group and Adagold consultancy role.
''The probity audit found no evidence that Mr David Charlton had any involvement in, or influence on, the Request for Tender or tender evaluation process … Mr Charlton immediately and appropriately, declared a potential conflict of interest noting his civilian employment as an airline industry consultant,'' Mr Brown wrote.
However, internal Adagold Aviation emails obtained by The Age reveal concern about its close ties to Mr Charlton - who worked with the company to win a 2008 Danish military contract - being publicly exposed.
In an email, an Adagold director told staff that if journalists called and asked for Mr Charlton, they were to say ''no David Charlton works for Adagold - nothing more''.
The Denmark contract has also been subject to a complaint by a Danish aviation firm that missed out on the contract. A member of the Danish Parliament's defence committee, Jens Lund, recently declared he would like to reopen an investigation into Adagold's contract to explore Mr Charlton's role.
Both the Defence Department and Adagold have declined to comment.
Greens leader Bob Brown said he was concerned by the Defence revelations. ''These are extremely serious allegations which warrant a parliamentary inquiry as soon as the next government is established,'' he said.
''They also indicate new rules to be required of people entering and leaving the public service to ensure there isn't a lucrative revolving door with the private sector that is against the public interest.''
Former Defence secretary Paul Barratt said public service guidelines were meant to ensure officials involved in tender processes did not take jobs with winning firms.
You would have to expect the odds of Strategic ever securing any government work from now on would be extremely long.
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Defence bidders had inside help
I can't believe SA were SO stupid as to cry foul when they should have known their own involvement in such deeds would be discovered eventually.
What direction is the coriolis effect in W.A?
I can't believe SA were SO stupid as to cry foul when they should have known their own involvement in such deeds would be discovered eventually.
What direction is the coriolis effect in W.A?
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Some more light reading
Some good emails they have secured here...
The sky's the limit
Richard Baker
September 2, 2010
Ads by Google
Australian tender writer Professional tender preparation
WHEN his private airline collapsed last year with $93 million in debts, entrepreneur and army reservist David Charlton found refuge within the Defence Department's Joint Movements Group, the unit responsible for deploying Australian troops overseas.
His return to Defence coincided with the time the department was tendering for the lucrative contract to fly 6000 troops to Kuwait City, before their deployment to Iraq and Afghanistan.
In 2005, the last time Charlton worked in the group, the contract was also up for grabs. Not surprisingly, Charlton is a man aviation companies seeking the Defence contracts have wanted to know.
Advertisement: Story continues below
An investigation by The Age has uncovered emails linking Charlton and another Joint Movements Group figure, former army warrant officer John Davies, to the directors of Strategic Aviation - the company which that year won the contract to fly troops to the Middle East - during the 2005 tender process.
The emails show the Strategic directors referring to being ''fed'' information by Charlton and Davies about the tender process they would end up winning.
''The A330 will be good as Defence are ramping up to a bigger force. David has indicated that the tender will start on the 9th of May,'' wrote Michael James in an email to Strategic co-director Shaun Aisen on February 23, 2005.
''I don't think [competitor] Tadros is being fed too much just the same as David has told us. But this is where John is very handy to get the information for us.''
That same day, Davies sent Strategic's James an email from his Defence email address that showed he was stationed at the Joint Movements Group headquarters at the time. A week later, Davies sent James another email, this time from his private account. The email was titled ''007'' and addressed to a ''Mr Bond''.
It is clear from this and other emails that Strategic was getting some inside information from Charlton and Davies about the Middle East tender that would later earn it tens of millions of dollars over the next five years.
There is little doubt the tender process was compromised by the relationship between Charlton and Davies and Strategic Aviation. But making matters more serious is the fact that later in 2005 both men ended up being employed by Strategic in senior management roles.
Moving forward five years to this year's Middle East troop flight tender, Defence found itself in a similar predicament. Charlton was back in the Joint Movements Group and once again had a relationship with the company that won the contract, Strategic's bitter rival, Adagold Aviation.
