Bad Apple Bullies

Tips For Queensland teachers: How to deal with workplace bullies.

Queensland and Australian Public Service corruption, victimisation, harassment, workplace bullying, mobbing, discrimination and "payback".

8 February 2010

A young waitress, Brodie Rae Constance Panlock, 19, killed herself in September 2006 after being subjected to relentless workplace bullying.

Three of Brodie's workmates, Nicholas Smallwood, 26, now of Queensland, Rhys MacAlpine, 28, of Kooyong, and Gabriel Toomey, 23, of Melbourne, all pleaded guilty in the Melbourne Magistrates Court to failing to take reasonable care for the health and safety of persons.

The cafe's owner Marc Luis Da Cruz pleaded guilty to two charges, including failing to provide and maintain a safe working environment.

They were all convicted and fined a total of $335,000.

Magistrate Peter Lauritsen said there was a "poisonous atmosphere" among the staff at the Hawthorn cafe.

 

Brodie Panlock's father Damien Panlock said the law should be changed to include a custodial sentence for workplace bullies.

"Change the law," he told reporters.

 

The QTU have known since July 2002 that Queensland teachers are being bullied out of work.

When will the QTU take some action to protect members against workplace abuse?

When will they launch a class action against the Queensland Government, the Queensland Premier, The Minister of Education, etc. for their failure to -

  • take reasonable care for the health and safety of persons.
  • to provide and maintain a safe working environment.

 

 

5 February 2010

The article below was actually published in The Cairns Post on November 14 2009. I read it today and thought that the article and the comments were very interesting.

Former Cairns police officer Rosario Russo, 43, who retired from the Queensland Police service in January 2009, claims he suffered a mental and physical breakdown following years of job-related stress, bullying and threats from his fellow officers.

He claims that his colleagues tried to drive him out of the force by issuing him an improper search warrant for stealing property, a charge for which he was later cleared.

He said the ordeal drove him to consider taking his own life.

The Weekend Post has been in contact with current serving officers who tell their own stories of bullying in the ranks.

And The Weekend Post has become aware of a report that links a large majority of police officer suicides to workplace bullying.

Queensland Police Union spokesman Ross Mussgrove said "undoubtedly" bullying occurred within a police officer's workplace.

 

The Reader's Comments on this article suggest that there is a high level of awareness of public service workplace bullying in Cains -

When a culture of bullying becomes entrenched in an organisation, it is extremely difficult to eradicate.

Work values slowly change.

Personal ethical behaviour becomes increasingly difficult.

Bullying has become worse today because "promotion" is no longer based on seniority and experience but on a nebulous criteria called "merit."

Sociologists point out that this has permitted sociopathic personalities the chance to quickly rise to positions of power.

Posted by: Alison Alloway of CAIRNS 

 

I expect institutional bullying is widespread within the Queensland Police Service, as it is within Education, Emergency Services,Queensland Health and what other vital Queensland tax-payer funded essential services you care to name.

But what are the Queensland Government and its managers are doing about it?

Are they using it as a tool of management, perhaps?

Posted by: Dr Robert Lewis of Cairns

 

How disgraceful that the official Queensland Police Service media response to this story is to infer that anyone who complains of bullying or intimidation within the QPS is automatically someone who does not meet professional standards or is themselves facing serious disciplinary action.

This response just reinforces the already widely held perception that if you report bullying -

- or, in the case of Education Queensland, if you report child abuse -

- you will be targeted, ostracised and treated like the offender rather than supported as a victim.

Victims have largely reported that after complaining of bullying they were placed under intense scrutiny and labelled 'troublemakers'.

This official response completely corroborates that complaint.

It's funny because any public sector policy on bullying indicates that it is supposed to be the bully who does not meet professionalism standards and is supposed to be subject to serious disciplinary action.

Posted by: Jack Scagnetti 

 

I would like to see all workplaces revert to the old practice of promotion based on seniority and experience.

This is far better than having a self-serving sociopath parachuted into an organisation.

The benefits of promotion based on seniority are that people have to demonstrate their skills, both knowledge and people skills over a long period of time.

Another aspect is that it prevents the behaviour of currying favour and institutionalised cronyism which quickly turns a work culture toxic.

Posted by: Alison Alloway of CAIRNS

 

4 February 2010

There are new media reports today about alleged police misconduct in Far North Queensland.

How interesting and how very mysterious.

But Ms Bligh says investigations there have concluded and recommendations have been accepted by police.

"My understanding is that the CMC regularly provide confidential material to the Queensland Police Service for them to take action on," she said.

Why is this information confidential?

She has also dismissed suggestions the watchdog is toothless because it allows agencies like police and Education Queensland to investigate themselves.

It's toothless, Anna.

 
4 February 2010

There will be continuing revelations about corruption in Queensland until the power to initiate investigations is restored to the CMC and it is properly resourced.

 

4 February 2010

Two former Gold Coast detectives, Kurt Krebs and Graham Cameron, claim that they were bullied out of the police service partly because they refused to act on illegal search warrants.

They are suing for more than $2 million in compensation.

The detectives have launched legal action against the Workers Compensation Regulatory Authority ( Q-Comp ) after they were refused compensation for alleged bullying-related stress.

 

and, in relation to the recent allegations of police corruption on the Gold Coast :

The Queensland Police Union ( QPU ) has thrown its support behind Queensland police officers who give evidence against police accused of corruption.

A QPU spokesman yesterday confirmed that the union was providing legal representation for any witnesses required to give evidence by the CMC for its Operation Tesco.

 

If the Queensland Police Union can support members who are in conflict with members, why can't the Queensland Teachers' Union ( QTU )?

Queensland teachers are on their own when they report corruption.

 
 
4 February 2010
 
Rose Chapman, from Perth's Curtin University of Technology led research into the working conditions of 113 nurses, mostly female nurses aged in their early 40s.
 
The results of the study, published in the Journal of Clinical Nursing, show that -
  • 52 per cent of the nurses had been attacked while tending to patients.
  • 69 per cent had been physically threatened.
  • 92 per cent had verbally abused.

Most nurses failed to formally disclose the incidents because they believed that violence and abuse come with the job.

 

3 February 2010

The staff of the Lotus Glen Correctional Centre, west of Cairns, have passed a vote of no confidence in the jail's management.

The Queensland Public Sector Union ( QPSU ) say that staff at Lotus Glen have accused the prison management of ignoring safety and security concerns.

A handgun went missing at Lotus Glen last month.

 

The QPSU has lodged a dispute with the Industrial Relations Commission to resolve "continuing systemic failures'' of management.

Queensland Public Sector Union Far North Queensland organiser Kevin O'Sullivan said it was not unusual for inmates to attack corrective services officers.

Mr O'Sullivan said the dispute lodged with the IRC covered several issues, including -

  • claims of a double standard, with "one rule for management and another for staff'';
  • the victimisation of staff who complain
  • the failure to properly investigate security concerns.

"We believe there's no genuine desire to fix anything,'' he said.

 

A Queensland Corrective Services spokesman said the department now considered the IRC "the most appropriate forum" for the parties to air their differences.

 

2 February 2010

Two highly-trained members of the Specialist Services Branch of the Queensland police at Oxley, west of Brisbane were caught running nude around a police van during a buck's celebration in September 2009.

As many as five or six officers may have been nude in the police van at the time, including a police sergeant, but all but one of them were off duty at the time, Deputy Commissioner Ian Stewart said.

The two men who were running around the van could remain stood down for another five months while a police investigation continues.

How can it take the Queensland Police nine months to investigate something so simple?

 

University of Queensland public sector ethics lecturer Dr Bill De Maria labelled the situation "silly".

"It appears quite trivial; just a couple of boys having a good time and bucks' parties go on all the time and young men get up to all sorts of tricks,'' Dr De Maria said.

Deputy Commissioner Ian Stewart has previously said the behaviour of the officers and their use of a police vehicle was "unacceptable".

"Words fail me to be able to describe the disappointment," he said.

I can only presume that Deputy Commissioner Ian Stewart was laughing when he said that, because everybody else in Queensland is laughing.

 

Queensland Police Union President Ian Leavers would not comment this week because he did not want to jeopardise the officers' positions.

In September, he called on Queensland Police not to sack the pair.

"Sacking these experienced and highly-trained officers would be an over-the-top reaction,'' Mr Leavers said.

 

2 February 2010

Queensland Premier Anna Bligh announced this morning that principals of underperforming Queensland schools have been warned that they will lose their jobs if their schools don't lift standards.

And a new independent education authority has been proposed to monitor and provide training to lagging schools.

The new education authority is expected to replace the Queensland College of Teachers, the Queensland Studies Authority and the Non-State Schools Accreditation Board.

To view the green paper: A Flying Start for Queensland Children go to: http://www.deta.qld.gov.au/aflyingstart/

 

1 February 2010

One third of British children are convinced that one of their teachers is an extra-terrestrial.

( This can hardly be called workplace abuse, but I could not resist it! )

 

1 February 2010

Prime Minister Kevin Rudd has revealed that if Labor is re-elected, parents will be surveyed to gauge their satisfaction with their children's schools.

The results would be posted on My School.

This is a really bad idea, Mr Rudd - it will put teachers in an impossible situation.

They will be afraid to do anything other than colouring-in with children, in case children complain to their parents.

To get better academic results, students will have to work hard.

And they - and their parents - do not necessarily like working hard.

It's "boring'.

Mr Rudd and Education Minister Julia Gillard said the survey could examine -

  • whether parents believed their children were safe at school,
  • how teachers responded to their concerns,
  • and their happiness with behaviour-management strategies for tackling bullying.

Again, these demands put teachers in an impossible situation, Mr Rudd.

They will be at the beck and call of parents - and some parents can be very needy and demanding - when they really should be preparing their lessons.

They will have to respond to every complaint of "bullying" - and there would be hundreds of these "bullying" complaints at each school every day, often made by children in play.

Parents could also be asked about how a school approached teaching and learning.

And whether teachers were helpful and easy to talk to.

 

Mr Rudd, you are demanding far too much of classroom teachers.

Teachers need to be allowed to teach.

They are far too busy teaching to spend their time "helping" parents and "being easy to talk to".

 

What about surveying the teachers and asking them -

Do you have the resources that you need to teach effectively?

Does your principal support you effectively?

Does the school behaviour management plan work effectively?

Are poorly-behaved children dealt with effectively?

Does their behaviour improve?

Do the parents of your students support you effectively?

Has any parent behaved towards you in a violent or aggressive manner this year?

Have you been bullied or abused at work this year?

Do you enjoy your work?

  • My School website may allow parents to grade teachers, Stefanie Balogh, The Courier-Mail

The comments on this article are interesting - http://www.news.com.au/couriermail/comments/0,23836,26658849-3102,00.html

Thank goodness there are so many parents with some common-sense.

 

31 January 2010

THE Rudd Government will expand the My School website if it wins the next federal election.

The website compares the literacy and numeracy results of schools.

Prime Minister Kevin Rudd said it should also include information on school bullying - please include teacher bullying and abusive parent incidents, Mr Rudd - classroom innovation - too waffly, Mr Rudd, stick with the facts - and local community participation.

This website has huge potential for good.

You can actually pin-point where the problems are in a school.

The community may begin to value teachers for their ability to teach the children something, rather than their ability to smile and keep the children calm and happy with lots of colouring-in.

What about including information on the qualifications of teachers?

And the number of children who had to be sent to the principal, suspended, expelled, etc?

  • Labor wants to expand My School website, AAP, The Sunday Mail.

 

29 January 2010

Congratulations, Julia Gillard, the My School website is really, really good.

 

27 January 2010

There is an oversupply of primary school teachers in Queensland.

2751 of the student teachers who graduated in 2009 applied for a position with the Queensland Department of Education this year.

267 of these graduate teachers - about ten per cent - were offered a permanent position.

520 of the graduate teachers - about twenty per cent -  were offered temorary or contract positions.

 

Which seems to suggests that, if you study education in Queensland, there is a seventy per cent chance that you will be unemployed at the end of the course.

Queensland College of Teachers director John Ryan commented that teaching graduates and Queensland schools would both benefit if there was "greater alignment of university places in education with the supply and demand of Queensland schools".

Queensland Department of Education assistant director-general Craig Allen commented that primary and early learning positions "are not teacher-shortage areas in Education Queensland".

  • Few teacher vacancies in state schools, Tanya Chilcott, The Courier-Mail

 

23 January 2010

The Australian will announce the "Australian of the Year".

The Bad Apple Bullies website has nominated Karen Smith for this award.

Karen is the nursing assistant who reported the abuse of elderly people in a Queensland aged care home - and was sacked!

You can read Karen's story on her website : SING : Silence Is Not Golden  http://whistleblowerssupportgroup.blogspot.com/ 

Karen appeared in the recent SBS TV series about whistleblowers.

Her husband talked about how Karen's whistleblowing - "she wanted to do it for the old ladies" - has affected their lives.

Karen and her husband are having to live on a very reduced income.

To support Karen Smith as Australian of the Year - and to protest her treatment - write to The Editor in Chief, The Australian, GPO Box 4162, Sydney, 2001.

Or email the Australian, giving your name, address and phone number and saying why you support Karen.

A nomination form was also published on Page 2 of The Australian on Saturday 9 January 2010.

 

21 January 2010

Amy Handel has worked in the aged care and funeral industries.

She worked at the Cairns Base Hospital mortuary 18 months ago. 

But she only stayed for two days.

Amy says she witnessed shocking mistreatment of bodies in the Cairns Base Hospital mortuary.

"What I witnessed in those four walls was unethical, violent human behaviour which I cannot tolerate,'' she said.

"It was horrific.''

