Top Five Queensland Cases

THE FIVE HIGHEST IN THE QUEENSLAND JURISDICTION

THE QUEENSLAND JUDICIAL SYSTEM AND THE JUDICIARY

Issue: Allegations broadly based over recent years from different stakeholders against the performances and behaviours of members of the judiciary and of judicial institutions, including the Legal Services Commission and practitioner societies, the Office of the Crown Solicitor, and the Office of the Director of Public Prosecutions.

Recommended Inquiry: A Royal Commission by a panel of three interstate retired senior judges approved by the Queensland Legislative Assembly, each from different States or Territories, with bipartisan endorsement of the panel members, each being free of any reasonable claims of any conflict of interest.

FLOOD STUDIES AND INQUIRIES

Issue: Insufficiencies in certain flood inquiries and flood studies conducted in Queensland since 2010, and the omission of upgrades to Wivenhoe Dam and Somerset Dam from priority infrastructure programs, with regard to the issues of dam safety, the role of the Bureau of Meteorology and the responsibilities and ethics of professional organisations;

Recommended Inquiry:  A quasi-judicial inquiry by a panel of three independent persons from risk management, from whistleblowing, from law and/or from dam safety, 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.

DESTRUCTION and DISPOSAL OF EVIDENCE

Issue: The accumulation of allegations of destruction or disposal by government agencies of documents sought by citizens for intended litigation or litigation already afoot. A decision by a Cabinet two decades ago in the Heiner Affair, may have become a routine practice amongst middle level bureaucrats. Entities may be using practices, unaffected by the attention of law enforcement agencies already compromised or confused by the example set by institutions when the destruction of the Heiner documents was disclosed;

Recommended Inquiry: A Royal Commission by a panel of three independent persons from trade union, whistleblowing, law and parliamentary service, with bipartisan endorsement of the panel members selected from these fields, each being free of any reasonable claims of any conflict of interest.

TRANSFERS OF WHISTLEBLOWERS

Issue: Institutional response to disclosures of transfers of public officers and private sector employees after they make public interest disclosures of suspected wrongdoing by their public sector or private sector employer, including but not limited to those who can demonstrate that they received such a transfer within one year of the date of their disclosure, or within one year of any subsequent action taken by them associated with that disclosure or any form of application alleging suspected reprisal as a result of that disclosure.

Recommended Inquiry: A quasi-judicial inquiry by a panel of three independent persons from an organisational management consultancy, whistleblowing, law and/or regulatory watchdog authority, 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.

GOVERNMENT AS A MODEL LITIGANT

Issue: Behaviours by government lawyers or agencies acting under legal advice, in response to litigation taken by individuals against the Queensland Government or its agencies.

Recommended Inquiry:  A Royal Commission by a panel of three independent persons from the community, from whistleblowing, from law and/or from public service, 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 or by the whistleblower network, that are not currently rated as high as the above, include Rights to the Use and Enjoyment of Land, Abandonment and non-Rehabilitation of Mine Sites, Politicisation of the Queensland Public Service, and Pollution of the Great Barrier Reef.

Sufficient examples may exist which may indicate a lack of performance of watchdog authorities and law enforcement in dealing with decades of past public interest disclosures. Governments may be invested in the continuation of existing responses, it has been alleged.