In effect, Charlton had switched sides. Since 2008 Charlton had been acting as a consultant to, and prospective business partner of, Adagold. Indeed, The Age has obtained documents showing Charlton was in Denmark in 2008 accompanying Adagold executives in talks with Danish military officials about a contract to fly their troops to Afghanistan.
When Strategic's directors this year learned the Defence Department wanted Adagold to fly its troops to the Middle East instead of their firm, they leapt on the presence of Charlton in the Joint Movements Group and pointed to his consultancy role with Adagold, and Strategic lodged an official complaint alleging leaking of information to Adagold about the 2010 tender.
Last week, a Defence audit cleared the department, Adagold and Charlton of any wrongdoing. In fact, Defence auditors praised Charlton for pointing out his conflict of interest with Adagold and then excluding himself from any area remotely related to the Middle East tender process.
But despite Defence's absolution of all involved, many questions remain about its decision to accept David Charlton back into the Joint Movements Group in the first place and also about the findings of the recent audit.
As for Strategic's loss of its most lucrative contract, one prominent Australian aviation figure says: ''It's the old adage about people in glass houses.''
THERE are many millions to be made flying Australian troops to war overseas, federal ministers to the outback and asylum seekers to detention centres.
In 2007 Adagold, winner of the most recent Middle East troop flight contract, flew Guantanamo Bay detainee David Hicks back to Australia on a chartered Gulfstream jet at a cost to taxpayers of $578,000.
In recent years the Brisbane-based aviation broker, which finds aircraft to suit the needs of clients, has organised a large proportion of federal Immigration Department flights to transport asylum seekers to detention centres. The contracts have been worth more than $10 million.
It has also provided VIP flights to the Department of Prime Minister and Cabinet, taking ministers and senior public servants across the country.
Given the huge sums of money at stake, the competition among aviation brokers and airline companies to land taxpayer-funded contracts is fierce and alliances between the relatively small number of players involved in the Australian industry change all time.
''You are always looking over your shoulder to see whether your rival is trying to stitch you up,'' says one airline director.
Both Adagold and Strategic have experience in being dudded by their own. In 2005, Strategic director Michael James was secretly working to establish the company with partner Shaun Aisen while he was on the books as a senior consultant with Adagold.
Corporate records show Strategic Aviation was founded in January 2005. It was a new name given to an old company associated with Aisen since 1993. According to Strategic's business plan, its mission was to become the leading aviation contractor to the Australian Defence Force.
It got off to a flying start by winning the 2005 Middle East flight tender - getting some help from inside the Defence Department through Charlton and Davies along the way.
But as Strategic's business plan made clear, the road ahead was tough. The company had entered a field occupied by operators who, like Strategic, ''have realised that the government contracts are the biggest aviation charter contracts in the industry.''
To outsiders, the ethics of Michael James working for Adagold in 2005 - in a role where he knew so much about what it would offer to Defence to hold on to its Middle East transport contract - while secretly setting up a rival firm that would wrest the contract from Adagold are highly questionable.
Here is what he wrote to Strategic co-director Shaun Aisen in March 2005: ''I have set myself up to leave Adagold if required, my only concern is that if I write Adagold's tender it may cause troubles for us later on.
''This is why I have set myself up, I can stay with Adagold up until almost completion of the tender so I know what they have but I don't want to really put us in a position that Adagold goes complaining to Defence about our actions.''
But to those familiar with the often incestuous nature of the relatively small Australian aviation industry, James's actions ultimately proved to be good business. Strategic has had the Middle East troop contract for the past five years and the multimillion-dollar fees from the government that went with it.
Strategic yesterday said James had a non-exclusive role with Adagold and was free to pursue other opportunities.
But like its rival Adagold, Strategic also experienced betrayal from the inside. The cosy relationship that formed in 2005 between Defence officers Charlton and Davies and Strategic turned sour in 2006-07.
Strategic was in the process of setting up a deal to operate a commercial airline service to the Solomon Islands. Charlton, as the firm's general manager, was heavily involved in the negotiations.
