| THE DISMISSIVE PUBLIC COMMENTS BY THOSE NAMED ON THE RIGHT:
Channel 9's Sunday "Queensland's Secret Shame" 28 March 1999 - Anna Bligh, Family Servics Minister: "....I can find no persuasive argument to spend one more cent of taxpayers money investigating something that has been so thoroughly scrutinised and on every occasion found to be without substance . " Premier Peter Beattie 28 October 1999 State Hansard p4502 said: "..... There is no audience for this issue (Heiner Affair). There have been more inquiries into this issue than we have had hot dinners. The answer is: no, no, no, no, no and no. It is done. It is finished. It is over." "Hon. Anna M. BLIGH (South Brisbane ALP) (Minister for Families, Youth and Community Care and Minister for Disability Services) (6.46 p.m. Hansard 25 August 1998): "...The motion before us tonight makes a series of very serious allegations serious allegations against five of my colleagues, serious allegations that do not bring forward one shred of evidence against these colleagues. It is time, as the Deputy Premier said, to call a spade a spade. This has not been debated on the facts; this is nothing more than a complicated, convoluted conspiracy theory a totally mad conspiracy theory. Far be it for me to ruin their grand conspiracy theory with some facts, but I feel I am bound to put them on the record here tonight. It seems to me that, if one is going to have a conspiracy theory, one ought to do it properly. If one is going to have a conspiracy theory, one really should have a totally mad one. One should have one that is gloriously mad, one that is grandly, gloriously, barking mad and this one bears all the hallmarks of that. Not only have members opposite come in here and made repugnant and malicious personal slurs on five Ministers, they have made false and disgraceful attacks on current and former officers of my department. We do not mind so much. We have broad shoulders. We take a lot of flak and we will take a lot more. But who else has been dragged into this barking mad conspiracy? Who else is being accused of communism, paedophilia and criminal activity? None other than the Crown law office, the Audit Office, the Office of the Information Commissioner, the Director of Public Prosecutions, the Queensland Police Service, the Criminal Justice Commission and the Federal Senate! I am disappointed here tonight. I had hoped to hear the full extent of this conspiracy. I was hoping that we would hear tonight of the involvement of the United Nations in this matter; that we would hear tonight about the involvement of the Vatican, the Pope and the entire Catholic Church around the world; that we would know tonight at last the truth about the involvement of the ABC in this; about how Bananas in Pyjamas have figured in this, and the role of the Wiggles in this matter. But no! What we have had tonight is further nonsense about documents and documents and documents. While we are on the subject of documents, there is a lot of curiosity from One Nation members about the attendance register from Cabinet. I am going to let the One Nation members into a secret. Just so that they never know who is there and who makes these dastardly decisions, at the end of every Labor Cabinet meeting right throughout the Goss years and we have restored the tradition the Premier eats the attendance register. I say to the One Nation members: you will never get it. You can take us to the International Court of Justice and the attendance register will remain in the bowels of former Labor Premiers. It is part of the austerity drive; we do not get lunch." Mr Paul Lucas MP, State Hansard 25 August 1998 p1879 said: "...if their leader (i.e. Mr Bill Feldman MLA of One Nation) wants to go on with silly tricks and silly tactics and loony tune conspiracy theories about Heiner, and if they follow him like lemmings over the cliff, we will be very happy." ABC-TV Australian Story "Three Little Words" 17 May 2004 PETER BEATTIE QLD PREMIER: I just want to say to Kevin, sooner or later, you've got to let this go. You can stand there with your finger in the dike, saying, everyone on the other side of that is wrong, or you can face the reality and let it go. PETER BEATTIE QLD PREMIER: You know what would happen - and I say this with great courtesy to Kevin, 'cause I know he holds these views very strongly - if that didn't come up with what he wanted, he would believe that was, too, part of the conspiracy. Now, I didn't shoot John Kennedy, and there's not gonna be a special prosecutor, either. Then member of the Parliamentary Criminal Justice Committee (PCJC) Mr Tom Barton MLA, said (Hansard Queensland Legislative Assembly 17/11/94 p.10487): "...I was not going to name him, but he has been referred to extensively today by the Leader of the Opposition. I am talking about Kevin Lindeberg who, I would suggest, is a self-proclaimed whistleblower with the grandest conspiracy plan that I have ever heard. He claims that he is a victim. I would suggest that the other person whom he claims to represent is the real victim - not a victim of the Heiner inquiry, but a victim of Kevin Lindeberg's actions. In my view, Lindeberg is a self-professed whistleblower. He has defamed innocent people - some who are very close former colleagues of mine - before Senate inquiries, before the Cooke inquiry and in other places..." |
THE AUGUST 2007 JUDGES LETTER IGNORED BY GOVERNOR GENERAL QUENTIN BRYCE, PREMIERS BEATTIE and BLIGH, PRIME MINISTER RUDD:
The Hon Peter Beattie MLA Dear Premier THE HEINER AFFAIR - A MATTER OF CONCERN We, the undersigned legal practitioners formerly on the Bench, currently at the Bar or in legal practice, seek to re-affirm our sworn duty to uphold the rule of law throughout the Commonwealth of Australia and to indicate our deep concern about its undermining as the unresolved Heiner affair reveals. We believe that it is the democratic right of every Australian to expect that the criminal law shall be applied consistently, predictably and equally by law-enforcement authorities throughout the Commonwealth of Australia in materially similar circumstances. We believe that any action by Executive Government which may have breached the law ought not be immune from criminal prosecution where and when the evidence satisfies the relevant provision. To do otherwise, we suggest would undermine the rule of law and confidence in government. It would tend to place Executive Government above the law. At issue is the order by the Queensland Cabinet of 5 March 1990 to destroy the Heiner Inquiry documents to prevent their use as evidence in an anticipated judicial proceeding, made worse because the Queensland Government knew the evidence concerned abuse of children in a State youth detention centre, including the alleged unresolved pack rape of an indigenous female child by other male inmates. The affair exposes an unacceptable application of the criminal law by prima facie double standards by Queensland law-enforcement authorities in initiating a successful proceedings against an Australian citizen, namely Mr. Douglas Ensbey, but not against members of the Executive Government and certain civil servants for similar destruction-of-evidence conduct. Compelling evidence suggests that the erroneous interpretation of section 129 of the Criminal Code (Qld) used by those authorities to justify the shredding of the Heiner Inquiry documents may have knowingly advantaged Executive Government and certain civil servants. This serious inconsistency in the administration of Queensland's Criminal Code touching on the fundamental principle of respect for the administration of justice by proper preservation of evidence concerns us because this principle is found in all jurisdictions within in the Commonwealth as it sustains the rule of law generally. The Queensland Court of Appeal's binding September 2004 interpretation of section 129 in R v Ensbey; ex parte A-G (Qld) [2004] QCA 335 exposed the erroneous interpretation that the (anticipated/imminent) judicial proceeding had to be on foot before section 129 could be triggered. We are acquainted with the affair* and specifically note, and concur with, (the late) the Right Honourable Sir Harry Gibbs GCMG, AC, KBE, as President of The Samuel Griffith Society, who advised that the reported facts represent, at least, a prima facie offence under section 129 of the Criminal Code (Qld) concerning destruction of evidence. In respect of the erroneous interpretation of section 129 adopted by Queensland authorities, we also concur with the earlier 2003 opinion of former Queensland Supreme and Appeal Court Justice, the Hon James Thomas AM, that while many laws are indeed arguable, section 129 was never open to that interpretation. Section 129 of the Criminal Code (Qld) - destruction of evidence - provides that: "Any person who, knowing that any book, document, or other thing of any kind, is or may be required in evidence in a judicial proceeding, wilfully destroys it or renders it illegible or undecipherable or incapable of identification, with intent thereby to prevent it from being used in evidence, is guilty of a misdemeanour, and is liable to imprisonment with hard labour for three years." (Underlining added). It concerns us that such an erroneous view of section 129 was persisted with for well over a decade despite the complainant, supported by eminent lawyers, pointing out the gravity of their error consistently since 1990 when knowing its wording and intent were so unambiguous, with authoritative case law available for citing dating back as far as 1891 in R v Vreones. Evidence adduced also reveals that the Queensland Government and Office of Crown Law knew, at the time, that the records would be discoverable under the Rules of the Supreme Court of Queensland once the expected writ/plaint was filed or served. With this knowledge, the Queensland Government ordered the destruction of these public records before the expected writ/plaint was filed or served to prevent their use as evidence. Such scandalizing of these disclosure/discovery Rules by the Executive also concerns us. So fundamentally important is respect for these Rules that the Judiciary's independent constitutional functionality depends on it. Under the circumstances, we suggest that any claim of "staleness" or "lack of public interest" which may be mounted now by Queensland authorities not to revisit this matter ought to fail. Neither the facts, the law nor the public interest offer support in that regard. However, should such a claim be mounted, we suggest that it would tend to be self-serving and undermine public confidence in the administration of justice and in government itself knowing that the 2004 Ensbey conviction, taken by the same Queensland Crown, did not occur until some 9 years after the relevant destruction-of-evidence incident. This affair encompasses all the essential democratic ideals. The right to a fair trial without interference by government and the right to impartial law-enforcement, to say nothing of respecting the rule of law itself, rest at its core. Respecting the doctrine of the separation of powers and our constitutional monarchy system of democratic government are involved. We believe that the issues at stake are too compelling to ignore. We suggest that if the Heiner affair remains in its current unresolved state, it would give reasonable cause for ordinary citizens, especially Queenslanders, to believe that there is one law for them, and another for Executive Government and civil servants. We find such a prospect unacceptable. We urge the Queensland Government to appoint an independent Special Prosecutor as recommended by the House of Representatives Standing Committee on Legal and Constitutional Affairs in its August 2004 Report (Volume Two - Recommendation 3) following its investigation into the affair as part of its national inquiry into "Crime in the community: victims, offenders and fear of crime". Such an independent transparent process we believe will restore public confidence in the administration of justice throughout the Commonwealth of Australia, more especially in Queensland. SIGNED:
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CC: Her Excellency the Honourable Quentin Bryce AC, Governor of Queensland * (For details see Mr. Kevin Lindeberg's article recently published in Volume 17 of The Samuel Griffith Society's book "Upholding the Australian Constitution." http://www.samuelgriffith.org.au/papers/html/volume17/v17contents.htm) |