"I have suffered a horrendous debilitating injury due to what I had to witness in a position as a mortuary attendant,'' she said in Cairns.

Ms Handel is pursuing a compensation claim against Queensland Health in the Industrial Magistrates Court with the support of Shine Lawyers.

Queensland's compensation authority QComp have rejected Ms Handel's initial claim.

And Queensland Health says an audit of the mortuary shows the facility is operating "at a high standard and within guidelines".

Who did the audit?

What were the Terms of Reference?

 "Find no evidence, mate." ?

Ms Handel has vowed to pursue the claim, not only for herself but also, she says, to prevent further instances of the behaviour she witnessed.

"I cannot walk away after witnessing and not try to make things better,'' she said.

Ms Handel, you seem to be a whistleblower.

And now your journey begins.

You are going to find out a great deal about how democracy works - in Queensland.

  • 'Corpse's arm broken to remove shirt', AAP, The Courier-Mail

 

19 January 2010

Students with attention deficit disorder (ADD) or attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) find it hard to concentrate.

They are often unruly and sometimes violent.

Across Queensland, ADD or ADHD affect close to five per cent of primary school children.

 

But at least three schools in the Lockyer Valley had classes in which one in every two youngsters has either attention deficit disorder (ADD) or attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD).

Queensland Teachers’ Union representative Barry Welch said several classes in Ipswich had similar levels of behavioural disorders.

 

At Gatton State School, a teacher in their first year in the job was given a class in which more than half the students had behavioural disorders.

  • ADHD cases swamp our schools, Chris Garry, The Queensland Times.

 

17January 2010

Education Queensland have just performed a stunning back-flip.

Foreign languages will now be reinstated as a mandatory subject in Queensland state schools.Education Queensland had quietly allowed principals to opt out of teaching LOTE (Languages Other Than English) in Years 6, 7 and 8 – the years it used to be compulsory.Figures provided to The Courier-Mail by Education Queensland last week showed 298 state schools did not teach a foreign language ( or intercultural investigations, which can be taught instead of LOTE under the changes ) in 2009.So even more than 298 schools are actually not teaching LOTE.But the schools have concealed this by calling not teaching LOTE "intercultural investigations".

Education assistant-director general Yvana Jones last week said the changes – implemented statewide in 2009 – were made because a "one-size-fits-all approach didn't work in state schools".

The real truth is that many state school principals had not learned a language themselves and so they gave Languages Other Than English ( LOTE ) no support at all.

And young Australian teachers used to teach for two years and then set off overseas to do a world trip.

Teachers who have travelled - especially those who have travelled independently - or who can speak another language themselves are much more supportive of LOTE.

But nowadays Queensland teachers are paid so poorly and have so little job security - many of them have not travelled at all.

 

But when the news leaked out, experts - and many, many parents who emailed the Courier-Mail - slammed the move as short-sighted, damaging and out-of-step.

The response of parents to the Courier-Mail article was amazing - there was a very high level of support for LOTE.

Within hours of the story appearing on Saturday, Acting Education Minister Stephen Robertson moved to separate the Bligh Government from the Department's changes.

Queensland Education Minister Geoff Wilson has since ordered his top bureaucrat, director-general Julie Grantham, "to investigate how an 'optional' approach to LOTE came to be rolled out statewide without the endorsement of the State Government".

Isn't that amazing.

LOTE was significantly undermined by school principals - and the Queensland Government claims to know nothing about what was going on in their schools.

Ms Grantham is on leave.

Smart move, Julia.

  • Language subjects backflip in Queensland schools, Tanya Chilcott, The Courier-Mail

 

17 January 2010

Queensland schools are battling a rising tide of aggressive behaviour.

Queensland teachers and teacher aides are undertaking courses to learn how to handle the most violent students.

The "Nonviolent Crisis Intervention" course includes coaching on eight defensive moves teachers can use on children who -

  • bite them,
  • pull their hair,
  • kick
  • and choke them.

It also outlines four ways to lock and hold out-of-control children who have become a danger to themselves and others.

The course was originally introduced to counter the number of workers' compensation claims arising from injured Queensland teachers.

Queensland Teachers Union president Steve Ryan said many Queensland teachers didn't have access to the program and were left to fend for themselves.

  • Queensland teachers take on nonviolent crisis intervention, Kathleen Donaghey, The Sunday Mail

 

9 January 2010

The Henderson Labor government in the Northern Territory of Australia is under pressure to stamp out bullying and harassment among NT public servants.

SHORT-TERM contracts are being blamed for poor management within the Northern Territory public service.

A survey of the Territory's 17,000 public servants this week revealed 43 per cent say they've suffered workplace bullying and harassment.

A quarter of all Territory public servants participated in the survey.

54 per cent say bullying and harassment is not a problem in their office.

Twenty-two per cent reported they were bullied or harassed in the past year.

Of these workers, 67 per cent complained to someone in authority.

28 per cent said they were satisfied with how the matter was handled.

The most common source of alleged bullying was managers and supervisors, followed by other employees.

 

The Community and Public Sector Union's regional director Paul Morris says many public servants were reluctant to participate in the survey because they feared the computerised answer system would allow their views to fall into the hands of superiors.

"People were worried there'd be some retribution from a manager if they were too open and honest," Morris tells Inquirer.

  • Short contracts blamed for culture of bullying in public service, The Australian.

 

31 December 2009

Robert Needham, outgoing chairman of Queensland's Crime and Misconduct Commission ( CMC ) said the the practice of Queensland police men and women relying on the Queensland police union to provide their legal defence compelled officers to join the union.

Even if they had little real interest in union affairs.

Mr Needham makes o good point here.

And his comment could also apply to the Queensland Teachers' Union ( QTU ), or any other Queensland public service union. 

Mr Needham said parliament should consider establishing a defence fund for police officers - and teachers and other public servants - who were under investigation or facing complaints.

Mr Needham said that a huge percentage of Queensland police - and teachers and other public servants - did not vote in union elections.

"That shows that there is (sic) a lot of people in there who are not really interested in union affairs, and clearly they are there because of the chance that if there is an allegation against them, they need to turn to the union to be represented.'

And then they find that they are refused any legal advice, and that they are exposed to abuse.

This situation gives the unions too much power.

And it exposes Queensland classroom teachers to workplace abuse.

Mr Needham said he has been pushing for all public sector unions ...  to introduce a code of conduct to help promote integrity and honesty.

Mr Needham, to promote integrity and honesty in Queensland schools, or anywhere else in the Queensland public service, you need to PROMOTE public servants who act with integrity and honesty.

At the moment Queensland public servants who demonstrate any integrity and honesty are being attacked and driven out of work.

You need to totally reform the Queensland public service promotion system - and to weed out the lazy charming smilers, the incompetents, the illiterates and the psychopaths.

  • Push for code of conduct for Queensland police, Michael McKenna, The Australian.

 

19 December 2009

Yesterday Martin Moynihan  - a former Supreme Court judge - was appointed to replace Robert Needham as Chairman of the Queensland Crime and Misconduct Commission ( CMC ) for the next two years.

He is the uncle of Tony Moynihan, the Director of Public Prosecutions.

How very, very Queensland.

During 2009 the CMC investigated 80 cases, compared with the usual average of about 110 cases.

Because Mr Needham claimed to believe that the public service had "matured".

Based on what evidence, Mr Needham?

And Mr Needham had increasingly referred misconduct complaints back to Queensland public service departments, allowing the Queensland public servants to investigate themselves - and to find no evidence of their own misconduct.

Judge Moynihan said yesterday that he was aware of suggestions that some Queensland public service departments may be less "mature" than Mr Needham claimed to believe.

"I think it needs to be looked at," Judge Moynihan said of the "just let them investigate themselves and find no evidence of their own misconduct" Queensland CMC "investigation process".

  • New CMC boss Martin Moynihan to target government departments, Patrick Lion, The Courier-Mail.

 

18 December 2009

There were hundreds of violent attacks by problem students in Queensland classrooms during 2009.

Queensland Education Minister Geoff Wilson has said that, from next year, Queensland school principals would be able to expel students instead of having to get permission from an Education Queensland district boss.

"I'm appalled by the behaviour that's been reported to me," Mr Wilson said.

In one incident, a Queensland teacher was bitten and left bleeding after intervening in a student assault.

  • School principals win right to expel problem students, Alison Sandy and Tanya Chilcott, The Courier-Mail.

 

17 December 2009

Queensland classroom teachers are having to deal with some shocking classroom behaviour.

Our teachers deserve a workplace free from abuse, harassment and physical threats.

  • Principals given back leadership, Editorial, The Courier-Mail.

 

16 December 2009

Outgoing Crime and Misconduct Commission chair Robert Needham believes that the Queensland Government operates under a system in which some public servants saw their role as fulfilling the wishes of their ministers rather than giving impartial advice.

  • Bureaucrats are lap-dogs: CMC boss, Craig Johnstone, P. 7, The Courier-Mail.

 

30 November 2009

Queensland Education Minister Geoff Wilson said any allegation about the bullying of Education Queensland whistleblowers would be treated "extremely seriously".

"I urge (Opposition education spokesman) Dr Flegg to provide any evidence he has about these issues to Education Queensland for investigation as a matter of priority," Mr Wilson said.

Mr Wilson said his department encouraged staff to come forward with their concerns.

- And then, about a year later, they will put them on "Managing Unsatisfactory Performance" and drive them out of work.

This seems to be the Education Queensland unofficial policy for dealing with teachers' disclosures.

Mr Wilson, your staff seem to be afraid to tell you the truth!

On 4 September this year Robina Cosser sent an official submission to Anna Bligh and her "Round Table" concerning workplace bullying in Queensland schools.

Hasn't Anna Bligh discussed the submission with you yet?

When Robina first asked for the workplace bullying to be investigated in December 2000, she was threatened five times that "action would be taken" against her if she contined to complain.

Robina Cosser was certainly not "encouraged to come forward with her concerns".

The CMC and Education Queensland refused to investigate her complaint till 2006.

After Robina had discovered that her Education Queensland "offical records" had been extensively falsified.

And even in 2006 the "Independent Investigator" was only allowed to interview two of the bullies and to phone another bully.

And he was only allowed to copy down exactly what these bullies told him, even if it was obviously untrue. 

Mr Wilson, why don't you know these facts?

A copy of Robina's submission to Anna Bligh concerning the corruption / failure of the Queensland Crime and Misconduct Commission ( CMC ) / Education Queensland "investigation process" can be found on Anna Bligh's website :

http://www.premiers.qld.gov.au/community-issues/open-transparent-gov/submissions/submissions-201-220/robina-cosser.aspx

Mr Wilson, don't just passively wait for your staff to tell you about the bullying - they are too afraid to tell you the truth!

You need to set an example for your staff - read Robina Cosser's submission and find out the facts!

  • Qld teachers complain of bullying, AAP, The Brisbane Times, 30 November 2009 

Queensland and Australian public service corruption, victimisation, harassment, workplace bullying, mobbing, discrimination and "payback".

10 December, 2009

WHISTLEBLOWER ACTION GROUP critical of  GRIFFITH UNIVERSITY research on WHISTLEBLOWING.

A review of the Whistle While They Work Reports by Griffith University was presented to the National Conference of Whistleblowers Australia by Greg McMahon, Whistleblowers Action Group National Director, in Adelaide last weekend.

‘The Griffith study fails to address systemic wrongdoing’, Greg McMahon explained.

The performance of  "watchdogs" such as the Ombudsmen and the Crime Commissions needs to be included in any bona fide research into whistleblowing, Solicitor Gordon Harris concluded.

Thirteen (13) of the fourteen (14) organisations steering the Griffith study were these "watchdogs".

 

9 December 2009

Gary Long SC has been appointed as the Queensland Parliamentary Crime and Misconduct Commissioner.

He replaces Alan MacSporran, who, we are now told, has been doing the job for the past five years. 

Who knew that?

Who knew anything about Alan MacSporran?

What exactly has Alan MacSporran been doing for the past five years?

When I complained to the PCMC about the  CMC / Education Queensland faux "investigation process", what exactly did Alan MacSporran do?

Gary Long will assume the part-time position on January 10.

PCMC chairman Paul Hoolihan, the member for Keppel, said Mr Long was unanimously supported by the bipartisan committee.

The parliamentary commissioner is a focal figure in the review and oversight of the Crime and Misconduct Commission.

The parliamentary commissioner is charged with the responsibility of handling and investigating complaints against the alleged actions of the corruption watchdog and its officials.

Now they tell us.

They have been keeping this a big secret.

Complaints are referred to the commissioner by the Parliamentary Crime and Misconduct Committee.

This is not exactly true, according to my understanding of the situation.

The PCMC do not actually read complaints about the CMC.

Their office staff send complaints about the CMC directly to the CMC.

The PCMC allow the CMC to investigate themselves.

Then, based on the CMC's investigation into the CMC, the PCMC make their decision to do something about your complaint or to do nothing about your complaint.

At every stage of the CMC / Education Queensland faux "investigation process" the public servants that you have complained about are allowed to investigate themselves.

The Bligh Labor Government holds a 4-3 advantage in that committee room.

But under the Crime and Misconduct Act, the decision to refer a matter onwards for investigation by the commissioner must be made on bipartisan terms, with at least one non-government member acquiescing.

Wait a moment.

What about a decision not to refer a matter onwards for investigation?

If there are only 3 non-Labor members of the PCMC, that means that the 4 Labor members can block an investigation.

Twenty-seven such complaints against the CMC or CMC officers were lodged in the 2008/09 financial year, according to the PCMC annual report released last month.

But how many more complaints about the CMC did the PCMC refuse to send onwards for investigation?