But he also had designs on setting up his own airline and believed that he could offer the Solomon Islands a better service than Strategic.
So in 2007 Charlton established SkyAirWorld and set about stitching up a deal with the Solomon Islands government. John Davies followed him, leaving Strategic to become SkyAirWorld's business development manager.
WHAT is clear from the tumultuous and fiercely competitive world of aviation contractors is that the operators who survive long-term need to be street smart and tough.
In the case of Adagold, its founder, Mark Warren Clark, showed his strength by winning a series of hotly contested South African Defence Department contracts through his company, Adagold Africa. His business partners in Adagold Africa, which later became Adajet, included Lawrence Pietersen, a former South African intelligence officer.
Between 2004 and 2006, Adagold Africa won several South African defence contracts despite being found to be the highest bidder. One of Adagold's most contentious South African contracts was to fly ballot papers for elections in the Democratic Republic of Congo. The company won the tender even though it charged $1.3 million more than rival bidders.
In 2006 Adagold's African arm became embroiled in legal action in the Pretoria High Court after a company also directed by Adagold's Pietersen was accused by a rival of receiving beneficial treatment from South African defence officials.
The Pretoria High Court granted an interdict preventing South Africa's defence department from proceeding with Pietersen's Ibhubesi Trading, with the court finding the country's defence secretary, January Boy Masilela unfairly influenced the decision of his department's procurement committee. Ibhubesi and Adagold reportedly shared offices in South Africa.
In its recent complaint to the Australian Defence Department, Strategic Aviation highlighted Adagold's past controversies in South Africa as something Defence officials should take into consideration when awarding the Middle East troop flight contract.
However, Defence's chief audit executive, Geoffrey Brown, said there was no evidence to support allegations of tender irregularities involving Adagold in South Africa. Moreover, he said Defence did not consider the South African matters relevant to Australia because Mark Clark and another Australian Adagold director involved in South Africa severed ties with their South African partners in ''early 2007''.
What Brown does not address in his response to Strategic's complaint is the fact that most of Adagold's tender controversies in South Africa occurred between 2004 and 2006 - a time when Australian Adagold directors, including Clark, were on the board of the South African company.
Brown's assertion that Clark severed ties with his African business colleagues in ''early 2007'' is also misleading. South African company searches show Clark was still a member of the South African company's board in 2007.
Adagold director Stuart Lee declined to answer questions from The Age. So did the Australian Defence department.
Strategic Aviation defended its interactions with Davies and Charlton during the 2005 tender and said it advised Defence of its intention to recruit the pair. ''At all times we have acted ethically,'' Strategic said in a statement.
Davies denied any role in Defence's 2005 Middle East tender, but when confronted with his emails to Strategic, he conceded that ''it might not look great in hindsight''.
And what about the man at the centre of it all, the enigmatic 36-year-old Charlton? Well, he is uncontactable. He is understood to have moved house in Brisbane since the collapse of his business last year. Also, staff at Brisbane liquidator P. A. Lucas & Co refused to disclose the email address they use to contact Charlton.
But Charlton will have to appear publicly later this year when liquidator Peter Lucas will grill him in public examinations over allegedly trading while insolvent and uncommercial deals associated with the $93 million collapse of SkyAirWorld.
Among his 420 unsecured creditors is the federal government, which amazingly gave SkyAirWorld a $2.2 million payment to subsidise flights from Perth to Christmas Island and the Cocos Islands in January last year. Tickets were sold but no flights took place.
The level of due diligence done by the government regarding the SkyAirWorld contract is questionable given the company grounded aircraft and sacked 40 staff just weeks after winning the $2.2 million tender.
A few weeks later SkyAirWorld was in receivership and Charlton, who claims to have lost $10 million in the process, was soon back inside the Defence Department and working in the unit handling the latest Middle East aviation tender process.
As one of his former business associates remarked this week, ''David is a true soldier of fortune.''
