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The Heiner Affair - how it got where it is today

With the Senate about to (hopefully) launch an inquiry into the Heiner Affair (otherwise known as “Shreddergate”) it might be worth putting up a brief summary of how it got to this point.

In the late 1980s there were serious allegations (including allegations of child abuse) at a Brisbane youth detention facility (the John Oxley Youth Centre (JOYC)). In 1989, the Liberal-National coalition government led by Russell Cooper set up an inquiry to look into the allegations. The inquiry was headed by retired magistrate Noel Heiner. A new Labor Government came to power soon after.

Because of the nature of the allegations, including those leveled at staff of the JOYC, some of the material could have been considered defamatory. Normally those giving evidence to an inquiry would be protected but it seems that the Goss Labor government was not sure whether the Heiner inquiry had been properly constituted and whether witnesses would be protected. Certainly, it seems reasonable to assume that the government knew what was contained in the inquiry documents. The Minister for Family Services in the Goss Government, the Hon. Anne Warner, certainly knew about the alleged abuse. It was Warner who had urged the Cooper Government to set up the inquiry (see The Sunday Sun, 1 October 1989, p.18). It is difficult to believe that this knowledge (and more) did not reach the Goss Cabinet before it took the decision to shred the inquiry documents on 5 March 1990. It is difficult also to believe that the Goss Cabinet did not know that there was a realistic possibility that the evidence gathered was relevant for future police or other Crown inquiries such as the Criminal Justice Commission (CJC). The CJC did look at the matter but – it would seem – not in any meaningful way.

The allegations certainly appear to have had substance, as the recent out of court settlement with one of the complainants seems to demonstrate. The case involved the alleged pack rape of a 14 year old girl while in the custody of the State. It is a sad story that will no doubt come out before the Senate. This payment was not something that just happened “out of the blue”. The girl may not have been in a position to pursue her rights at the time, but as a woman, she did. The Queensland Police apparently declined to investigate. But the Government nevertheless settled.

That the Heiner affair has not simply withered away is due largely to the efforts of Kevin Lindeberg, the former trade union officer who represented some staff of the JOYC. As a whistleblower, Lindeberg paid the price that most (all?) whistleblowers do. But Kevin Lindeberg took the Heiner case to places that few other whistleblowers have managed.

The matter has been considered by Senate inquiries more than once (and addressed in the Senate by Senator George Brandis and former Senator John Woodley). In August 2007, a number of superior court judges issued a public statement, The Heiner Affair: A Matter of Concern, calling on Queensland Premier Beattie to appoint an independent Special Prosecutor to investigate the matter. Beattie rejected their call. Significantly, the judges stated that, on the matter of the shredding:
"…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 the Commonwealth as it sustains the rule of law generally…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."

Premier Beattie resigned some two weeks later and the judges’ letter was subsequently served on new Queensland Premier, the Hon. Anna Bligh. She refused to act claiming, among other things, that the Heiner Affair had been thoroughly investigated by the CJC. (It certainly had NOT been “thoroughly investigated”, but that is a common “out” used by the Queensland Government.)

The matter did not go away. On 14 February 2008, documents (the 9-Volume Rofe Audit, the Judges’ Statement, The Heiner Affair: A Matter of Concern, and a 55-page legal summary) were served by Lindeberg’s solicitors on the ‘bipartisan-by-law’ Queensland Parliamentary Crime and Misconduct Committee (PCMC) requesting a review by an acting Parliamentary Commissioner into the CJC/CMC’s handling of Lindeberg’s complaint to the CJC in 1993. In his 2008 submission to the Tasmanian Joint Select Committee on Ethical Conduct, Lindeberg described the issues confronting the PCMC in its duty to reach a bipartisan decision (see Lindeberg’s article written for the Records Management Association of Australasia 2010 journal for a full discussion):
"In the opinion of senior counsel, the issues are very simple if the rule of law is to prevail. On the evidence supplied, there only needs to be found the low threshold of a suspicion of official misconduct to lead to the establishment of a full and an open inquiry to get to the truth. Such an inquiry, however, would not only rock Queensland to its foundations but the nation itself because it is known that the Prime Minister Rudd and Her Excellency Governor-General, Quentin Bryce, are adversely named in the audit. Amongst other things, six serving Queensland judicial officers are adversely named."

And therein lies the problem for the Bligh Labor Government.

If this matter had been dealt with properly years ago it would now be just a footnote in the history books. But few complaints that involve the public service or the Government are ever investigated properly in Queensland. The Labor Government seems to have a horror of possible loss of control, or that scrutiny of one thing can sometimes turn to scrutiny of other things that are best left unseen.