The principal legal officer of the commissioner's office, Mitchell Kunde, has been appointed acting commissioner until Mr Long commences the job on January 10.

  • Long time coming for new anti-corruption commissioner, Chris Barrett, The Brisbane Times 

 

8 December 2009

In February 2009, former Bundaberg Hospital nurse Christine Cameron raised over 100 complaints about patient treatment and the manipulation of records at Bundaberg Hospital.

"The Crime and Misconduct Commission ( CMC ) didn't investigate, they handed it back to Queensland Health, and you can't have a department investigate itself and come up with an unbiased report," Ms Cameron said.

"... They don't want anyone to know and they don't want to investigate it and don't want to sort it out."

Mrs Cameron says an interim report provided to her by the Department's ethical standards unit was biased.

"I asked them on the first day would they come back and check things with me and they never did," she said.

"They did just the initial interviews and that was it.

This is why the Queensland CMC "devolution strategy" is a dismal failure.

Queensland government department / CMC "investigations" seem to consist of simply copying down any silly excuse, even if it is obviously untrue.

Then the departmental / CMC"investigation" is declared "finalised" and the complainant is not allowed to tell the "investigator", the Department and the CMC that they have been fooled with lies that could easily be disproved.

The purpose of a Queensland CMC / departmental investigation seems to be to find no evidence of the corruption / misconduct and to declare the investigation "finalised".

"They've never come back to me to check things so I could say, 'well, that's wrong - I've got documented evidence against it'."

But Queensland Health District director Kevin Hegarty says the Queensland Health did "act on the allegations".

  • Qld Health accused of Bundaberg hospital cover-up, Kallee Buchanan, ABC News

 

7 December 2009

The Australian understands former Supreme Court judge Martin Moynihan heads the list of candidates to succeed outgoing Queensland Crime and Misconduct Commission ( CMC ) chairman Robert Needham.

Mr Moynihan was appointed to the Supreme Court by Joh Bjelke-Petersen's Nationals in 1984.

He is married to former state bureaucrat Marg O'Donnell, who ran a number of government departments for Anna Bligh's predecessor as Queensland premier, Peter Beattie.

I know nothing about Marg O'Donnell, good or bad, but I am sick to the bone of Queensland being run by a small group of powerful husbands and wives.

In 2005, then Justice Moynihan effectively scuttled a $5.6 million commission of inquiry by barrister Tony Morris into a series of patient deaths linked to Indian-born surgeon Jayant Patel, ruling that the proceedings had been biased against two key witnesses.

Let's hope Justice Moynihan has the guts and integrity to tell Anna Bligh that the CMC "devolution strategy" - the practice of letting corrupt Queensland public servants investigate themselves and find no evidence of their own corruption - is an absolute, total, dismal failure.

  • Ex-judge to head crime watchdog, Michael Mckenna, The Australian

 

6 December 2009

39 per cent of Victorian teachers report they have been repeatedly bullied at work.

Parents' groups say the bullying culture among teachers is contributing to the problem among children - because students who see bullying in role models mimic that behaviour.

This is absolutely right.

School principals who are liars and bullies themselves seem to encourage poorly-behaved students to lie and bully.

The Sunday Herald Sun has also found:

Victorian teachers encourage parents to complain about their enemies to school principals.

Staff routinely complain about each other's teaching ability to year leaders, principals and even education authorities.

Difficult students are "palmed off" on unpopular colleagues.

"There is bullying between teachers and teachers, teachers and principals and principals and parents," said Parents Victoria spokeswoman Elaine Crowle.

Mary Bluett, president of the Australian Education Union Victorian branch, said she was not surprised teachers topped the table for workplace bullying.

"Bullying is a problem with some principals."

I really admire the way that Mary Bluett tells the truth about what is going on in Victorian schools.

This is what I would expect of a union leader.

Do the Queensland Teachers' Union admit that Queensland classroom teachers are bullied by school principals?

  • Teachers trapped by class bullying, Evonne Barry, Herald Sun

 

Saturday 5 December, 2009

The 2009 National Conference of Whistleblowers Australia began.

The conference was held at Aquinas College at the University of Adelaide.

The minutes of the Conference will be in the next issue of The Whistle.

 

Wednesday 2 December, 2009

Karen Smith appeared on SBS TV at 8:30pm in Law and Disorder.

 
Go Karen!  - A real Australian Hero. 
 
Monday 30 November 2009

New figures released by the Queensland Government showed the number of formal complaints of bullying and aggressive behaviour by teachers against other teachers had increased by more than 40 per cent over the past two years.

  • In 2007, 26 teachers made formal complaints to the education department about other teachers.
  • The number rose to 30 in 2008.
  • And there have been 37 complaints so far in 2009.

Opposition education spokesman Bruce Flegg said he had been approached by a number of teachers concerned about being told by other teachers to keep quiet about school problems.

"There's pressure to cover up those sorts of events, but teachers in those schools want the root causes to be addressed," Dr Flegg said.

"I don't think there is any doubt whistleblowers are being bullied.

"The agenda is about controlling the public relations rather than fixing the problems."

Dr Flegg said it was a systemic problem that required government action. 

  • Teachers bullied to keep quiet on problem schools, AAP (Isn't there any Queensland Newspaper Reporter with the guts to write about this issue under their own name?) 

 

Saturday 28 November 2009

FORMER sport minister Judy Spence told a misconduct hearing yesterday that some public servants would try to second-guess their ministers and not follow due process.

"I think there is a tendency for some public servants, not all, but some public servants to try to second-guess ministers to try to deliver up something that the minister wants without really due regard to process," she said.

If Judy Spence knows that this is the case, did she give instructions that the public servants were not to do this?

Did she instruct them to follow the "due process"?

Some ministerial staffers argued that there was no way senior bureaucrats would be so intimidated by a policy adviser that they would subvert due process.

  • Bureaucrats should have said no, says Judy Spence, Craig Johnstone, The Courier-Mail

 

Friday 27 November 2009

Gillian Sneddon helped police put her former boss, Swansea MP Milton Orkopoulos, in jail for child sex offences.
 
But New South Wales ( NSW ) Deputy Ombudsman Chris Wheeler has told Ms Sneddon that there is nowhere she can turn for help about her treatment as a whistleblower.
 
Maitland MP Frank Terenzini has tabled the NSW Government's report into the gaps in the system protecting public service whistleblowers.

No government agency can investigate how Ms Sneddon has been treated.

- Because Ms Sneddon did not report directly to the clerk of the Legislative Assembly, Russell Grove, as required under the Protected Disclosures Act!

Eighteen months after Milton Orkopoulos was jailed, Ms Sneddon remains unemployed.

She is fighting a worker's compensation case against the NSW Government.

NSW Opposition MP Peter Debnam said it was a scandal.

When Mr Orkopoulos's victims sought her help, and when police asked for help, Ms Sneddon took responsibility for helping them.

"At what point is someone going to take responsibility for what's happened to me?" Ms Sneddon said.

  • No help for Orkopoulos whistleblower Gillian Sneddon, Joanne McCarthy, The Herald, 21 November 2009 

 

Thursday 26 November, 2009

The Crime and Misconduct Commission is holding an inquiry into the behaviour of Simon Tutt.

Simon Tutt is the ex-advisor to former sports minister Judy Spence.

The picture emerging from the inqiry is one of a Queensland government bureaucracy which is being denied the opportunity to do what it is supposed to do : to provide "frank and fearless" advice to the government of the day.

Senior Queensland bureaucrats seem to be being bullied and browbeaten into providing advice that reflects a minister's political priorities rather than their own considered views.

CMC chairman Robert Needham is concerned about these revelations.

"I would be interested in ways in which public servants can be empowered to say no," he said.

I can solve your problem, Mr Needham.

You need to employ some good honest whistleblowers in the Queensland public service, Mr Needham.

They would soon sort the corruption out.

Most of the evidence to the inquiry so far suggests that some bureaucrats - some very senior bureaucrats - feel that they do not have the power to say "no".

  • Public servants too scared to say no, Craig Johnstone, P.4, The Courier-Mail.

 

Thursday 26 November, 2009

Respected academic Dr Christine Eastwood claims that -

  • senior Queensland police officers are involved in crime 

  • a senior member of the Queensland Crime and Misconduct Commission ( CMC ) is involved.

  • and that CMC chair Robert Needham has refused to act on her allegations.

Dr Eastwood is the wife of Southport magistrate John Costanzo.

She has made a Statutory Declaration describing a meeting between John Constanzo, Robert Needham and herself in a Coolangatta hotel room in August.

Dr Eastwood alleges that Mr Needham taped their conversation.

But that Mr Needham refused to "accept" her complaint.

And that he refused to take with him any of the documentation that she had prepared in relation to the complaint.

Last night Mr Needham said that Dr Eastwood's allegations appeared to stem from a long-running family dispute.

But CMC officers can sometimes "spin" your allegations to make them sound trivial.

Mr Needham said the allegations were not in his jurisdiction and did not raise "reasonable" suspicion.

But wouldn't a magistrate be able to judge "reasonable" suspicion?

Dr Eastwood wrote to the Parliamentary Crime and Misconduct Commission ( PCMC ) after Mr Needham allegedly refused to act.

She claims that the PCMC informed the CMC of her complaint and asked for a report from the CMC on the issue.

This is what the members of the Queensland PCMC tell you that they have to do.

They don't read your complaint.

Their office staff automatically send all PCMC matters directly to the PCMC.

And the PCMC office staff automatically send complants about the CMC to the CMC.

I have the impression - and it is only an impression - that the members of the PCMC never, ever actually read your complaint.

They simply read the CMC report on your complaint.

So, once again, Queensland public servants are allowed to investigate themselves.

And to find no evidence of their own misconduct, etc.

And this public service process of not actually reading your complaint is called "Natural Justice".

In Queensland.

Attorney-General Cameron Dick promised the matter would be properly investigated.

Mr Dick - Who will conduct this "proper" investigation?

  • Parliament told CMC head 'refused to act' on police complaint, Steven Wardill, The Courier-Mail
  • CMC boss 'rude, aggressive and insensitive', Daniel Hurst, Brisbane Times

 

Wednesday 25 November, 2009

8:30 pm Law and Disorder Part 2: Allan Kessing

Former customs official Allan Kessing has fought for years to clear his name after he was convicted of leaking reports to the media that highlighted major security flaws at Sydney Airport.

 

Wednesday 25 November 2009

The Queensland Labor Government has linked debate on its "Integrity Bill" with the Opposition's legislation for a corruption commission of inquiry.

The Labor Government says that a commission of inquiry into alleged corruption would be a waste of time and money.

Opposition Leader John-Paul Langbroek told Parliament that the "Integrity Bill" is not enough and that a Royal Commission is needed.

And I agree.

The Integrity Bill does not seem to reflect many of the issues raised in the 200+ submissions to Anna Bligh and her "round table".

"The integrity Bill is a wasted opportunity  ... because of its lack of breadth, the superficial way that it attempts to pretend that the Government has developed a newfound interest in accountability and integrity in the way the state is governed," Mr Langbroek said.

Labor MP Grace Grace says an inquiry would be a waste of money.

"All matters can be investigated by the CMC ( Crime and Misconduct Commission ), who has (sic) more than enough powers to carry out investigatory functions," Ms Grace said.

Actually, Grace Grace, in my experience that is not correct.

The CMC do not have the powers - 98 per cent of the CMC's  powers have been "devolved" to Queensland government departments - the government departments are being allowed to investigate themselves.

And it is not working.

Grace, I met you when the Queensland Parliament was held in the Cairns Convention Centre.

I told you that, when Queensland teachers were bullied at work, the immediate and only advice of the Queensland Teachers' Union  ( QTU ) was to "accept the things you cannot change" because there was no hope of justice.

You said that you found that hard to believe.

I urged you to check the facts with the QTU.

What did the QTU tell you?

I would be interested to know.

  • Qld MPs glove up for integrity stoush, Kerrin Binnie, ABC News

 

Tuesday 24 November, 2009

The Crime and Misconduct Commission has raised concerns of widespread political pressure being placed on "independent" public officials in Queensland.

CMC officer and counsel assisting the inquiry, Russell Pearce, said that public servants who were put in awkward situations by ministerial staffers were generally reluctant to come forward with formal complaints.

"Anecdotal evidence suggests to the CMC that the issue of ministerial staff attempting to influence public services may be prevalent," he told the inquiry.

"Certainly, the CMC is aware of some recent episodes in which public servants have been 'directed' in inappropriate ways."

  • Political pressure on officials 'widespread': CMC, Daniel Hurst, The Brisbane Times

 

Sunday 22 November, 2009

The Queensland Department of Education's 2008 / 2009 report reveals that -

  • one education department bureaucrat received a pay rise to between $440,000 and $459,999
  • and another received a pay rise to between $460,000 and $479,000

- while Queensland classroom teachers were battling for their miserable pay rise of 12.5 per cent - over three years!

Liberal National Party (LNP) education spokesman Bruce Flegg said that the massive bureaucratic salaries were an insult to Queensland classroom teachers.

And were hard to justify given Queensland was at the bottom of the class in literacy and numeracy standards.

"We pay out (sic) senior public servants consistently with those salaries across the country," Anna Bligh said.

But not your classroom teachers, Mrs Bligh.

"This is the reality of modern public sector employment - the most senior people ... attract these kinds of salaries."

But not the classroom teachers who actually do the work.

Just the "we-know-nothing-and-do-nothing-about-anything" bureaucrats.

  • Bureaucrats pay 'a slap in face' to teachersAAP

 

Wednesday 18 November, 2009

8.30pm SBS TV Law and Disorder : Andrew Wilkie - The Perfect Whistleblower. Part 1 of 3.

An account of what happens when whistleblowers take on higher powers.