Richard Baker
September 2, 2010
Ads by Google
Australian tender writer Professional tender preparation
WHEN his private airline collapsed last year with $93 million in debts, entrepreneur and army reservist David Charlton found refuge within the Defence Department's Joint Movements Group, the unit responsible for deploying Australian troops overseas.
His return to Defence coincided with the time the department was tendering for the lucrative contract to fly 6000 troops to Kuwait City, before their deployment to Iraq and Afghanistan.
In 2005, the last time Charlton worked in the group, the contract was also up for grabs. Not surprisingly, Charlton is a man aviation companies seeking the Defence contracts have wanted to know.
Advertisement: Story continues below
An investigation by The Age has uncovered emails linking Charlton and another Joint Movements Group figure, former army warrant officer John Davies, to the directors of Strategic Aviation - the company which that year won the contract to fly troops to the Middle East - during the 2005 tender process.
The emails show the Strategic directors referring to being ''fed'' information by Charlton and Davies about the tender process they would end up winning.
''The A330 will be good as Defence are ramping up to a bigger force. David has indicated that the tender will start on the 9th of May,'' wrote Michael James in an email to Strategic co-director Shaun Aisen on February 23, 2005.
''I don't think [competitor] Tadros is being fed too much just the same as David has told us. But this is where John is very handy to get the information for us.''
That same day, Davies sent Strategic's James an email from his Defence email address that showed he was stationed at the Joint Movements Group headquarters at the time. A week later, Davies sent James another email, this time from his private account. The email was titled ''007'' and addressed to a ''Mr Bond''.
It is clear from this and other emails that Strategic was getting some inside information from Charlton and Davies about the Middle East tender that would later earn it tens of millions of dollars over the next five years.
There is little doubt the tender process was compromised by the relationship between Charlton and Davies and Strategic Aviation. But making matters more serious is the fact that later in 2005 both men ended up being employed by Strategic in senior management roles.
Moving forward five years to this year's Middle East troop flight tender, Defence found itself in a similar predicament. Charlton was back in the Joint Movements Group and once again had a relationship with the company that won the contract, Strategic's bitter rival, Adagold Aviation.
In effect, Charlton had switched sides. Since 2008 Charlton had been acting as a consultant to, and prospective business partner of, Adagold. Indeed, The Age has obtained documents showing Charlton was in Denmark in 2008 accompanying Adagold executives in talks with Danish military officials about a contract to fly their troops to Afghanistan.
When Strategic's directors this year learned the Defence Department wanted Adagold to fly its troops to the Middle East instead of their firm, they leapt on the presence of Charlton in the Joint Movements Group and pointed to his consultancy role with Adagold, and Strategic lodged an official complaint alleging leaking of information to Adagold about the 2010 tender.
Last week, a Defence audit cleared the department, Adagold and Charlton of any wrongdoing. In fact, Defence auditors praised Charlton for pointing out his conflict of interest with Adagold and then excluding himself from any area remotely related to the Middle East tender process.
But despite Defence's absolution of all involved, many questions remain about its decision to accept David Charlton back into the Joint Movements Group in the first place and also about the findings of the recent audit.
As for Strategic's loss of its most lucrative contract, one prominent Australian aviation figure says: ''It's the old adage about people in glass houses.''
THERE are many millions to be made flying Australian troops to war overseas, federal ministers to the outback and asylum seekers to detention centres.
In 2007 Adagold, winner of the most recent Middle East troop flight contract, flew Guantanamo Bay detainee David Hicks back to Australia on a chartered Gulfstream jet at a cost to taxpayers of $578,000.
In recent years the Brisbane-based aviation broker, which finds aircraft to suit the needs of clients, has organised a large proportion of federal Immigration Department flights to transport asylum seekers to detention centres. The contracts have been worth more than $10 million.
It has also provided VIP flights to the Department of Prime Minister and Cabinet, taking ministers and senior public servants across the country.
