Roberts Resigns As Historic Commission Chairman

Tony Roberts, Chairman of the Historic Commission, today resigned from MSNZ citing disappointment and dissatisfaction with the direction Motorsport management was taking.

Roberts said that the Historic Commission had questioned the process by which Motorsport House was being sold and then questioned the secretive process of the sale, but received no meaningful answers to their questions.

Roberts says that as a major asset of the member clubs, the constitution applied to the sale and the member clubs should have been involved in the decision to sell and that the sale process should have been transparent.

"Without an auction, how do we know if the member clubs achieved the true value of the building?" he said. The building looks set to be sold for $1.3 million when the Government valuation was $1.53 million.

Roberts is also the President of the Historic Racing Club Inc., Chairman of NZ Historic Muscle & Saloon Cars and Chairman of the NZ F5000 Association and has been on the MSNZ Historic Commission for 20 years. He was the recipient of the prestigious MSNZ Ron Frost Award for his passion for Motorsport and the building of Hampton Downs Motorsport Park in 2011.

Mr Roberts' resignation statement read as follows:

Resignation

Dear Wayne Christie and the rest of Motorsport NZ Board. I tender my resignation as a Historic Commission member and Chairman of the Commission.

As you know, I have become increasingly dissatisfied with the management of MSNZ and the new CEO. I believe the board should be ashamed of itself for trying to bypass the constitution in the sale of Motorsport House and then trying to justify the sale process. Of all the emails that I have sent to you over the last three months questioning what is going on, only a few have been answered. This lack of response and lack of transparency makes the Historic Commission feel that we are not valued and suspect that the board would sooner we are not there.

Our work has not been followed through in the office and our opinions not sought. As an example, we updated Appendix 6 half a year ago and it has still not been included in the manual – why? We also had no consultation on the 270% COD cost increases, which caused a lot of consternation and disbelief in Historic Racing circles and the compromise has only just been notified yesterday - after four months.

MSNZ has grown into a bloated bureaucracy that is a long way away from assisting the competitor in Motorsport. After over thirty years of working in various voluntary roles for motorsport and being awarded the Ron Frost Award for my passion for motorsport, I am disappointed to be leaving in this way, but value my integrity above all else.

Tony Roberts
Chairman
Historic Commission

© Scoop Media