Brisbane City Council has terminated an Audi dealership contract in favour of a new contract for the Willims Motor Group, another Audi dealer which also represents Ferrari, Maserati and Bentley.
The Moggill Road site dealership had been used by an Audi motor car dealer, who has now been evicted in favour of the Willims Motor Group after council purchased the site for $17 million.
The Courier-Mail revealed yesterday that the lease for the pre-existing Audi dealer was terminated in 2012 so council could develop a six-lane T-intersection with traffic lights.
The evicted dealer, Audi West Brisbane principal Justin Trivett, was not offered the opportunity to lease back the property. The decision effectively ended his franchise agreement with the auto brand because of a lack of suitable sites.
Trivett says he would have been prepared to match his Audi rival but was told by council it was a “done deal”.
Council’s $17 million purchase in 2010 came months after Calile Malouf Investments bought the Indooroopilly site for $10 million, with plans to develop a low-level retail market complex.
A spokesman for Mayor Graham Quirk says the council still planned an intersection but needed to acquire the site before development drove up resumption costs.
Quirk’s spokesman says the new dealer, Audi Central, approached council and their short-term licence agreement was “much more favourable to the ratepayers”. He also pointed out that Trivett owed council $22,977.77 in back rent. Trivett was told when he was evicted that the unpaid rent would be forgiven.
“All of a sudden when I started to ask difficult questions, I got the bill,” Trivett told The Courier Mail. Trivett said it was incurred immediately after the council purchased the site over several months when he could not get a meeting to arrange payments.
Opposition Leader Milton Dick yesterday asked why ratepayers had paid $17 million for a property so the council could play landlord to a car dealer.
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