Given the huge sums of money at stake, the competition among aviation brokers and airline companies to land taxpayer-funded contracts is fierce and alliances between the relatively small number of players involved in the Australian industry change all time.
''You are always looking over your shoulder to see whether your rival is trying to stitch you up,'' says one airline director.
Both Adagold and Strategic have experience in being dudded by their own. In 2005, Strategic director Michael James was secretly working to establish the company with partner Shaun Aisen while he was on the books as a senior consultant with Adagold.
Corporate records show Strategic Aviation was founded in January 2005. It was a new name given to an old company associated with Aisen since 1993. According to Strategic's business plan, its mission was to become the leading aviation contractor to the Australian Defence Force.
It got off to a flying start by winning the 2005 Middle East flight tender - getting some help from inside the Defence Department through Charlton and Davies along the way.
But as Strategic's business plan made clear, the road ahead was tough. The company had entered a field occupied by operators who, like Strategic, ''have realised that the government contracts are the biggest aviation charter contracts in the industry.''
To outsiders, the ethics of Michael James working for Adagold in 2005 - in a role where he knew so much about what it would offer to Defence to hold on to its Middle East transport contract - while secretly setting up a rival firm that would wrest the contract from Adagold are highly questionable.
Here is what he wrote to Strategic co-director Shaun Aisen in March 2005: ''I have set myself up to leave Adagold if required, my only concern is that if I write Adagold's tender it may cause troubles for us later on.
''This is why I have set myself up, I can stay with Adagold up until almost completion of the tender so I know what they have but I don't want to really put us in a position that Adagold goes complaining to Defence about our actions.''
But to those familiar with the often incestuous nature of the relatively small Australian aviation industry, James's actions ultimately proved to be good business. Strategic has had the Middle East troop contract for the past five years and the multimillion-dollar fees from the government that went with it.
Strategic yesterday said James had a non-exclusive role with Adagold and was free to pursue other opportunities.
But like its rival Adagold, Strategic also experienced betrayal from the inside. The cosy relationship that formed in 2005 between Defence officers Charlton and Davies and Strategic turned sour in 2006-07.
Strategic was in the process of setting up a deal to operate a commercial airline service to the Solomon Islands. Charlton, as the firm's general manager, was heavily involved in the negotiations.
But he also had designs on setting up his own airline and believed that he could offer the Solomon Islands a better service than Strategic.
So in 2007 Charlton established SkyAirWorld and set about stitching up a deal with the Solomon Islands government. John Davies followed him, leaving Strategic to become SkyAirWorld's business development manager.
WHAT is clear from the tumultuous and fiercely competitive world of aviation contractors is that the operators who survive long-term need to be street smart and tough.
In the case of Adagold, its founder, Mark Warren Clark, showed his strength by winning a series of hotly contested South African Defence Department contracts through his company, Adagold Africa. His business partners in Adagold Africa, which later became Adajet, included Lawrence Pietersen, a former South African intelligence officer.
Between 2004 and 2006, Adagold Africa won several South African defence contracts despite being found to be the highest bidder. One of Adagold's most contentious South African contracts was to fly ballot papers for elections in the Democratic Republic of Congo. The company won the tender even though it charged $1.3 million more than rival bidders.
In 2006 Adagold's African arm became embroiled in legal action in the Pretoria High Court after a company also directed by Adagold's Pietersen was accused by a rival of receiving beneficial treatment from South African defence officials.
The Pretoria High Court granted an interdict preventing South Africa's defence department from proceeding with Pietersen's Ibhubesi Trading, with the court finding the country's defence secretary, January Boy Masilela unfairly influenced the decision of his department's procurement committee. Ibhubesi and Adagold reportedly shared offices in South Africa.
In its recent complaint to the Australian Defence Department, Strategic Aviation highlighted Adagold's past controversies in South Africa as something Defence officials should take into consideration when awarding the Middle East troop flight contract.
