Greg Roberts | October 05, 2007
Comment: The text shown in bold in the article below is an outrageous lie. - see our email exhange at this link. The claims of racism and extremism made against Balson were found to be unfair and false by the Australian Press Council in January 2008. These allegations were never discussed with Balson and were published when the reporter knew he was overseas.
A COALITION of right-wing extremists and conspiracy theorists has been identified as the driving force behind moves to revive the so-called Shreddergate affair as the federal election approaches.
Queensland Nationals senators Ron Boswell and Barnaby Joyce were told by government leaders not to proceed with plans last week to table in the Senate a 3600-page report by Sydney QC David Rofe on the Heiner inquiry in Queensland in 1989 and 1990, known as Shreddergate.
The report identified 67 possible breaches of the criminal code by Queensland cabinet ministers and public servants over the 1990 shredding by the Goss government of documents compiled by an inquiry headed by former magistrate Noel Heiner into Brisbane's Oxley Youth Centre.
Several investigations have dismissed claims of a criminal cover-up.
Mr Rofe told The Australian last week that Opposition Leader Kevin Rudd, chief of staff to premier Wayne Goss at the time of the shredding, was perceived as "the man we are after".
An internet website devoted to Shreddergate is maintained by former One Nation webmaster Scott Balson in co-operation with Kevin Lindeberg, a former union official who first raised allegations of a cover-up of sex abuse at the youth centre in the early 1990s.
Others whose controversial views have been published by Mr Balson on his internet sites include veteran American neo-Nazi William Pierce, prominent Holocaust denier Bradley Smith, One World conspiracy theorist Peter Myers, and League of Rights chief Jeremy Lee.
"Scott Balson has long been associated with extremist right-wing views and the spreading of crazy conspiracy theories," said Executive Council of Australian Jewry spokesman Jeremy Jones.
The conspiracy theories included a baseless claim of a plot by businesses to poison the public through an artificial sweetener in Diet Coke.
Mr Balson denied yesterday that he was an extremist. He said he had a responsibility to keep Shreddergate in the public eye. "I have kept the Lindeberg webpage open since 1997 and will continue to support him because his fight is for justice in a corrupt system."
The anti-Semitic League of Rights is another vigorous supporter of Mr Lindeberg.
An August edition of the league's newsletter, On Target, carries an article headed: "Long Running Suppurating Sore - The Heiner Affair". The newsletter reproduced parts of a column by journalist Piers Akerman, of Sydney's Daily Telegraph, who will appear at a public meeting with Mr Lindeberg in the NSW parliament next Tuesday.
Shreddergate has been embraced by Rural Action Movement head Selwyn Johnston, an independent candidate for the north Queensland seat of Leichhardt, who has organised speaking tours by Jeremy Lee.
Mr Rofe declined to comment yesterday on how he became involved with Shreddergate.
Mr Lindeberg also declined to comment.