Begins with the story of Andrew Wilkie, a former intelligence analyst for Australia's Office of National Assessments, who spoke out against the 2003 invasion of Iraq.

 

Monday 16 November, 2009

Last week, Education Minister Julia Gillard convened a national conference in Canberra involving 150 school leaders from around Australia.

Although her focus was on selling the Government's education revolution, it quickly became apparent that principals had other, more immediate and pressing things on their collective mind.

Foremost was classroom misbehaviour.

The reality is that spending billions on school buildings and trying to attract quality graduates to teaching is useless if teachers cannot teach because of disruptive children who refuse to learn. 

The real issue confronting Australian schools, which politicians are ignoring, involves rude, disengaged and violent students.

The result?

New teachers are quitting in droves, older teachers are retiring early and stress-related claims are on the increase.

The Australian Education Union's 2008 survey of new teachers ranks student misbehaviour before concerns about pay and class sizes, and second to workload as the chief source of complaint.

Secondary teachers rank it No.1 at 71.4 per cent.

Primary school teachers rank it second at 66.1 per cent.

  • New teachers say classroom violence their biggest concern, Kevin Donnelly, director of the Melbourne-based Education Standards Institute, The Courier-Mail.

16 November, 2009

Queensland Anti-Discrimination Commissioner Susan Booth has tabled her annual report to Parliament.

Susan Booth says that human rights laws in Queensland are only effective if complainants can afford a legal process.

Ms Booth also says that other states are more proactive in preventing discrimination.

I complained to the Anti Discrimination Commission of Queensland ( ADCQ ) in 2003.

I was forced to give my complaint to the local ADCQ office.

Which was only a few metres from the local office of Education Queensland.

I had the strong impression that it was just too difficult for these ADCQ officers to deal with a complaint about important people in the local community.

One of the ADCQ officers said to me, "But you can't say that about a school principal!".

That is why I asked the Director of Ethical Standards, Education Queensland to appoint an independent investigator who was not a member of the local community.

But The Director of Ethical Standards, Education Queensland ignored my concerns.

He appointed a local person as the "independent investigator".

And, as I had explained to the Director of Ethical Standards, Education Queensland, it was  not possible for a local person to deal "impartially" with a complaint about the wife of one of his workmates, or about important local personalities in their local community.

Maybe that was the point of the "investigation process"?

  • Qld anti-discrimination laws not proactive enough, Chris O'Brien, ABC News

13 November, 2009

Federal Education Minister Julia Gillard yesterday launched a strong attack on critics of the government's plans to publish school test results, accusing them of focusing on non-academic skills and wanting to produce "happy, illiterate, innumerate children".

Ms Gillard said "I don't believe our aim is to have schools full of happy, illiterate, innumerate children."

Well said, Julia Gillard.

What is so very sad is that a Queensland teacher who dared to say those words could be put on "Managing Unsatisfactory Performance" by an OP19 acting principal.

"Because we want to change the way that you are thinking".

And, over a period of two years of OP19-torture, the teacher would be driven into ill health and out of work.

In Queensland.

10 November, 2009

Premier Anna Bligh has announced reforms based on four key principles:

  • stronger rules of integrity and accountability,
  • a stronger culture of ethical behaviour across the public sector,
  • a program of strong scrutiny and stronger enforcement of the rules and regulations.

  • Editorial, The Courier-Mail

Dr Paul Williams says that the Government needs to consider introducing behaviour marshals into the worst of our schools.

9 November, 2009

Over time, a cavernous gap has opened between what parents and teachers know, and what bureaucrats and ministers publicly maintain.

Even in the mid-1990s Dr Paul Williams could see the writing on the wall of his classroom.

Sometimes literally.

Student apathy, aggressive children and their often spiteful parents turned the noble profession nasty.

Paul Williams says that without parental support, there is no classroom discipline.

The Government must directly engage the parents of disorderly children.

The Government would do well to consider the introduction of behaviour marshals to the worst of our schools.

These behaviour marshals would have the time, training and physical capacity to remove children from classes.

  • Lessons still to be learned, Paul Williams, Lecturer at the School of Humanities, Griffith University, Gold Coast, in The Courier-Mail

Anna Bligh responds to the "Queensland Green Paper on Integrity" submissions.

9 November, 2009

Queensland premier Anna Bligh will today unveil the first wave of measures to clean up the state's accountability -

  • The role of the state's Integrity Commissioner will be expanded to provide advice to all MPs rather than just ministers.

  • There will be changes to the Whistleblower Protection Act.

  • An ethical standards branch will be established to provide advice to bureaucrats.

 

And a "second wave of reforms" will be unveiled in the middle of next year.

  • Anna Bligh to cap donations, ban lobbyist success fees, Steven Wardill, The Courier-Mail 

Queensland classroom teachers do not have "the best working conditions in the world", Mrs Bligh.

Monday, 9 November, 2009

Queensland teachers are expected to vote in a fortnight on their new pay deal.

The deal could see the state's beginning teachers as the highest paid in the country in July 2011, with a base salary of $56,900 ( up from $48,829 ).

Classroom teachers who are selected for the new "senior teacher" classification will receive a salary of $83,308 a year in 2011.

 

Notice that it is only classroom teachers whose pay rise will have to be won on "merit".

 

Principals and heads of program, deputy principals and guidance officers will receive an additional 2.5 per cent pay rise in July 2011.

 

No "merit" will be necessary in their case.

But they will judge the "merit" of classroom teachers.

 

"We're sending a clear message to students starting university, enrol in a graduate teaching program and -

  • take up one of the best jobs in the world
  • in the best state in Australia
  • with the best conditions," 

Premier Anna Bligh said.

 

Mrs Bligh, Queensland teachers do not have the best working conditions in the world.

You know that.

What have you actually done about the workplace bullying in Queensland schools since 23 June 2002, Mrs Bligh?

  • Teachers win pay deal, Thomas Chamberlin, The Cairns Post

Queensland Teachers Union accept pay deal - but most classroom teachers seem to "win" very little.

7 November, 2009

The Queensland Teachers Union ( QTU ) state council yesterday signed off on the Government's offer of a 12.5 per cent pay rise over three years – an offer the union recently rejected.

The QTU wanted an 18.5 per cent increase.

Classroom teachers will get the (previously rejected) 4.5 per cent wage increase backdated to July 1 and further increases of 4 per cent in July 2010 and 2011.

But some last-minute sweeteners were thrown in by Premier Anna Bligh :

Teachers with 13 years or more experience can immediately apply for an upgrade.

This promotion and pay rise would not be automatic, but based on "merit".

Principals and other administrators would receive an extra 2.5 per cent pay bonus after the three-year deal.

 

The Queensland Teachers' Union spent $75,000 of members' money during the March election campaign attacking Anna Bligh in a media blitz.

  • Premier Anna Bligh finds $1 billion for Queensland teachers, Darrell Giles, The Sunday Mail

 

As a public servant, the QPSU - Queensland Public Sector Union - has sent out an email stating that all public servants will receive a 4.5% rise this year, backdated to July 1, and 4% over the next two years.

It is an Enterprise Bargain, EB.

This rise for teachers is the same as other government workers, so it isn't like this is a huge win for them.

  • Elle of Brisbane, Reader's comment 53.

Look out for whistleblowers on SBS TV!

SBS TV are running a series of programs on whistleblowers in the weeks before the Adelaide conference of Whistleblowers Australia:

 

Andrew Wilkie : Weapons of mass destruction : Wednesday 18 November

Alan Kessing : Airport Security : Wednesday 25 November

Karen Smith : Resident Care Abuse : Wednesday 2 December

The programs will run at 8.00pm or 8:30pm.

 

SBS will also be running a series of short "mini programs" about 6-8 minutes long, to be run online from just before the first documentary on Wednesday 18 November:

Debbie Locke, a former detective in the NSW police,

Phil Vardy, medical researcher and scientist in the Mcbride affair,

Alan Parkinson, talking about the Maralinga clean-up fiasco,

Jill Joliffe, speaking about the Balibo Five, who were murdered in Timor L'Este.

Nicolas Rothwell : The Failed State

24 October, 2009

Nicolas Rothwell's article "The Failed State" in The Australian today is interesting.

He is actually describing the Northern Territory but many of his comments could also apply to Queensland -

" In Australia we are used to seeing progress in governance, not failure. ...

Not in Queensland.

We expect governments in our jurisdictions that function well, provide efficient services, and maintain a fair match between the rhetoric of politics and the facts on the ground.

Not in Queensland.

... Elections have been reduced to straight vote-buying and the provision of high-cost "bread and circuses" projects.

... Why support an opposition party when you will be excluded from the circle of favour that expresses itself in plum jobs, promotion opportunities, special awards, consultancies, contracts and development opportunities?

... In this environment, a party-state comes into being -

  • Bureaucrats carrying out party dictates,
  • politicised appointments to key posts,
  • a climate of obedience,
  • a culture of prudent silence.

Buttressing this inner cement of unspoken ties is a culture of vociferous announcement.

At the core of the system is a mind-set reminiscent of Pacific Island cargo-cults.

An institution is named, set up, housed and lightly staffed : problem solved.

A few words are added to an old policy and a "new" policy is announced and launched : problem solved.

Thus Queensland is full of facades rather than real institutions -

  •  a Crime and Misconduct Commission that investigates 2 per cent of the disclosures that it receives.
  • Ethical Conduct Departments that conduct faux "investigations", produce falsified "final outcome" reports and facilitate appalling ethical conduct.

Such facade institutions, and the philosophy behind them, infect the air.

They create a fantasy approach to administration, where the declaration of a policy is sufficient to change the world.

Hence the avalanches of "reviews" even as conditions in the real universe continue to deteriorate.

 

The fantasy approach to administration necessitates a ceaseless production of propaganda and spin.

So a large media army is employed in the state sector.  

But fewer newspaper reporters are employed. 

So there is a much-reduced print forum for the reflection of events.

The result is a strange void at the heart of things, a silence, a failure of serious conversation about serious issues.

 

Meanwhile, the obedient, silent bureaucrats receive vast salaries and perks.

And consultants feed at the trough.

  • The Failed State, Nicolas Rothwell, The Australian

The Queensland Police Union stand up and fight for bullied union members.

October 17, 2009 (and earlier report on 12 October 2009)

Sergeant Robbie Munn is a 30-year veteran police officer who has exposed cronyism and corruption in the police force.

The police force claims that Sergeant Munn requires psychiatric help.

And he has been ordered off work even though his doctor says he is fit for duty.

Queensland Police Union general secretary Mick Barnes said Sgt Munn was a victim of "bastardisation" in the force.

 

I really like the way that the Queensland Police Union stand up for their members when they are bullied at work.

Why don't the Queensland Teachers' Union stand up for bullied members?

 

"When our members are under investigation we get the best lawyers in Queensland ..." said Queensland Police Union president Ian Leavers.

 

Queensland teachers who are bullied at work get no legal assistance.

They just get told to "accept the things you cannot change."

 

Police work is very stressful and most police officers will tell you the best therapy they get comes from chatting to their workmates.

So -  "When the police department turns on you ... it's sort of like being rejected by a parent," one officer said.

 

Senior Sergeant Mick Isles is another highly respected police officer.

He was in charge of Ayr police station, in north Queensland.

His "treatment" by the Queensland police began with his very public arrest at a charity event last August.

 

What a horrible thing to do to a policeman.

How degrading.

 

Senior Sergeant Isles was off work for 13 months on stress leave.

First the Crime and Misconduct Commission ( CMC ) and then the police ethical standards command investigated allegations of wrongdoing.

Senior Sergeant Isles was fully exonerated.

He returned to work on September 21 2009.

But he was still feeling humiliated by the lengthy investigation that was well known around town and the police service.

Exactly what has happened to Sen Sgt Isles is unknown.

An extensive search south of Ayr located his vehicle but no sign of the 58-year-old.

Steven Isles, his son, has begun a crusade of sorts against what he describes as a culture of victimisation within the Queensland Police Service ( QPS ) and the CMC.

Steven Isles has been inundated with support from dozens of serving and former officers from Cairns to South-East Queensland.

Many agreed to be interviewed by The Brisbane Times, though they declined to be named for fear of recrimination.

All were scathing in their criticisms of the treatment of Sen Sgt Isles.

 

Other police officers raised concerns of bullying within the police service.

"It was so blatantly obvious that they didn't like you and they came after you," one officer said. 

 

Steven Isles is going to make sure his father's case won't be forgotten.

"We are here to fight this culture, we want to make sure that no employee is treated like this again."

  • AAP Police whistleblower sent home, told to see psychiatrist, Tuck Thompson, The Courier-Mail, 12 October, 2009 
  • Shadow over the thin blue line, Evan Schwarten, The Brisbane Times, 17 October 2009

The Queensland Ombudsman : Response to Anna Bligh's "Integrity Review".

16 October, 2009

3.3 Whistleblowing

" ... The Whistleblowers Protection Act 1994 (WPA) ... makes each public sector agency responsible for receiving public interest disclosures about the conduct of its officers, managing the disclosure process, and taking steps to protect its officers from reprisals.

In my view, this current system is seriously flawed.

A decentralised whistleblowing model whereby the recognition, investigation and resolution of a public interest disclosure (PID) can be handled totally within the agency whose officers are the subject of the PID, without any measure of external oversight (unless it involves official misconduct), does not represent best practice in this area and does not provide whistleblowers with an adequate level of protection."

The Ombudsman suggests that -

  • When an agency receive a disclosure (PID) they send the disclosures involving official misconduct to the Crime and Misconduct Commission (CMC) and all other disclosures to the Ombudsman.
  • Then the Ombudsman would either investigate the disclosure or refer it back to the agency to conduct the investigation. The Ombudsman would be empowered to monitor, take over or review the investigation.