The sky will not fall if these things are opened to public scrutiny. Nor do those named have any special claim on protection. Future governments should take heed. The “no problems here” mentality of governments (of all persuasions) and public servants needs a radical overhaul. The open information systems of today’s society make accountability more difficult to avoid. More citizens should stand up (like Kevin Lindeberg and the woman in this case) and demand that governments and public servants be held accountable for their actions.

However, it can only be hoped that the girl (now a woman) who will be very much a focus of interest in the Senate inquiry, will not suffer all over again for the Queensland Government’s contempt for the law.

Tags: Bligh, Brandis, Bryce, Heiner, Lindeberg, Rudd, Woodley

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Replies to This Discussion

Permalink Reply by John Richardson on June 8, 2011 at 1:27pm

Some worthwhile reading abour kevin rudd and the "Heiner Affair"..............

http://blogs.news.com.au/dailytelegraph/piersakerman/index.php/dail...

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Permalink Reply by Brendan Michael on June 8, 2011 at 6:56pm

Gidday Peter.

In Feb 2010 I started a discussion on this very subject. Anybody interested can goto that thread and follow some interesting links and comments by a number of our esteemed members who are still contributing to this site today.

Cheers,

Bren

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Permalink Reply by Peter Jesser on June 8, 2011 at 10:15pm

Yes, Bren, I remember it well. Kevin Lindeberg gave me a "heads up" yesterday so I thought it was worth a re-visit.

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Permalink Reply by Brendan Michael on June 9, 2011 at 2:43pm

Gidday Peter,

Totally agree. About time Akkerman & Jones took up the fight again. All involved, from the perps of the crime to the Goss Gvt should be bought to account. Glad you raised it again.

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Permalink Reply by Jan Courtney on June 10, 2011 at 9:05am

http://www.heineraffair.info/site_pages/Rudd.html

Lots of information and links here.

This case MUST be brought into the open and investigated properly , especially considering a leading politician and the current Governor General have questions unanswered about their involvement in the cover ups.

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Permalink Reply by Peter Jesser on June 12, 2011 at 9:45pm

Another recent link worth a look:

http://www.onlineopinion.com.au/view.asp?article=11917

This one draws a comparison between Archbishop Peter Hollingworth and Quentin Bryce. Hollingworth was forced (by public opinion) to resign as Governor-General because of his role in covering up sexual abuse by a priest and - particularly - some ill-judged comments he made about the victim. Quentin Bryce failed to act appropriately (in the eyes of some) on a petition regarding the Heiner affair. I do not think the two situations are directly comparable because Bryce was not acting to cover up the original issue - she was just not acting on the government cover-up. But there were certainly ethical issues involved. Those issues were sufficient for former Governor-General Michael Jefferies to ask some questions about Bryce's suitability for the appointment. There may not have been much that he could do, but he asked the question. And that is the key. Bryce apparently did not question the ethics of the Heiner affair. She may not have had constitutional power to take any action. But she was not constitutionally prohibited from asking what was going on. And that would have put the spotlight right on the issue.

I would not expect Bryce to be any more sensitive to the issue in her capacity as Governor-General than she was in her capacity as Governor of Queensland. Which is a pity. The Crown's representative (as with the Crown) needs to be sensitive to matters where governments act oppressively. They need to have the backbone to say "perhaps you need to think about this". And let it be known that they have made the suggestion.

Incidentally, the Heiner affair has been brought to the attention of the Palace. The Queen politely suggested that it should be a matter of concern. The Queensland Parliament ignored her.

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Permalink Reply by Matt Thompson on June 23, 2011 at 3:04pm

Picture (Device Independent Bitmap)

Senator Barnaby Joyce

Shadow Minister for Regional Development, Local Government and Water

Leader of The Nationals in the Senate

LNP Senator for Queensland

23 June 2011

Heiner affair still under wraps

Today, the Senate dealt with a matter of grave seriousness involving an incident where a girl who was allegedly raped at the John Oxley Youth Detention Centre in 1988 by 2 people.

Today, Senator Xenophon proposed a Senate inquiry into this matter which would have given the victim her opportunity to speak out under the rules of Parliamentary privilege.

It was bitterly disappointing to once more see the process of transparency thwarted by the absolute hypocrisy of the so-called champions of transparency and independence, Senator Fielding and the Greens.

The issues pertaining to the events surrounding an occurrence at a corrections centre in Queensland once more have drawn a dark pall over our Chamber as an unholy amalgam was brought together to preclude a lady from a process that the Parliament of this nation should have given to her.

You can leave this Parliament in dignity or you can leave in disgrace. Senators should reflect strongly on which alternative they choose.

