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18 Newspaper Article, January 1976...
Sports car promoter Malcolm Bricklin has $2,000 in assets and $32,354,870.03 in
debts, as nearly as he could figure, when he filed a voluntary petition with a
United States District Court in Phoenix, Arizona, in December to be declared
personally bankrupt. He hadn't kept books, just chequing records, he said, so
some information was sketchy.
His entire assets consisted of one rifle, one watch, skis, some clothing and
personal effects. He had his rent paid a little in advance on an apartment in
Phoenix, his sworn declaration stated, and he thought General Vehicle Inc. owed
him a little back pay. The company has since gone into receivership.
The declaration revealed he had made a property settlement with his wife Brenda
a month before he filed for bankruptcy. He listed two joint bank accounts with
her and one with a girlfriend whom he had been dating for two years. All three
accounts were empty.
On paper, he still had $350,000 in General Vehicle Inc., the U.S. parent of
Bricklin Canada Ltd., and $300,000 in FasTrack International Inc., an earlier
venture, but, said the statement, "both of these corporations are
insolvent and the true value of each debt is zero". General Vehicle
went belly-up with debts listed as $34,000,000 a month later.
Among debts listed by Malcolm Bricklin in a copy of his bankruptcy petition
obtained by investigators for the New Brunswick Liberal Party were:
The statement descibes Malcolm Bricklin as an automobile executive,
unemployed, and says he received income of $125,000 in 1974 and $90,000 in 1975
from his job. He owed $11,0030 in U.S. federal taxes for 1974 but did not know
what he owed in either federal or state taxes for 1975.
And the final irony. In the portion of the form dealing with Malcolm Bricklin's
personal property there is a line on which he is to list his ownership of
automobiles and other vehicles. He answered this question with one word: None.
Editorial, March
1978...
Five pageboys were needed to carry the documents relating to New Brunswick's
ill-fated auto venture into the Legislature. And in a way, this was typical of
the Bricklin performance - flamboyant from beginning to end.
It is going to take days, perhaps weeks, before all pertinent material in those
43 volumes of Bricklin documents can be assessed. But early disclosures reveal
nothing to support Premier Hatfield's costly association with this
ill-conceived venture.
In fact, the documents seem to suggest that if any ordinary business had been
foolish enough to become involved with Malcolm Bricklin, the plug would have
been pulled in a short time; certainly long before Premier Hatfield got around
to it.
Malcolm Bricklin's flagrant nepotism alone would have been reason enough for a
prudent business operator to call a halt. Just imagine a situation where a
cowboy-booted young man out of Philadelphia by way of Scottsdale Arizona could
sweet-talk someone into bankrolling his pie-in-the-sky dream of starting a
brand new automobile manufacturing firm from scratch.
Imagine all the upfront money required to get such a project going. Imagine all
the trouble the new company was having, with no hope of a return on venture
capital for many years (or, as it turned out, no hope of ever getting a
return).
And in these circumstances, imagine the young promotor padding the company
payroll with family and friends - his own income and that of his relatives
running to a yearly take of $265,000. That's just salary. Expenses? They're
extra.
Of course don't let these documents give you the impression that young Malcolm
Bricklin was all bad. No sir, that boy took care of his mother.
He took care of her to the tune of $30,000 a year. She was on the payroll too,
you see (Vice President). And Dad, he was worth more - at $60,000 a year (in
charge of "speedway and cost reduction") And then there was Barbara
Bricklin Jonas (Vice President), and Uncle Ben (new dealership development),
and other assorted friends and associates.
Sure, it took a lot to keep that automobile company going before it finally
folded. Chris Hegarty got $90,000 a year as president of Bricklin Vehicle
Canada. And Malcolm's former banker friend, Ralph Henry, became president of
Bricklin Canada at $10,000 a month.
A lot of the information tabled in the legislature this week isn't new. But it
totes up a weird way to run a business. The picture seems to shape up this way:
Malcolm Bricklin took care of his family.
Premier Hatfield took care of Malcolm Bricklin - for far too long.
And nobody took care of the interests of the taxpayers.
After all, the taxpayers of New Brunswick weren't really involved in running
the company or getting on the payroll. All they did was cough up the cold, hard
cash - for an industry that was destined to fail before the first car ever came
off the assembly line. So who was it that kept Malcolm Bricklin and his family
living in the style that would be beyond the wildest dreams of the little guy
picking up the tab? Just us taxpayers.
Newspaper Article, November 1981
Fredericton - The Conservative government has reduced taxes, improved public
services, provided a secure supply of electrical power and stimulated economic
development over the past decade Premier Richard Hatfield told his party's
annual meeting here last Saturday.
Even the Bricklin project which cost the province over $20 million was not a
failure, he said. The federal government wouldn't provide meaningful financing
for Bricklin, he said, but it has poured hundreds of millions of dollars into
the Ontario auto industry. And the British government has put $160 million into
a gull-winged car similiar to the Bricklin.
"Consider the fact that hundreds of Bricklins are still on the road,
still providing the service to their owners they were designed for. And how
about the hundreds of New Brunswickers who were earning good wages and salaries
during the period of Bricklin production?"
He said "this government was just a little ahead of its time in
industrial strategy" with a project that was killed by a
"hesitant" federal government and a "destructively
critical Opposition".
"Must be a large car to take the whole province for a ride..."
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