Paul Little made his fortune building Toll Holdings into a national and international logistics giant – and generating headlines during a tumultuous period as president of AFL club Essendon – Little is now quietly making money in property development. He is chairman of Little Group, which builds apartments in Melbourne as well as undertaking residential subdivisions, while the Little Real Estate division manages and sells properties.
He is No. 64 on the The Financial Review Rich List this year, which helps when your other passions include restoring World War II aircraft.
Australia’s third DC-3 plane, Kanana, was imported from the US by Australian National Airways in 1938. It was used by the federal government during World War II and was then used by various airlines, including Ansett, over the years. You bought it for $1 in 2014, as part of the Little Group’s purchase of the Melbourne Aviation Precinct at Melbourne Airport. You’ve spent $1 million restoring it. Why?
I’ve always thought, in anything I do, that it’s important to capture the history associated with the endeavour. At Toll we built a museum and restored a number of vehicles. That was part of passing on lessons to employees – about what we had learnt from the past, and how we moved forward.
Are you a nostalgic person?
I am. I’ve restored an old MG. I love the engineering. They were more simple times. They relied on workers being skilled and conscientious, plus things being built to last.
Airshows and the like have a huge following, people love old machines.
I love the old war birds. There’s no point having them sitting in the museum, it’s best to have them in a state where you can still use them.
When we finished the old MG we went to Winton raceway and spent the day doing laps. It’s about trying to experience what it was like in those days, be it in a plane or a car.
Kanana arrived in Port Melbourne in 1938 and was seconded by the federal government to go into war service. Over its journey it’s had different colours and liveries depicting its roles. It’s been very versatile; they used it for troop carrying, then later it went in and out of King Island. Regionally it was used extensively and it’s been on the eastern states passenger run. Its history is not without incident, it’s had some engine fires and hard landings. The fact it’s still around is a tribute to its engineering.
Were you interested in aviation as a child?
Yes, I’ve always had a fascination with it. The family was involved in spotting aircraft at Essendon Airport. We didn’t live next to it, but a lot of families went there then. And of course I was a big supporter of the Essendon Football Club, which was nearby [and which Little later chaired]. I was keen to go into space with Virgin. My son and I had tickets for a future space flight, but then they had a mishap so we cancelled.
Have you been up in Kanana yet?
It hasn’t flown since we’ve had it. The first trip will be to the Bathurst 1000 in October, with a bunch of fellow petrolheads. It may take us a day or two to get there, but it’ll be great fun. We cranked up the engines in April for the first time though. It’s being restored by volunteers, old Ansett engineering staff from the R.M. Ansett Historical Aircraft Society. So it’s a partnership between them and us.
What are you and your wife Jane Hansen doing in the philanthropic space?
We’re still involved in First and Second Step. First Step is an addiction clinic in St Kilda and Second Step is about getting people into jobs after they’ve recovered from addiction or time in jail. It’s one of the things I was most proud of in my 25 years at Toll Holdings. Getting people detoxed and off heroin is unpleasant, it’s confronting. So that’s First Step, which led us to Second Step, getting them into jobs at Toll. That extended into people getting out of prison. It was very successful; I hope Toll’s new owners [Japan Post] keep it going.
Jane is heavily involved in the Melbourne Theatre Company, she sits on its board and is inaugural chair of its foundation, which we helped set up with a $1 million gift. Jane has always loved the theatre. The MTC is owned by Melbourne University, and there we’ve committed $8 million to a new History program within the Arts faculty. Jane is also on the university council. We are building a boutique theatre as part of our restoration of the Royal Victorian Institute of the Blind building in St Kilda Road.
So addictions, theatre and history are the three key focuses.
You’re into property, via the Little Group. But you’re also involved in tourism, as chair of Visit Victoria, and you’ve started a passenger ferry service between Portarlington and Melbourne.
Property is a huge part of our investment; our property management group manages about 25,000 properties. We’re also building apartments across Melbourne, up in Queensland and in New Zealand. So that takes up a lot of my time.
I love the ferries. Ours goes from Portarlington into Melbourne. I’ll never make a lot of money out of it but I think Melbourne is ready to support it in terms of passenger interest.
We’re also looking at the operations from Cowes on Phillip Island to Stony Point on the Mornington Peninsula, which we think has a lot of potential from a tourism point of view. The biggest tourist attraction in Victoria is the penguins on Phillip Island. They get buses and buses going down there. It would be great to get those people across to Mornington Peninsula and then over to the Bellarine Peninsula. That would get people into Victoria’s regions.
The Financial Review Rich List is published on May 26, in The Australian Financial Review Magazine and online at afr.com.
