Top Five Federal Cases

THE FIVE HIGHEST IN THE FEDERAL JURISDICTION

COMMAND RESPONSIBILITY FOR THE KILLING OF AFGHANI PERSONS

Issue: Information tending to show that investigations by the Australian Government into allegations of such killings by the Australian Defence Force may not have been sufficiently competent nor undertaken with sufficient independence to meet Australia’s obligations under international law.

Recommended Inquiry: An Inquiry as directed by the International Criminal Court where members of the Australian Defence Force participate as witnesses, not as members of the Inquiry or in conducting investigations, and where any members alleging wrongdoing by Defence members or Commanders or Chiefs or Inquiry Officers are provided with effective protections before during and after any investigation and inquiry.

CHILD SEXUAL ABUSE UNFINISHED – THE RESPONSE BY POLICE, JUSTICE AUTHORITIES AND GOVERNMENT

Issue: Institutional response to disclosures of child abuse and child sexual abuse may not have been able to be fully investigated by the 2013-2017 Royal Commission. This may have caused some victims and their families not to come forward, and may have caused the Royal Commission not to investigate or not to investigate fully claims that were submitted. Particular problems may have occurred where the police, justice authorities and government agencies or bodies may be the subject of claims

Recommended Inquiry: A Royal Commission by a panel of three persons independent of the police, of justice authorities and of government, supported by professionals in advisory rather than investigative roles. The three persons need also to be independent of organisations and institutions who were the subject of claims in the first Royal Commission.  

THE USE OF SECRECY PROVISIONS TO SUPPRESS ANY DISCLOSURES OF WRONGDOING

Issue: Inquiries and the public interest can be disadvantaged where government agencies are able to argue that matters must by law be held secret and / or conducted in secret even from principal participants in the adversarial process. These restrictions can extend to the whistleblowers and their legal representatives where the government, its agencies and / or its officers are subject to disclosure of wrongdoing.

Recommended Inquiry: A Royal Commission by a panel of three independent persons from police, whistleblowing, and law, with bipartisan endorsement of the panel members selected from three of these fields, each being free of any reasonable claims of any conflict of interest. The Royal Commission is to consider recent and historic cases without restrictions of secrecy, and report in general terms rather than in specific terms whether the cases indicate any outcomes unfairly imposed on participants adverse to the public interest in the proper use of secrecy provisions.

JUSTICE FOR ALL MEMBERS OF DEFENCE, INCLUDING RESERVISTS AND DEFENCE PUBLIC SERVANTS

Issue: The conditions of employment and the leadership and management practices applied to Defence members other than members in the Permanent Military Force may be unfair and unreasonably so, contributing to a disregard in the culture of the Permanent Military Forces that disadvantages those forces and overall Defence Force capabilities.

Recommended Inquiry: A Royal Commission by a panel of three independent persons from the parliament, from trade unions, from law and/or from the community, with bipartisan endorsement of the panel members selected from three of these fields, each being free of any reasonable claims of any conflict of interest.

GOVERNANCE of TRADE UNIONS AND NOT-FOR-PROFIT ORGANISATIONS

Issue: Institutional response to disclosures of practices used in the governance of trade unions and not-for-profit organisations, including the Fair Works agencies and Federal and State trade union courts, tribunals, commissions, departments and other agencies.

Recommended Inquiry: A quasi-judicial inquiry by a panel of three independent persons from financial auditing, from whistleblowing, from law and/or from trade unionism, with bipartisan endorsement of the panel members selected from three of these fields, each being free of any reasonable claims of any conflict of interest.

Other candidate issues proposed by members and by the whistleblower network that are not currently rated as high as the above include Care of Persons in Offshore Detention, Deaths and Bashings and Abuse in Custody, and Treatment of East Timor.