However, Defence's chief audit executive, Geoffrey Brown, said there was no evidence to support allegations of tender irregularities involving Adagold in South Africa. Moreover, he said Defence did not consider the South African matters relevant to Australia because Mark Clark and another Australian Adagold director involved in South Africa severed ties with their South African partners in ''early 2007''.
What Brown does not address in his response to Strategic's complaint is the fact that most of Adagold's tender controversies in South Africa occurred between 2004 and 2006 - a time when Australian Adagold directors, including Clark, were on the board of the South African company.
Brown's assertion that Clark severed ties with his African business colleagues in ''early 2007'' is also misleading. South African company searches show Clark was still a member of the South African company's board in 2007.
Adagold director Stuart Lee declined to answer questions from The Age. So did the Australian Defence department.
Strategic Aviation defended its interactions with Davies and Charlton during the 2005 tender and said it advised Defence of its intention to recruit the pair. ''At all times we have acted ethically,'' Strategic said in a statement.
Davies denied any role in Defence's 2005 Middle East tender, but when confronted with his emails to Strategic, he conceded that ''it might not look great in hindsight''.
And what about the man at the centre of it all, the enigmatic 36-year-old Charlton? Well, he is uncontactable. He is understood to have moved house in Brisbane since the collapse of his business last year. Also, staff at Brisbane liquidator P. A. Lucas & Co refused to disclose the email address they use to contact Charlton.
But Charlton will have to appear publicly later this year when liquidator Peter Lucas will grill him in public examinations over allegedly trading while insolvent and uncommercial deals associated with the $93 million collapse of SkyAirWorld.
Among his 420 unsecured creditors is the federal government, which amazingly gave SkyAirWorld a $2.2 million payment to subsidise flights from Perth to Christmas Island and the Cocos Islands in January last year. Tickets were sold but no flights took place.
The level of due diligence done by the government regarding the SkyAirWorld contract is questionable given the company grounded aircraft and sacked 40 staff just weeks after winning the $2.2 million tender.
A few weeks later SkyAirWorld was in receivership and Charlton, who claims to have lost $10 million in the process, was soon back inside the Defence Department and working in the unit handling the latest Middle East aviation tender process.
As one of his former business associates remarked this week, ''David is a true soldier of fortune.''
so, their eggs are no longer all in the one basket, half of them are over their faces, now!!!
If their growth plans are being handled by the same characters that decided on the pursuit of Adagold - well, it'll possibly all be over soon.
If their growth plans are being handled by the same characters that decided on the pursuit of Adagold - well, it'll possibly all be over soon.
Join Date: Mar 2002
Location: Adelaide
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Finally a journalist that has put both sides stories together. Both should be excluded.
And as for the Defence investigation. What a whitewash. Talk about put spin on their own investigation. If someone quits due to conflict of interest after the tender is let then that conflict exists into the future. Follow that up with the wrong conclusion on the corruption in Africa. Now we need an investigation into the investigation.
I really feel for the people that work for both these organisations as however this plays out one or both organisations are probably finished.
You would have to think DC and his mate may end up in handcuffs on both this and the previous tender.
And as for the Defence investigation. What a whitewash. Talk about put spin on their own investigation. If someone quits due to conflict of interest after the tender is let then that conflict exists into the future. Follow that up with the wrong conclusion on the corruption in Africa. Now we need an investigation into the investigation.
I really feel for the people that work for both these organisations as however this plays out one or both organisations are probably finished.
You would have to think DC and his mate may end up in handcuffs on both this and the previous tender.
And as for the Defence investigation. What a whitewash. Talk about put spin on their own investigation. If someone quits due to conflict of interest after the tender is let then that conflict exists into the future. Follow that up with the wrong conclusion on the corruption in Africa. Now we need an investigation into the investigation.
I really feel for the people that work for both these organisations as however this plays out one or both organisations are probably finished.
You would have to think DC and his mate may end up in handcuffs on both this and the previous tender.
I really feel for the people that work for both these organisations as however this plays out one or both organisations are probably finished.
You would have to think DC and his mate may end up in handcuffs on both this and the previous tender.