I’d like to refer to a speech I gave on this matter in 2007 when I first attempted to table the Rofe report:

I have crossed the floor on the legal rights of David Hicks. I was part of the reason the legal rights of the West Papuan refugees were preserved. But it is only now, when the people in a position of power are threatened, that there are those who state it is smear and muckraking. Fiat justitia ruat caelum: though heaven may fall, justice will be done. This issue has seen the attempt to use the mechanisms available in Queensland, and they have obfuscated, contrived and corrupted the process. Public ventilation of these crimes is crucial in bringing this issue out of its contrived maze and into the light of conclusion. … A proper investigation may dispel these. I seek leave to move that the documents in the Rofe report now be tabled.

Senate Hansard, 19 September 2007

The response was this:

Leave not granted.

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Permalink Reply by Peter Jesser on June 23, 2011 at 7:13pm

Yes, blocked by those outstanding examples of moral rectitude, Family First and the Greens. And Steve Fielding has the gall to describe himself as a "sexual abuse survivor". However, Fielding's vote was not without consequences:

"Family First Senator, and sexual abuse survivor Steve Fielding, has been dumped as the patron of White Balloon Day, an awareness campaign for child sexual abuse victims, on his last day in Parliament, for failing to support a Senate inquiry into sexual abuse."

See the full article at:
http://www.smh.com.au/national/fielding-dumped-as-white-balloon-pat...

Cam't help wondering what influenced him to vote that way. "Investigated too many times" is simply parroting Labor Party propaganda. You can have any number of investigations. If they do not examine the issues (and NONE have) then they are not investigations at all.

But the Heiner affair is not going away. Fielding is just another inconsequential bump in a very corrugated road.

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Permalink Reply by Peter Jesser on June 26, 2011 at 11:02am

Piers Akerman has a nice piece on this.

http://blogs.news.com.au/dailytelegraph/piersakerman/index.php/dail...

It is interesting to see the Clerk of the Senate's view of the matter. But I agree with Barnaby. Is there a job in the offing for Fielding?

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Permalink Reply by Elizebeth Flower on June 26, 2011 at 1:05pm

Great to read Piers Akerman's excellent comment on this heinous affair, Peter, reporting also Barnaby's very apt and commonsense opinion.

I thought Piers' following comments, with reference to Barnaby, were worth quoting here:

The action this week was dishonorable, he said. Even the Clerk of the Senate, Dr Rosemary Laing, said in a written advice on a submission received on this matter that “there is no doubt the subject matter is very serious”. Which surely begs another important question.
If the Clerk of the Senate, having read a submission, regards the matter as “very serious”, has the Senate acted improperly in attempting to have it swept under the carpet?
Further, the submission which she comments upon publicly has not been released, which must be a parliamentary first. Joyce’s description of this as Australia’s Watergate is most appropriate: It was not the crime that sank US President Richard Nixon, it was the cover-up.
This crime has a victim, a girl, then 14, raped in 1988. The perpetrators haven’t been charged. She received hush money from the Queensland government last year, effectively gagging her from speaking
out. She needs to have her voice heard.This is not about an old crime.
It is about an ongoing and disgusting cover-up by shameless politicians and their hypocritical supporters in a ghastly denial of justice.

Obviously, this old crime, so dishonourably covered up, has now become a new and far more insidious one, more akin to Watergate, as Barnaby maintains: It was not the crime that sank US President Richard Nixon, it was the cover-up.

Whatever can Steve Fielding be thinking? Has he completely lost his moral fibre? Is he being bribed? or threatened?? How can we view the imperative to cover-up as anything other than evidence of guilt?

Peter Jesser said:

Piers Akerman has a nice piece on this.

http://blogs.news.com.au/dailytelegraph/piersakerman/index.php/dail...

It is interesting to see the Clerk of the Senate's view of the matter. But I agree with Barnaby. Is there a job in the offing for Fielding?

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Permalink Reply by Brendan Michael on July 31, 2011 at 9:15pm

Dale, This the best news I"ve heard in months. This woman is to praised for her courage and should be supported by all who believe in justice for the victims of heinous crimes. Go girl. Barnaby will be jumping up and down with glee on hearing this news. Rudd, Swan, Goss, the GG and the rest of the "shreddergate" mob will be s****ing bricks. Whoo Hoo.

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Permalink Reply by noel porter on July 31, 2011 at 9:23pm

Let us hope that there is a good ending in this tragic case ,

Good on you Annette McIntosh speak up and tell the real story and expose these mongrels that control our everyday life ,Show the system as it really is .

Corrupt ,and crooked ,

god bless you.