But handing investigations back to agencies and allowing them to investigate themselves is useless.

The ombudsman strongly suspects that there is significant underreporting of PIDs of maladministration.

For example, in the 2007-8 financial year Education Queensland reported that they had received no PID's of maladministration.

They probably "lost" them.

There may be some confusion in agencies about terms such as 'maladministration'.

The Ombudsman recommends that the CMC and the Ombudsman share responsibility for supervising agencies in this manner so that the purposes of the Whistleblower Protection Act are not defeated by -

  • misinterpretations
  • inconsistent approaches
  • inadequate investigations
  • or lack of commitment.

The CMC and the Parliamentary Crime and Misconduct Commission ( PCMC ) support this idea.

In the 7th PCMC's Three Year Review of the CMC ( tabled 20 April 2009), the PCMC called for the Queensland government to undertake a complete review of the Whistleblower Protection Act.

(In about 2006) a Directive was issued requiring all agencies under the Public Service Act to implement internal complaints systems that complied with recognised standards for complaint handling.

Education Queensland must have lost their Directive.

The Ombudsman then developed a State-wide project to provide training to agencies on understanding and applying the principles of effective complaints management.

But I have seen no evidence of any change.

They attend your training courses and nothing changes.

The Ombudsman wants to develop a training program designed to assist agency staff to understand the principles of whistleblowing.

Training is a cop-out.

It is easier and nicer to "train" people than to actually deal with their corruption.

Training is not the answer.

Nobody cares.

Accountability is the answer.

Show corrupt public servants that you are willing to hold them accountable.

Train and test and hold accountable.

 

Apologies

The Ombudsman is another enthusiast for Claytons apologies - the apology you get when nothing actually changes.

He suggests that any type of Departmental apology be "protected".

At the conclusion of an investigation the Ombudsman often recommends that the relevant head of a department apologise to a complainant who has suffered some detriment as a result of the agency's defective administrative action.

The CMC chair supports the Ombudsman's idea that legislative change should provide that an apology by an agency regaring a decision or action affecting an individual does not constitute an admission of liability and will not be relevant to a determination of fault or liability.

So the Government department that has harmed you will say that they are sorry that they have harmed you - because they know that if they say "sorry" it will calm you down - but their "sorry" is a "protected sorry" - they are not going to do anything to correct the harm that they have done you.

What kind of Claytons sorry is that?

If you are really sorry, you want to correct the harm that you have done.

For example, if a "decision" to punish a teacher was made in breach of several Departmental policies - and if this abusive document was then placed on the teachers' official record - this document will continue to damage that teachers' professional reputation long after your Claytons "sorry".

There is a need to correct the document - to annotate all copies of the document to say that the decision was made in breach of Departmental policies and it has been withdrawn.

http://www.premiers.qld.gov.au/community-issues/open-transparent-gov/submissions/submissions-181-200/qld-ombudsman.aspx

Scott Patterson, former senior Queensland state government policy adviser : sacked for "refusing to lie to the CMC".

4 October, 2009

Scott Patterson is a former senior Queensland state government policy adviser.

In late 2000 Mr Patterson told senior figures that he would not lie to the Queensland Crime and Misconduct Commission ( CMC ).

Mr Patterson said that he was the only office member not interviewed by the CMC during a "probe".

Mr Patterson claims that he was then sidelined and sacked in late 2001.

"I didn't trust the CMC then and I don't trust them now," the former Labor Party member said.

"It seems there is an intimate connection between the CMC and the government."

Mr Patterson said that his experience was not an isolated incident among ministerial staff.

Another former ministerial staffer, Jacqueline King, recently claimed that she was sacked after raising concerns about jailed former minister Gordon Nuttall in 2002.

  • Ministerial adviser sacked after 'refusing to lie' to CMC, Steven Wardill, The Courier-Mail

The Queensland Crime and Misconduct Commission (CMC) : the CMC submission to Anna Bligh's integrity and accountability review.

1 October, 2009

Recommendation # 4 - Ethics education

The CMC recommends that ethics education programs include adequate attention to ... conflicts of interest which disadvantage or cause a detriment. ...

Recommendation # 25 - Codes of Conduct

The CMC recommends that all agencies seek to find ways to improve the working effectiveness of their codes, through training, regular updates, effective consultation and public commitment to ethical conduct.

Recommendation # 26 - Role of the Public Service Commission

The CMC recommends that the Public Service Commission take a more active role in the oversight of the conduct and actions of government agencies.

 

The CMC seem to be lobbying for the Public Service Commission to take over responsibility for investigating Queensland public service corruption.

 

Transparency.

... when an official's actions and decisions are open to scrutiny, not only by their superiors, peers and official oversight agencies, but also by the media and the general public, ... opportunity is severely limited and the risk of detection rises.

Accordingly, to minimise the risk of corruption, every strategy to increase the transparency of government should be explored and, wherever practicable, implemented without delay.

The principle of transparency applies to all aspects of public administration, and relies upon :

  1. systems and processes which can be understood by the uninitiated
  2. communication in plain language and using the minimum of jargon and obscure expression
  3. ...
  4. independent, merit based and and evidence-based processes for making decisions
  5. publication of sound, fair and eqitable reasons for decisions which are made
  6. ...
  7. ...
  8. rigorous processes at all levels to ensure that and conflict of interest, pecuniary or non-pecuniary, is openly declared and appropriately managed.

 

Prevention is undoubtedly better than cure. Effective management of misconduct and complaints alleging misconduct shows both employees and the community that such matters are dealt with honestly, fairly and openly. Openness about the way inappropriate conduct is addressed and managed can be an effective deterrent.

The CMC's devolution strategy is a key change-maker. It is targeted towards an evolution of management attitude,

I have seen no evidence of any such evolution of management attitude.

"Devolution" - i.e. allowing Queensland Public Service Departments to investigate themselves -  does not seem to be working.

 

... and the changes to organisational culture which flow from it.

Organisations come to appreciate that complaints, and even identified instances of misconduct, are learning experiences, opportunities to discover ways to do the job better.

At the moment they seem to be learning that they can delay an investigation for years and then produce a report full of absolute gibberish.

And that the gibberish will be "accepted" by the CMC.

 

Agencies are encouraged in the development and monitoring of processes which ensure that misconduct is effectively prevented.

On the rare occasions that it does occur, the processes and monitoring are desgned to address the issues effectively, and to use each instance constructively for the ongoing improvement of the organisation.

Can the CMC nominate one Queensland government department in which this golden dream has been achieved?

 

An agency which cannot learn from the abuses which sometimes occur is an agency which cannot improve.

So what exactly did Education Queensland learn from their abuse of me?

"We can get away with it if we delay the investigation for years and then all tell the investigator that we can't remember what we did or why we did it?"

 

Ethics education (Green Paper question # 4)

A range of miscellaneous issues ... tend to slip from the forefront of consciousness in the ethical decision-making process ...

  1. In identifying possible conflicts of interest, there are a range of non-pecuniary interests which are of considerable relevance. Membership of community groups (eg. branches of certain political parties) ... social networks (family, friends, campaign managers, wives of workmates) - all are susceptible to being perceived as influencing an official position or decision. Education about the perception of these non-pecuniary ties is important to ensure that appropriate conflict of interest declarations are made by officials.
  2. Conflict of interest is not limited to an opportunity to seek an advantage for oneself or others. It also includes opportunities to harm, disadvantage or cause a detriment to persons or organisations. Targets of disadvantage can (include people with) ... professional differences, personal disputes and political, professional or cultural rivalries. It is important that all definitions and education programs include this aspect. ...

...

Responsibility for dealing with complaints

The CMC strongly opposes the suggestion that it takes sole responsibility for dealing with complaints, for two principal reasons-

  1. external complaint management will not lead to positive cultural or systemic change within the Queensland public sector.
  2. it would mean more than doubling the CMC's budget and operational capacity.

Devolution is about strengthening public sector agencies integrity, accountability and misconduct resistance.

In my experience it is about turning a blind eye to the corruption.

It is about accepting "outcomes" that are falsified gibberish.

It does not mean that the CMC ... will stop holding agencies accountable for the way in which they deal with complaints of misconduct.

In my experience, the CMC does not "hold agencies accountable".

The CMC accepts gibberish.

The CMC will also continue to take a lead role in building the capacity of agencies to prevent and deal with misconduct.

In my experience, the CMC have a very, very long way to go with this.

Education Queensland, for example, seems to take no interest in preventing or dealing with misconduct.

Misconduct / corruption/ professional negligence / incompetence / workplace abuse etc. seem to be systemic.

This is the problem.

So long as an agency relies upon the ever-present oversight agency to deal with complaints, it will be unable as an organisation to accept responsibility and embrace accountability in its own right.

Poor performance and misconduct will continue to be perceived as the oversight body's problem, and standards will not improve.

Only when an agency takes responsibility for its own culture of integrity, and extends that responsibility downwards from the senior management to line managers and individual employees, will it fully appreciate that ethical behaviour is integral to its operations.

OK, we understand the theory.

But do the CMC understand that it is not happening?

Leaving public service Departments to investigate themselves is not working!

Because the corruption / negligence / abuse is systemic.

Managers must embrace complaints about misconduct as a positive learning opportunity, a tool for them to address any inappropriate conduct of an employee and any systemic issues, control failures, policy and procedural deficiencies, poor workplace culture and standards ...

But, in my experience, they don't.

Queensland public service Departments "lose" complaints and produce falsified "final outcomes" that are full of gibberish.

How can Departments learn from complaints if the CMC accept their gibberish?

...

Compensation

... in a New South Wales case ... the court awarded $664,270 in damages to a police officer on the grounds that his employer had breached its duty of care to the officer.

In order to encourage public officers to disclose corruption and misconduct of which they become aware, it is necessary not only to promise protection and to take active steps to provide that protection, but also to ensure that there is an adequate system of compensation should that protection, for whatever reason, fail.

...

Offence of misconduct in public office (Green Paper questions # 31, 32)

Effective prevention and minimisation of misconduct depends in aprt on potential offenders knowing that there is a real and potent punishment in store for wrong-doers.

... there is no doubt at all that if there is no penalty for particular misconduct, many people would feel that there is no reason not to engage in it.

...

Deliberate failure and wilful neglect.

... a man was violently assaulted by a number of men who beat and kicked him to death.

(An Engish police) constable took no steps to intevene inthe assault and when it was over merely drove away. He was charged with the common law offence of misconduct in public office. Lord Widgery, in delivering the decision of the Court of Appeal, said :

The allegation made was not of mere non-feasance but of deliberate failure and wilful neglect. This involves an element of culpability which is not restricted to corruption or dishonesty but which must be of such a degree that the misconduct impugned is calculated to injure the public interest so as to call for condemnation and ppunishment. ...

A Queensland public servant was asked to "review" a teacher's complaint that she was being bullied. All but the first page of her complaint had been "lost". But a mass of falsified documents had been placed in  the teacher's official file to create the false impression that they had been discussed with her during the process of her Stage 1 Grievance. The public servant was instructed to base his "review" on the falsified "records" and not to "consider" the teacher's response to the falsified "records".

So what should the "reviewer" do?

...

Apologies

While it is true that an apology does not fix a problem, experience shows that it is a powerful signal that the gravity of the issue is appreciated, and that the feelings of the aggrieved person are accorded proper respect. An apology undoubtedly provides satisfaction to many complainants ...

...complainants quickly (and justly) become resentful of a government culture which denies imperfection and will not genuinely engage with them.

An apology is a good start, but if the Department really regret the error they should "put it right".

For example, if an irrational and unjust decision to put a teacher into a punishment program has been placed on that teacher's official record - in breach of several Departmental policies - that teacher will have to declare that detrimental decision to all future employers.

The unjust decision should be withdrawn.

I understand that the actual document cannot be destroyed, but all copies of the document could be annotated to say that the decision has been withdrawn.

Then the professional harm to the teacher would be minimised.

...

Trade Unions and the QTU in particular.

The CMC also notes that trade unions which have coverage over government employees do not generally have codes of conduct or other ethical frameworks which govern their actions or set standards for their behaviour or provide them with guidance when ethical dilemmas arise.

While the members of these organisations are bound by the relevant agency Code of Conduct, paid officials of the unions are not.

A considerable number of unions have members who are employed in the public sector and the conduct of those unions and the decisions made by them have a considerable impact on the conduct and behaviour of public officials.

It is acknowleged that no power exists or should exist to enable the government to regulate the conduct or action of such bodies.

However, it would be adventageous to the relationship between these bodies and the government and its agencies that the unions should voluntarily develop ethical frameworks.

Voluntary codes or ethical frameworks could provide useful assistance and guidelines, especially in dealing with grievances, disputes and disciplinary matters where the interests of one member may be in conflict with the interests of another, or with the interests of the majority of members in the workplace or in general.

In particular, guidelines are desirable to ensure that the union's duty to support and protect a member accused of misconduct should not lead it to sacrifice the interests of other members affected by the alleged misconduct.

One of the interests commonly endangered in this way is the members' wish to be perceived by the public as honest and ethical.

While support should certainly be provided to members as a right, partisan, energetic and vocal defence of members who are proven to be dishonets or unethical can severely damage the public perception of the ethical conduct of all members.

...

Strengthening Codes (green paper questions # 2, 35)

The CMC, in its regular dealings with agencies, has identified a general need for agencies to place a greater emphasis on training and education.

Staff (and especially senior staff) need to be regularly reminded about their obligations.

It is equally important that the agency be visibly committed to ethical conduct, and placing a high priority on Code updates and awareness is a crucial part of this.

