It has been revealed the hilarious but controversial winner of the $100,000 public competition to name one of Sydney’s new harbour ferries didn’t receive the most votes.
Documents obtained by Nine under the Freedom of Information Act show Ferry McFerryface, the competition winner, broke the original criteria set out by the selection committee and only accrued 182 votes.
The clear winner for the ferry’s name was Ian Kiernan, the founder of charity Clean Up Australia, which received 2025 votes.
Documents obtained by Nine under the Freedom of Information Act show Ferry McFerryface, the competition winner, broke the original criteria set out by the selection committee and only accrued 182 votes
Criteria revealed in the NSW Transport documents show they were specifically trying to avoid names similar to the British research vessel Boaty McBoatface.
The government wanted to avoid ‘satirical naming campaigns’ after ‘the highly publicised mishaps in the naming of ships in other jurisdictions’.
Despite their ambition ‘aimed at mitigating as far as practical the risk of this situation arising’, Transport Minister Andrew Constance signed off on Ferry McFerryface.
‘We got global attention and a bit of fun for the kids with selfies and grandparents,’ he said of his decision to go against the guidelines set by his own department.
Criteria revealed in the NSW Transport documents show they were specifically trying to avoid names similar to the British research vessel Boaty McBoatface
Despite the ambition ‘aimed at mitigating as far as practical the risk of this situation arising’, Transport Minister Andrew Constance signed off on Ferry McFerryface
‘We followed the panel recommendations for the first 5, but for the last one we thought let’s do something a bit different.
‘It’s been a name for the kids.’
However, they are now currently discussing whether to keep the vessel’s current name instead, Emerald 6.
The other five names in the fleet of six new ferries are Bungaree, Pumulwuy, Fred Hollows, Victor Chang and Catherine Hamlin.