NEW Boral chief executive Mark Selway loved his bespoke Aston Martin "dream car".
The building and construction company chief spent a year looking for the perfect Buckingham Green metallic convertible - with sandstorm hide and Parliament Green secondary hide - before buying the second-hand Aston Martin DB9 5.9 Volante for $171,000 last March.
But the car remains in climate-controlled storage in Scotland after the federal government and the Administrative Appeals Tribunal rejected his legal efforts to import it to Australia.
Under government regulations, personal importers must own a car for more than 12 months before bringing it into the country.
Transport bureaucrats rejected the original application of Mr Selway, who lived as an expat from 1989 until last year, after he had owned the car for only nine months.
Mr Selway elevated the matter to the tribunal, which this month rejected his arguments that he would suffer financial loss, face unfairness and that it was a "unique" vehicle.
Yesterday, he told The Australian it was a disappointing decision. "It's ridiculous that after 20 years offshore, I'm not able to bring my car into Australia, partly as the government will be approximately $50,000 worse off through the loss of luxury car tax, which would have been paid on importation," he said.
"I do understand the need for rules but this clearly is not in the best interest of the Australian taxpayer and is a great disappointment to me."
In evidence, he said he had a passion for cars, especially Aston Martins, as one of his earlier jobs was overseeing development of automotive parts for the DB9.
"It was a car that he loved from the design concept," the tribunal reported in their findings.
"The colour combination was important to him because the very first one that he was associated with in the styling studio was, in fact, the same colour with the same interior as the Aston Martin DB9 he purchased."
Mr Selway had argued he had to take the Boral job no later than January 1 this year because it had suffered during the construction downturn sparked by the global financial crisis but the tribunal rejected this.
Since taking on the leadership role, Mr Selwyn has announced plans to sell off non-core assets to raise $490 million.
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