The CMC has recently received information that ministerial staff frequently avoid Code of Conduct training (which is provided to them by Ministerial Services).

Given the key exposure of staff in these positions, coupled with the fact that they are frequently political rather than public service appointees, it is vital that Code of Conduct and ethical decision-making training be compulsory within a short time (no more than three months) of commencement, and that strong measures (suspension of salary, termination of contract) be in place to enforce this.

Similar concerns are heard from time to time from other agencies, especially in regard to senior management and other high level staff, who often claim to be 'too busy' to attend.

This sends a very poor message to less elevated staff about the ethical commitment and standards of management and of the organisation as a whole.

All agencies are encouraged to put in place strict attendance requirements, as the effectiveness of codes of conduct is heavily dependent on the commitment of the agency's senior management.

...

http://www.premiers.qld.gov.au/community-issues/open-transparent-gov/submissions/submissions-101-120.aspx

Neil Laurie, Clerk of Queensland Parliament : submission to Anna Bligh's integrity review.

29 September, 2009

The Clerk of the Queensland Parliament - Neil Laurie's - response to Anna Bligh's "integrity review" has been published.

Mr Laurie writes that :

"I believe that the root problem lies in institutional weakness.

This is turn leads inevitably to -

  • lack of transparency,
  • an absence of fear of detection or enforcement,
  • poor leadership in ethics and integrity
  • and, most importantly, the growth of a culture that either accepts, ignores or is fearful of reporting unethical conduct.

... I would strongly recommend compulsory, certified ethical training in the public sector, requiring refreshment of certification every few years for every public officer.

The more senior the officer, the more regular the refreshment.

Education should include study of "real life" past unethical conduct.

Hopefully this will not only reinforce ethical behaviour, but provide identifiers as to unethical behaviour and the deterent effect if those case studies include those 'caught in the act'.

... Many self labelled 'whistleblowers' are not in fact whistleblowers,

What evidence do you have to support that statement, Mr Laurie?

... but rather are either opportunists or persons themselves the subject of allegations of misconduct or poor performance ...

Mr Laurie, are you aware that whistleblowers - or even Queensland teachers who try to discuss professional issues such as the unsupervised groups of children who are roaming about the school disrupting the other classes - seem to be put into punishment programs to "pay them back"?

... and who attempt to use the status of whistleblower as protection.

But there are also many genuine people who feel conflicted with knowledge or suspicion that activities are taking place which are not within the public interest.

The amount of courage it takes to stand up and do the right thing in the face of authority and power cannot be understated.

I am not sure that you are right about that, Mr Laurie.

If you have very little experience of corruption it takes very little courage to expose corruption.

You are just doing the obvious thing.

I think that is why 'outsiders' from overseas or interstate are at risk in Queensland.

They have no experience of corruption and so, when 'outsiders' experience corruption in Queensland they try to deal with the corruption in what they think is the normal manner, expecting that they will be supported.

While people who have long experience of corruption - most Queenslanders - just seem to concentrate on 'not knowing'. 'not understanding' and 'losing' evidence.

... The risk, if not the actuality, is that the public service no longer gives full and frank advice or that such advice is 'filtered'.

It is understandable that Ministers will want to work with Directors-Generals that they know and trust.

However, the perception is that as the years progress, the number of officers with political allegiances / connections increases. ...

http://www.premiers.qld.gov.au/community-issues/open-transparent-gov/submissions/submissions-81-100/clerk-of-parliament.aspx

A.J. Brown of Griffith University : His report proposes better legal protection for Queensland public servants who expose corruption or maladministration.

25 September, 2009

A.J. Brown is a Griffith University academic.

He has written a report to the Queensland state government which proposes the establishment of a "Whistleblower" protection system that would go beyond federal Whistleblower reforms being considered by Special Minister of State Joe Ludwig.

A.J. Brown's proposed changes would give Queensland public servants better legal protection when revealing maladministration or corruption.

Queensland public servants would also have legal protection if they went to the media in some situations - for example, if public service agencies failed to act on a disclosure within a reasonable time.

But Senator Ludwig's scheme - drawn up by a committee of the House of Representatives - only offers protection to public servants whose disclosure concerns an immediate and serious threat to public safety.

Public servants who told the media about maladministration and corruption in general would face criminal penalties.

"We should not try to find middle ground on an issue where there is no middle ground," A.J. Brown says. 

"We should just bite the bullet on good, firm principles."

  • Call for stronger leaker rights, Chris Merritt, Legal affairs editor, The Australian

Queensland Teachers Union West Moreton manager Barry Welch says Queensland teachers are afraid to intervene in incidents of bullying for fear of a complaint being made against them.

2 September, 2009

Barry Welch said teachers had been brought before Queensland's Education Department just for separating two students who were fighting.

“The current guidelines are very unfair for teachers,” Mr Welch said.

“There have been teachers in Ipswich who have simply pressed on a student's chest to move them away from another kid and the student will complain about inappropriate touching.

“The teacher then has a mark on their record - even though all other evidence showed they did nothing wrong.”

  • Calls for self defence training for teachers, Chris Garry, The Queensland Times

"When you stick your hand up and say anything nowadays, you just get smashed and told to shut up".

Wednesday 26 August, 2009

Queensland Emergency Medical Service Protection Association (EMPSA) president Prebs Sathiaseelan said he had received numerous complaints from his members about some form of harassment and bullying.

"It isn't improving," Mr Sathiaseelan said.

Mr Sathiaseelan said Queensland paramedics and emergency workers operate in a "culture of fear".

"When you stick your hand up and say anything nowadays, you just get smashed and told to shut up," a senior officer told The Courier-Mail.

The Courier-Mail reveals today that an internal investigation found an Emergency Management Queensland boss guilty of victimisation, harassment and inappropriate comments.

Six out of ten allegations were substantiated.

 

There are three impressive things about this situation -

  • the fact that the EMPSA took action in support of bullied members.
  • the fact that Emergency Management Queensland were able to run a proper investigation and to find out the truth.
  • the fact that the Freedom Of Information (FOI) process worked properly and the investigation report was released.
  • Paramedics operate in 'culture of fear', Alison Sandy and Tuck Thompson, The Courier-Mail

Ken Smith - Can Julie Kinross release the Freedom of Information documents that I have been waiting for since September 2003?

7 August 2009

The Queensland government has announced the appointment of Julie Kinross as its new Information Commissioner.

Ms Kinross, who has acted in the position since April 2008, has been appointed to the job for the next three years.

 

Oh no!

-  does that mean that I am going to have to wait till 2012 for the Freedom Of Information documents I have been waiting for since September 2003?

 

Ken Smith, would you please tell Ms Kinross that she can give me those documents.

Or are my FOI applications still being blocked at the Cairns District Office of Education Queensland?

 

"The Information Commissioner will be responsible for assisting and training agencies to proactively release information under these new laws, as well as monitoring and enforcing compliance with information and privacy laws," Ms Bligh said.

 

Not in my experience, Anna.

  • Qld names new Information Commissioner, AAP, Sunshine Coast Daily Online

How many times do Robert Needham and David Solomon need to be told about Queensland public service incompetence and corruption?

Friday 7 August, 2009

Queenslanders will now get a say on how government accountability can be improved.

Queensland Members of Parliament and senior public servants love to talk.Then they walk away and do nothing at all about the situation.

 

Premier Anna Bligh has released a green paper canvassing a range of issues including how investigations into misconduct claims should be processed and whether current guidelines that set standards are good enough.

Doesn't she know yet?

How many times does she need to be told? 

Ms Bligh said Queenslanders would be able to make submissions to the green paper. 
 

A round table of experts including Integrity Commissioner David Solomon and Crime and Misconduct Commission head Robert Needham will then consider the feedback before providing advice to the government on changes.

How many times do Anna Bligh, Ken Smith,  David Solomon and Robert Needham need to be told?

They have been told about the public service incompetence and corruption over and over again: http://www.badapplebullies.com/letters.htm

They don't seem to be able to hear the whistles.

  •  Anna Bligh seeks public input on preventing corruption, Rosemary Odgers, The Courier-Mail

In Queensland, we are dealing nothing less than a serious failure of the democratic process and everything on which our society is built.

31 July, 2009 

If Tony Fitzgerald is right about corruption in Queensland, we are dealing nothing less than a serious failure of the democratic process and everything on which our society is built.

The Criminal Justice Commission (CJC) was supposed to receive and investigate complaints, institute proactive intelligence-driven investigations of official misconduct including corruption, and to provide research and corruption prevention reports and recommendations.

The CJC was largely successful, probably too successful for political comfort.

But Peter Beattie - the first chairman of the Parliamentary Criminal Justice Committee - sowed the seeds for the CJC's destruction with a "behind-closed-doors" review.

This resulted in a merger of the CJC with the Queensland Crime Commission to create the Crime and Misconduct Commission.

That was on January 1, 2002.

On that date the aggressive fight against corruption and official misconduct previously conducted by the CJC was replaced by a relatively benign regime of so-called "capacity building" within departments and public-sector organisations.

And public servants investigated public servants.

And today Queensland public servants are allowed to invetigate themselves - and to "find no evidence of" their own misconduct.

And the Labor Government has made it legal for ministers to lie before the Queensland Parliament.

The weakness, the relative impotence of the CMC, is tacitly acknowledged by chairman Robert Needham every time he warns of dangers that seem beyond his control.

Peter Beattie cannot credibly deny the consequences that are part of Anna Bligh's inheritance.

It's time for the Bligh Labor Government to forget the handwringing, admit its errors and fix a problem that is staring us in the face.

  • Return to the dark side, Terry Sweetman, The Courier-Mail

In Queensland "you can't rely on policy, process or representations of government to deliver a just or proper outcome."

Friday 31 July, 2009

David Marriner, veteran developer, told The Courier-Mail yesterday that he felt his money would be safer in South America, which he said had less corrupt processes and procedures than Queensland.

Mr Marriner claimed he had been pressured to employ former minister Merri Rose, warned to hire lobbyists and showered with invitations to fundraising events during his ill-fated attempt to win approval for an international airport at his Laguna Whitsundays Resort. 

"In my opinion investing in Queensland has a greater risk in the current environment than investing in Chile," he said.

"You just can't rely on policy, process or representations of government to deliver a just or proper outcome."

We know how you feel, Mr Mariner.

The criminals have gained control of the colony.

  • Developer David Marriner tips bucket on Queensland, Steven Wardill, The Courier-Mail

Opposition Leader John-Paul Langbroek says that Queensland is being run by Labor mates, for the benefit of Labor mates.

Wed 29 July, 2009

Queensland corruption buster Tony Fitzgerald has warned that the state is slipping back to its dark past.

He warned that political leaders who gloss over corruption risk being perceived by their colleagues and the electorate as regarding corruption of little importance.

Opposition Leader John-Paul Langbroek said that Queensland is run by Labor mates, for the benefit of Labor mates.

Today talkback radio has been abuzz with criticism about problems in the political and business culture in Queensland.

A whistleblower group says the problems are evident in that good people leave the bureaucracy after blowing the whistle, while it says those behind the problems often remain.

  • Fitzgerald warning puts powerbrokers in a spin, Annie Guest for The World Today, ABC News

Australian Public Service workplace bullying, harassment, mobbing, victimisation, discrimination and "payback" : July, 2009.

Wednesday 29 July 2009

Today -

Robert Needham, Chairman of the Queensland Crime and Misconduct Commission,

The Honourable Jerrold Cripps QC, Commissioner of the New South Wales Independent Commission Against Corruption

and The Honourable Len Roberts-Smith RDF, QC, Commissioner of the Corruption and Crime Commission of Western Australia

- will meet in Brisbane for the second Australian Public Sector Anti-Corruption Conference.

They will discuss contempoary anti-corruption trends and strategies such as -

  • not reading disclosures,
  • not recording disclosures that are made over the phone
  • and accepting ""Final Outcome Advices" that are based on gibberish and faux investigations.

And to network.

The conference will end with a fun interactive drumming session.

The delegates will begin to drum in four different rooms and will follow the drums to converge on each other to enjoy a final cocktail party.

Delegates will almost certainly disregard one teacher whistleblower who would like to tell them about the total failure of the CMC / Education Queensland investigation process.

They will be too busy eating, drinking and congratulating each other on the wonderful living that they are making out of the business of corruption:

http://www.badapplebullies.com/letters.htm 

 

Tony Fitzgerald QC, the famous Queensland corruption reformer, has spoken out after years of silence.

He was particularly critical of ex-premier Peter Beattie.

Mr Fitzgerald said that he had decided to move to New South Wales when Peter Beattie was elected.

He attacked the "ethics" of the current and former Queensland Labor governments.

Mates and supporters were being appointed.

  • Queensland has forgotten corruption lessons, Tony Fitzgerald QC says, Tony Koch and Sean Parnell, The Australian

 

Saturday 25 July, 2009

Tony Koch raises some very signifcant issues in The Australian today -

Can Queensland  public servants effectively investigate their own?

There are calls by legal representatives and civil liberties lawyer Terry O'Gorman for the reinstatement of a dedicated investigative team within the CMC to handle all complaints.

At present 98% of complaints to the CMC are handed back to the government department involved.

The system does not work.

It was set up to fail.

That is a serious allegation, but Tony Koch writes that history is undeniable.

The original CJC's brief was to investigate corruption in the public service - and the police and politicians.

But in January 2002, under Premier Peter Beattie, the CJC was amalgamated with the Crime Commission to become the Crime and Misconduct Commission.

Peter Beattie's Crime and Misconduct Act 2001 required the CMC to hand complaints over to the relevant departments to be dealt with if the complaint was not considered to be "serious".

