Page 3363 - Week 08 - Thursday, 23 August 2012
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Clause 27 specifies conditions when an individual can make a disclosure to the media or a member of the Assembly. Failing these conditions, they do not receive protections under this bill. Clause 42 specifies that only a Supreme Court can issue an injunction to stop or prevent detrimental action from occurring.
As I noted earlier, it is interesting to note that after 11 years of this ACT Labor government, only now it seems they are taking some steps to improve protection for whistleblowers. But the truth must be told. Under this ACT Labor government in general, and under this Chief Minister, persecution of whistleblowers and the protection of bullies has become endemic. We hear stories of 10-year wars in the Chief Minister’s department, doctors leaving en masse, the distressing cases of whistleblowers who lose not only their job but their homes and their health because of the bullying culture of this government. Legislation will not fix this. Only a change of government will fix this. And of course, this week we saw the examples in relation to the no-confidence motion.
But let us have a look at some of the examples of whistleblowers and other brave public servants who have been shoddily treated by this government. Debbie Scattergood revealed that TAMS had wasted taxpayers’ money on a $15 million contract for unforeseen expenditures. In return for highlighting this discrepancy, she suffered discrimination at her workplace for four years, with the added insult of having her department trying to restructure her out of a job, not to mention findings on a biased report against her and allegations of a cover-up.
The result of her ill-treatment by her employers at TAMS left her with reactive depression, and the strain on her finances forced her to sell her home. This is how the government treats a 30-year veteran of the ACT public service for, as the Price report states, having legitimately raised a genuine concern. All in all, it took Ms Scattergood one year to get reports of investigations of her own mistreatment, costing her $22,000 in legal fees.
At a time when the Chief Minister promised to make the ACT government the most transparent government in Australia, TAMS failed to issue 17 of the 21 key possible findings in the report sent to her. It is another example of the hypocrisy of this government, saying one thing and doing exactly the opposite.
We saw the example of Doug Buchanan, who was cleared in relation to allegations against him. The Hamburger review issued in March found that Mr Buchanan was mentoring the AMC leadership team and leading by example in his interactions with staff and detainees and that feedback from some external stakeholders was that the superintendent was having a positive impact on AMC operations. The review also noted that staff morale improved significantly after Mr Buchanan took over.
A professional with 30 years experience in the corrections industry was denied due process because of his opposition to the government’s needle and syringe program. You will recall the Canberra Liberals called for a committee to investigate Mr Buchanan’s departure, but the Labor Party, with Greens support, rejected this.
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