Lord Mayor Graham Quirk says the deal will bring a dividend to Brisbane ratepayers. Credit:Glenn Hunt The loan approval came under question from Labor councillors at this week's council meeting. "We are a local government that is meant to be assessing development applications," Morningside councillor Shayne Sutton said. "We are not supposed to be lodging them and making a profit. "If the Lord Mayor wants to run a development company, he should retire and resign and go out and join one of them.

Opposition leader Peter Cumming has called on the Lord Mayor to resign and pursue a development career. Credit:Glenn Hunt "He should not be using a city of Brisbane and ratepayer-funded organisation. He should not be setting up dodgy shelf companies that allow Brisbane City Council to become a developer. "...Does he want to be a developer or does he want to be the lord mayor of this city?" Cr Quirk said the CBIC was acting no differently to the state government's Queensland Investment Corportation. "At the base of both entities, at the base of this investment, is the return to the ratepayers," he said.

"Is it good for the ratepayers? The answer to that is 'yes'." Cr Quirk defended the loan and said it would ultimately help the council's bottom line. "It is a borrowing specific to that development with an attractive interest rate return and, for that reason – it will be a short-term loan – the (establishment and coordination) committee approved such a borrowing," he said. "The funds from that will be directly going back to ratepayers by way of a dividend return." Opposition leader Peter Cumming said it was inappropriate for the council to assess what was effectively its own application.

"Instead of focusing on the core business of a council which is to serve the ratepayers of Brisbane, this LNP Administration is turning into a property developer," he said. "Graham Quirk has a lot of questions to answer regarding this development, and council's involvement in it. "It goes to the heart of the LNP's lack of transparency and accountability to the ratepayers of Brisbane. "For Brisbane City Council to be assessing development applications relating to their own development is a serious conflict of interest. "Labor lord mayor Jim Soorley engaged an independent third party assessor when the council was perceived to have a conflict of interest. It happened with the Minnippi Parklands and the Cannon Hill Golf Links."

City planning chairman Julian Simmonds said it was appropriate that the council's development assessments were done by its own independent officers. "Labor's suggestion that these types of applications should be assessed by a third party and not council, simply does not stack up," he said. "Is Labor suggesting the council is incapable of assessing development applications for new public pools, community halls or libraries, a practice that they have never raised concern with before? "They also don't seem to have considered that their state Labor colleagues own, develop and assess projects – all without any legal appeal rights for the community. Some of these projects include Queens Wharf, Hamilton Northshore and Bowen Hills." A spokesman for Cr Quirk said the CBIC had grown to more than $250 million in value since it was established in 2009 and had provided $70 million in dividends over that time.

"The CBIC is managed at arm's length from council, by an independent board of directors," he said. For independent news coverage, be sure to follow our Facebook feed.