This handing-over process was termed "building the the capacity of agencies to prevent and deal with cases of misconduct effectively and appropriately".

The CMC was also given the responsibility to promote public confidence in the integrity of agencies (departments) in the way misconduct was handled.

Does that mean that CMC officers are required to lie?

Before January 2002 the CMC had been expected to fight corruption and misconduct aggressively.

But after January 2002 the CMC was relegated to a benign regime of public service "capacity building".

Obviously, when an in-house investigator reports to a senior manager, the senior manager may not welcome a rigorous investigation that results in adverse findings about their own conduct.

It is now clear that Peter Beattie's post January 2002 public service "capacity building" experiment has failed.

And that Anna Bligh's government must make a sincere effort to root out the corruption in the Queensland public service.

  • The secret police, Tony Koch, The Australian

 

Poor management and lack of attention to proper process typify most of the Queensland public sector.

The scale of misbehaviour recently unveiled by the Queensland Crime and Misconduct Commission ( CMC )  emanated from some random anonymous complaints, rather than from orchestrated detection.

What else lies beneath the surface?

Queensland public servants still seem to believe they can get away with misbehaviour and corruption.

This is hardly surprising, particularly given the broad spread of incompetence now evident in public life.

The Premier should mount a crusade against the incompetence within her Government.

Incompetence and corruption are symbiotic.

Loose systems give crooks room to spread their influence.

Ms Bligh needs to aggressively tackle the incompetence of her Government if we are not to see many more instances of corruption in the Queensland public sector.

  • Queensland police cover old ground, Editorial, The Courier-Mail.

 

Saturday 18 July, 2009

In an interview to mark his leaving the job, outgoing Integrity Commissioner Gary Crooke, QC, had this to say :

"There is a danger, a very real danger, that . . . an individual is so confident of their own ethical approach to anything that confronts them that they won't heed whatever is thought to be the conflictual aspect.

"But, in fact, they fall into the trap of engaging in a practice that, objectively, is seen to be inappropriate."

  • Gordon Nuttall case sparks debate about politics of trust, Craig Johnstone, The Courier-Mail

 

Friday 17 July, 2009

NO MORE BAD APPLES : BLIGH

Was the front page headline in the Courier-Mail today.

  • No More Bad Apples : Bligh : Premier forced to defend Labor integrity, Steven Wardill, State Political Reporter, p.1 and p.7, The Courier-Mail.

 

Mark Oberhardt points out in The Courier-Mail today that Gordon Nuttall's legal costs would have been close to $400,000, had he been able to pay.

Noosa barrister John Rivett represented Mr Nuttall pro bono and with no instructing solicitor - Mr Nuttall's solicitors withdrew when he was not able to pay them.

Mark Oberhardt says that this raises the issue of whether the law is now only available to the rich, who can afford private counsel, and the poor, who are eligible for Legal Aid.

  • Nuttall trial fans debate, EARSAY, Mark Oberhardt, p. 32, The Courier-Mail.

 

According to Premier Anna Bligh, the Fitzgerald report did not just find "a couple of rotten apples", it demonstrated an entire system of Government that was corrupt to the core.

A system of government in which the accountability mechanisms were either non-existent or had completely broken down.

Deputy opposition leader Lawrence Springborg said that Gordon Nuttall's behaviour was "symptomatic of a Labor government that has been in power for almost all of the last 20 years, where they believe anything goes and its members lack moral compasses and moral judgment".

Four years ago Premier Anna Bligh co-sponsored a motion with Peter Beattie to exonerate Gordon Nuttall of contempt of parliament over evidence he gave to an esimates committee hearing.

Mr Springborg said that this seems to have sent Mr Nuttall a message that "anything would go".

Dr Rae Wear, a political academic from the University of Queensland, said that ministers seemed to get a sense of entitlement that clouded their judgement.

  • Joke's now on Nuttall, The Canberra Times

 

Thursday 16 July, 2009

Opposition Leader John-Paul Langbroek said that voters couldn't be sure there weren't "more bad apples" in the Bligh government.

Anna Bligh protested that she would not allow criminals to sit around her cabinet table - but then she admitted that during her time sitting around the cabinet table with Nuttall, she never suspected him of being a criminal.

It was a "nothing is for nothing" moment.

  • Govt goes after Nuttall's super, property, AAP, The Brisbane Times

 

There are questions that need to be asked about the Gordon Nuttall conviction -

  • Why Gordon Nuttall ?

In an environment where the Queensland Crime and Misconduct Commission (CMC) sends 98% of corruption allegations back to the Queensland Government department concerned to be faux "investigated" over a long period of years, while the public servants involved in the corruption promote and celebrate each other, change jobs and destroy the documentation of the abuse -

  • Why was Gordon Nuttall held accountable?

and

  • Was Gordon Nuttall really allowed justice? - he could not afford legal advice because - before he had been found guilty of any crime - he was not allowed to access his money to employ a solicitor.

In the end Mr Nuttall was given Pro Bono legal support, but in an environment where the Queensland Government have a bottomless pit of taxpayers money to fund the prosecution case, was this really justice?

 

Mr Nuttall seemed to believe in his own innocence.

Which seems a bit hard to believe.

But then Mr Nuttall is considering his own behaviour in a Queensland Government and Public Service context.

Whereas the jury were considering his behaviour in a normal context.

 

You have to wonder if the jury were really Mr Nuttall's peers.

Did any of them have experience of working for the Queensland Public Service?

Did they understand the Queensland public service environment - the pressure to "not know", "not understand", "not find any evidence of", etc.

 

Mr Nuttall told The Australian that he was being persecuted by the CMC.  

"They have turned a good and kind deed into something dirty and nasty, just to suit their egos and justify their existence."

Mr Nuttall intended to attack the CMC if he was acquitted.

He was planning to hold a press conference to demand a judicial inquiry into the CMC.

Mr Nuttall told The Australian that the CMC were "paying him back" because he had regularly and robustly questioned CMC activities behind closed doors while he was deputy chairman of the Parliamentary Crime and Misconduct Committee (PCMC - the parliamentary committee that is supposed to oversee the activities of the CMC) in the 1990s.

 

Is this correct?

What do the other Local Members who were on the PCMC at that time say?

  • Reality strikes 36 times, Andrew Fraser and Michael McKenna, The Australian.

 

Opposition deputy leader Lawrence Springborg last night said that Gordon Nuttall's conviction showed ''the corrupt attitude that some members of the Labor Government now have''.

Mr Springborg said that Queensland Premier Anna Bligh had vocally supported legislation to make it legal to lie in Parliament when Nuttall had been accused of this offence several years ago.

Mr Nuttall could lose more than $500,000 in Queensland parliamentary superannuation because he has been found guilty of an offence while he was in office.

  • Ex-Queensland premier condemns ... Nuttall's corruption, Steven Wardill, The Courier-Mail

 

Monday 13 July, 2009

Former Queensland Government Minister Gordon Nuttall is a man "trying to quieten the better angel of his conscience", a Brisbane District Court jury was told today.

Crown prosecutor Ross Martin SC asked the jury to think about Mr Nuttall's mindset, saying it was that of a man who had sold his soul.

This is a bit unfair on Mr Nuttall.

The whole Queensland Government and Queensland Public Service have to sell their souls.

Because anybody who refuses to sell their soul is driven out of work.

  • Former MP Gordon Nuttall "in denial" says crown in summing up, Sarah Elks, The Australian

 

4 July, 2009

Outgoing Queensland Integrity Commissioner Gary Crooke, QC, warns that MPs are thumbing their noses at conflict-of-interest criticisms.

Mr Crooke said he was often aware of politicians and senior public servants who did not seek the Integrity Commissioner's advice because they believed in their own ethical standards.

"... There a developing tendency in public administration for people to say: 'If we just do it and tough it out people will forget about it'," he said.

  • MPs thumb noses at ethics, says Gary Crooke, QC, Steven Wardill, additional reporting by Rosemary Odgers and Patrick Lion, The Courier-Mail

 

3 July, 2009

Education graduates in Queensland will be tested on their literacy and numeracy skills.

Primary school teaching graduates will be tested from the end of 2011 at the earliest.

Education graduates who fail the test will be allowed to the test again and again till they eventually pass, and they will be registered as teachers as long as they do eventually pass the test.

Tests for high-school teaching graduates will be introduced at a later date.

What does this tell us about the standards at Queensland universities?

Education students need to attain basic literacy BEFORE they begin university study.

This is really degrading the teaching profession.

The Government is yet to figure out what would constitute a pass mark for the tests, which will judge proficiency in literacy, numeracy and science.

The Queensland College of Teachers will be responsible for developing and administering the tests.

  • Queensland teachers can fail literacy, numeracy test, Steven Wardill and John McCarthy, The Courier-Mail.

 

Wednesday 1 July, 2009

Queensland Premier Anna Bligh has announced the formation of an Institute of Education Leadership -- only the second in Australia -- to resource principals and senior teachers wishing to become principals.

Ms Bligh said by accepting the report's recommendations the Government was telling universities they would now have to 'make literacy and numeracy an important part of their teacher education'.

Students should not be accepted into education courses till they have demonstrated that they are literate and numerate to a minimum standard.

Universities are not supposed to teach spelling.

"We believe there is a very important opportunity here for Queensland teachers to lead the country," Ms Bligh said.

Anna - you really would lead the country if you had the guts to rule that no Queensland University could accept a student into an education course who had an OP of less than 12.

  • Bligh ticks spelling tests for teachers, Ken Vernon, The Gold Coast News

Australian Public Service workplace bullying, harassment, mobbing, victimisation, discrimination and "payback" : June, 2009.

17 June, 2009

A report in The Australian yesterday detailed criticisms of the implementation of the $14.7 billion school infrastructure program by Craig Mayne, the head of the P&C at Holland Park State School.

The Prime Minister's electorate office seems to have rung the office of Anthony Gribben, the Holland Park principal, at 10 15 am yesterday, asking the principal for a letter praising the school building program.

And Education Minister Julia Gillard then stood up and read the principal's letter in parliament. 

Last night Mr Rudd's office said that the report of the electorate officer's phone conversation was "entirely inaccurate and false".

Mr Mayne's concerns were echoed by Rick Elsey, another parent at Holland Park State School.

"This program needs someone who knows what a shovel is to oversee the dumbness," Mr Elsey says in a letter to the editor sent to The Australian.

  • PM's office rang principal before letter of praise, Justine Ferrari and Matthew Franklin   The Australian

 

June 14, 2009

Queensland treasurer Andrew Fraser confirmed that $250 million will be saved by capping pay rises for the public sector, down from 4.5 per cent a year to 2.5 per cent a year. 

Mr Fraser has given Queensland teachers until September 1 to complete wage negotiations at the 4.5 per cent "higher" rate, or face a ceiling of 2.5 per cent a year for the next three years.

Did Anna Bligh and Andrew Fraser explain this plan to the Queensland Teachers' Union before the Queensland election?

  • Government perks, free lunches to end in budget,  Darrell Giles, The Courier-Mail.

 

Sunday 7 June, 2009.

Lost in the uproar in Queensland Parliament last week was Premier Anna Bligh's new legislation on Freedom of Information.

It will come into force on July 1.

Section 54 of the new Right to Information Act allows the Government to publish details from a successful FOI application on the internet 24 hours after they have been released to a person or media organisation.

Anna Bligh refused to take this section out.

"While the Premier will dress this clause up as proof of the Government's openness and accountability, it is in fact a sneaky way of deterring journalists from seeking official information," LNP leader John-Paul Langbroek said.

John-Paul Langbroek also quite rightly pointed out that it would give media organisations little time to analyse the information before being widely published.

  • Anna Bligh's info law has a catch, Darrell Giles, The Sunday Mail

 

Monday 1 June, 2009

Ipswich teachers are being forced to keep unruly and violent students in school to ensure the official number of suspensions and exclusions falls.

Queensland Teachers' Union Moreton organiser Barry Welch claims that the pressure to keep troubled youngsters in schools is causing chaos in classrooms and endangering the safety of staff.

He said high suspension and expulsion rates were not necessarily bad as it meant principals had a zero-tolerance policy for bad behaviour.

“When a student is violent to a teacher, that should be an offence warranting exclusion," Mr Welch said.

 

A teacher from an Ipswich region school, who spoke to The Queensland Times on the condition of anonymity, said students, some as young as five, had thrown chairs, bitten and kicked students and staff and walked out of class, and there were sometimes up to four unruly children per classroom.

“Teachers are spending most of their time doing behaviour modification rather than teaching,” she said.

  • Wild kids cause classroom chaos, Felicity Caldwell, The Queensland Times

 

1 June 2009

The Queensland Catholic Education Commission wants an OP of around 12 to be the minimum entry requirement for university teaching courses.

Analysis of QTAC enrolments 2007-2008 admissions indicates that -

  • 15 per cent of students entering education courses had an OP 1-7.

  • 39 per cent (approx) of students entering education courses had an OP 8-12.

  • 46 per cent of students entering education courses had OP of 13-19.



"The desirability of teaching as a profession needs to be increased for students with higher academic achievement."

  • Universities failing our teachers, Tanya Chilcott, The Courier-Mail

Australian Public Service workplace bullying, harassment, mobbing, victimisation, discrimination and "payback" : May, 2009.

Thursday 28 May, 2009

I spent three years of my life studying for a Certificate in Education, three years studying part-time for a B.A., two years studying part-time for a B.Ed and three years studying part-time for a Masters' degree in Education.

But when I was bullied at work by an incompetent Education Queensland "acting principal" with all the knowledge of Education Queensland policies that could be contained on a sticky-note, the Queensland Crime and Misconduct Commission ( CMC ) advised me that they did not have the resources to investigate my complaint.

So, if our government does not have the "resources" to protect Queensland teachers from workplace abuse,  what does our government have the "resources" to do?

What does our government and the Australian community value more highly than the health and welfare of Queensland teachers?

  • Dead Australians

As many as 16,000 dead people have received Australian federal government stimulus payments of $900 each.

It is likely that more than $14 million dollars was given to dead people by the federal government.

The tax office admits it does not know where the payments to dead people ultimately finish up.

  • Australians who are living overseas

 27,000 expatriate Australians have also received up to $26 million dollars worth of federal government stimulus payments.

  • Backpackers

Non- Australians who have lived Australia for six months or more and then returned home will also receive a $900 federal government stimulus.

  • Prisoners

Some prisoners will receive the $900 federal government stimulus.

  • "marketing"

More than $11 million was spent telling the dead people, backpackers, prisoners and Australians living overseas that they were going to be given a $900 stimulus by the federal government.

99.6 per cent of Australian teachers report that they are being bullied at work.

But the Queensland CMC claims that it does not have the resources to deal with the workplace bullying in Queensland schools.

It isn't good enough, Robert Needham.

It isn't good enough, Anna Bligh.

It isn't good enough, Kevin Rudd.

  • 16,000 dead people and 27,000 expats receive payments, AAP , The Brisbane Times

 

Saturday 23 May, 2003

Peter Renshaw, from the University of Queensland, said up to 50 per cent of teachers do not see themselves remaining in the profession for longer than 10 years.

Queensland University of Technology researcher Leanne Crosswell said that there was dissatisfaction with the way principals dealt with the unruly behaviour of parents and students.

  • A black hole at the blackboard as teachers go missing, Des Houghton, The Courier-Mail

 

Monday May 18, 2009

The Right to Information Bill will be introduced to Queensland parliament this week.

The Queensland government claims that the law is intended to boost government transparency.

A Privacy Bill will, it is claimed, "enable easier access and the ability to fix mistakes in personal information held by the government".

 

One provision of the new laws seems to be intended to discourage Freedom of Information applicants.

Information released to applicants will be published online within 24 hours of its release to the journalist or outlet that paid for the application.

"It was paid for by the public purse, it's the taxpayer that pays for the collection of records, for the archiving of records, the production of the material and the keeping of the information,"  Premier Anna Bligh said.

"It's public information, and the mere fact that one individual or one organisation asks for it doesn't deny the fact."

  • Govt to overhaul freedom of information laws , AAP, The Brisbane Times

 

A group of six students involved in a fight have shared $235,000 in compensation, according to figures released to the Herald Sun under Freedom of Information laws.

Lawyer Barrie Woollacott, from firm Slater and Gordon, said schools were often sued for failing to act properly when there was trouble brewing among students.

"They allow volatile situations to continue in circumstances where a quick response would have defused them," he said.

"But because they haven't responded appropriately, something's happened and one of the victims has been assaulted.

And then he's said to the school, 'You didn't look after me properly'."

 

Let me see if I understand this situation correctly.

Six students fight each other.

Then they share $235,000 compensation because their teacher did not stop them from fighting each other.

 

Hmmm ... isn't this rewarding the students for fighting?

 

The teacher is to blame because he or she "did not respond quickly enough".

The teacher "allowed the volatile situation to continue".

The teacher did not "respond appropriately".

So "something happened"-

The students attacked each other.

Because the teacher "wasn't looking after them properly".

 

"In some cases, people are not taking responsibility for their own actions. It's becoming too litigious," Association of School Councils in Victoria CEO Stephen Franzi-Ford said.

"If a kid climbs a tree and the teacher doesn't see it and the kid is hurt, who's responsible?"

  • Playground fight victims get compo, John Masanauskas, The Herald Sun

 

Queensland teachers are being terrorised by their students.

State School students have -

  • assaulted their teachers with bricks and furniture.
  • threatened them with death.
  • spat on them.
  • held them hostage.

 

One special school teacher had her jaw broken and multiple teeth knocked out by a student.

Another suffered extensive eye socket and rib damage after being assaulted by a student.

 

There were more than 150 attacks on Education Queensland staff and students from intruders during 2008.

And teachers in prep classes face rising violence.

 

A teacher who specialises in behaviour management contacted The Courier-Mail last week to report that during the past fortnight-

  • a brick had been thrown at her
  • she had been threatened with dangerous weapons
  • a chair had been thrown at her
  • a classroom window had been smashed
  • she had received specific and detailed death threats.
  • she had been told that, after she was dead, her classroom was going to be burned down.

 

An Education Queensland spkeswoman said violence had no place in the sector.

 

It is really annoying the way that "departmental spokespersons" trot out this sort of meaningless gobbledy-gook.

When I was bullied the Director-General wrote to me to tell me that there was no place for workplace abuse in Queensland schools.

Meanwhile, the bully had been given a whopping great promotion.

 

More than 17,000 students were suspended for violence in Queensland state schools in 2007-2008.

Almost 300 state school students were expelled for violence.

  • Teachers subject to harrowing attacks by students, Tanya Chilcott, The Courier-Mail

Thursday 14 May, 2009

The biggest threat of corruption is through public sector complacency, Robert Needham, the Chairperson of the Queensland Crime and Misconduct Commission (CMC) has said.

Robert Needham said that standards had noticeably slipped.

"While I don't believe systemic corruption exists in Queensland, ..."

  • CMC warns of complacency on corruption, Rob O'Brien

 

Wednesday 13 May, 2009

Australian school principals or other school executives are bullying classroom teachers at alarming levels, Professor Deidre Duncan of the Australian Catholic University and Dan Riley of the University of New England have found.

In a national online survey of more than 800 teachers, 99.6 per cent said they had experienced bullying in the workplace.

State school principals received the worst rating for bullying.

"In government schools, the principal receives a significantly higher nomination as a frequent or persistent bully than found in independent or Catholic schools," Professor Duncan said.

Teachers also reported being bullied by parents.

Education Minister Geoff Wilson said the research was a concern and he would ask his department to look into it.

  • Teachers are 'worst school bullies', Elizabeth Allen and Tanya Chilcott, The Courier-Mail

 

The Legal and Constitutional Affairs Committee of the House of Representatives, chaired by Mark Dreyfus, inquired into whistleblowing and reported on February 25, 2009.

The 2009 Dreyfus Report is a regression from the standard set by the 1994 Senate Select Committee on Public Interest Whistleblowing.

The 1994 Senate Committee listened to and recommended for whistleblowers.

The Dreyfus Report is about managing the whistleblowing problem.

It is written for legislators not whistleblowers.

But who regulates the regulators?

This is the problem that Dreyfus ignores.

 

Whistleblowing is best studied longitudinally, namely over a period of time.

A longitudinal study reveals the repeated regulatory failure that whistleblowers on systemic problems typically encounter.

 

The protections for whistleblowers that the Committee recommended are meaningless.

There are no prescribed penalties for those who "payback" or victimise whistleblowers.

There is no suggestion that the career of the whistleblower should be monitored for some time after the whistleblowing.

Discrimination against a whistleblower doesn't end with the whistleblowing; it persists for years afterwards.

 

We have regressed a lot in 18 years.

The 1994 Senate Committee listened to whistleblowers.

They learnt about regulatory failure.

The Dreyfus Committee should have done the same.

 

Wednesday 6 May, 2009

There is an entrenched mindset within Queensland's education bureaucracy that resists drawing attention to academic excellence.

  • Queensland Government should improve grade: editorial, The Courier-Mail

 

Tuesday 5 May, 2009

The maths skills of Queensland school students fell so greatly during the 1970s and 1980s that researchers have likened it to losing two years of learning.

And Geoff Masters said that his recent review of primary education in Queensland was told of underperforming school leaders.

"A theme that emerged from the review was the fundamental importance of having all players – teachers, students, parents, school leaders, system leaders – working in a consistent and mutually supportive way," Professor Masters said.

  • Queenslanders' maths skills slump, Craig Johnstone, The Courier-Mail

 

Monday 4 May, 2009

A University of New England study has revealed that almost all Australian school teachers have been bullied in the workplace, often by senior staff or the principal.

"The survey's findings are highly disturbing, as zero tolerance to any form of bullying is the expected norm in Australian schools," Dr Dan Riley from the University of New England, in northern NSW, said. 

"The report reveals that the most persistent bullies were identified as the school executive staff and then the principal and that the typical victim is a teacher," Dr Riley said.
  • Almost all school teachers have been bullied, AAP, The Courier-Mail

 

Sunday 3 May, 2009

Premier Anna Bligh will head the Labor Day march in Brisbane tomorrow with -

  • Queensland Teachers' Union General Secretary John Battams - who is also president of the Queensland Council of unions (QCU), 
  • and QCU General Secretary Ron Monaghan.

Thousands of union members would be marching to celebrate more than a century of achievements.

 

Queensland Teachers' Union members, for example, are the lowest paid teachers in Australia.

99.8 per cent of Australian teachers - almost all union members - report that they have been abused at work.

And up to 50 per cent of Queensland teachers leave the profession after five years.

These are the benefits of union membership.

  • Job losses a theme of Labour Day march, Natalie Gregg, AAP, The Sydney Morning Herald

 

Saturday 2 May, 2009

John Faulkner, Special Minister of State, unveiled proposed freedom of information law reforms a few weeks ago.

Mr Faulkner promised "a shift from the culture of secrecy to one of openness".

He said that his aim was to encourage "a pro-disclosure" attitude in the Australian public service.

Because "the best safeguard against ill-informed public judgment is not concealment but information".

 

But John Faulkner's grand rhetoric about openness and transparency seems to stop at the FOI laws.

Whistleblower protection laws recommended by a parliamentary committee headed by Labor backbencher Mark Dreyfus, QC, are actually aimed at keeping the lid on public disclosures.

The Dreyfus committee report on whistleblower protection was released only a few weeks before Faulkner's "openness and transparency" speech.

The committee lists the key values that guided it as privacy, confidentiality, procedural fairness, and "the importance for people to make disclosures internally".

The committee would establish an elaborate bureaucratic maze, purportedly to "enable" public servants to report corruption, maladministration and other misbehaviour.

But the reporting would all be internal and secretive.

Public servants who blew the whistle publicly would, in almost all cases, be viewed as breaking the law, and they would risk jail.

  • Despite reforms, government accountability still wanting, Laurie Oakes, political editor for the Nine Network, The Courier-Mail

 

Friday 1 May, 2009

Education expert Professor Geoff Masters today handed down a report into improving Queensland students' literacy, numeracy and science levels.

Geoff Masters made five recommendations to improve standards, including - 

  • all aspiring primary school teachers sit a Queensland College of Teachers test to show proficiency levels and gain their registration.
  • a new program be designed and delivered through distance education for teachers to improve their teaching methods.

 

Student teachers should be required to achieve a basic standard of literacy, numeracy and science before they are accepted into a University Education course.

And Queensland school principals should be required to sit tests to demonstrate -

a) their reading, writing, listening and comprehension skills

b) and their understanding of Education Queensland policies

- before they are promoted.

Because too many Queensland classroom teachers are suffering under illiterate and incompetent school principals.

The readers' comments on this article are interesting.

  • Queensland teachers face competency exam before teaching, Jessica Marszalek, AAP, The Courier-Mail
  • Call for national exam for primary school teachers, Justine Ferrari, Education writer, The Australian

 

Australian Public Service workplace bullying, harassment, mobbing, victimisation, discrimination and "payback" : April 2009.

Tuesday 28 April, 2009

Ray Halligan is the  chair of Joint Standing Committee on the Corruption and Crime Commission in Western Australia (WA), the WA version of the Queensland Parliamentary Crime and Misconduct Committee (PCMC).

Mr Halligan says that the Queensland system that allows party politics to throw out complaints concerning official misconduct is "totally and utterly wrong".

In Queensland, the government holds a majority on the PCMC.

This allows Parliamentary Crime and Misconduct Committee decisions on complaints concerning official misconduct and corruption to be made on a political basis.

  • Queensland loophole 'totally and utterly wrong': WA watchdog chair, Chris Barrett, Brisbane Times

 

Saturday 25 April 2009

Queensland's deputy public service commissioner Gary Barnes has been appointed the new head of the Northern Territory Education Department.

Northern Territory teachers might want to ask how Gary Barnes dealt with workplace bullying in Queensland schools.

  • Territory education names its new boss, Nick Calacouras, Northern Territory News

 

Sunday 19 April, 2009

Some recent reviews have prompted me to think about the similarity between the behaviour of people in Nazi Germany - who refused to "know" about the Nazi concentration camps - and the behaviour of Queensland public servants - who refuse to "know" about the workplace abuse in Queensland schools.

Last weekend Stephen Matchett asked :

"What would any of us do in a society governed by bullies with no respect for the rights or lives of others ...?

A society where people are imprisoned for not deferring to moral cripples ...?

A society where everybody understands what happens to individuals who do not keep their heads down and mouths shut?"

 

Mr Matchett, it is obvious you do not live in Queensland.

This is the way that Queensland teachers are living today.

 

"It's not the sort of question Australians ask of ourselves because this sort of threat is so alien to our experience."

 

Not here, not in Queensland, Mr Matchett, not alien at all.

 

" But ... there is no reason we couldn't become such a society if enough people stayed silent."

 

They are silent in Queensland Mr Matchett.

They are silent in Queensland hospitals, Queensland schools, Queensland public service offices, the Queensland Ombudsman's offices, the Queensland CMC offices ... all silent.

Silence is their "Code of Conduct".

 

"While some civil servants argued against the abuse of power long before the outbreak of war, the Nazis had completely corrupted the rule of law, and almost everybody looked the other way."

Silence, a passive silence, is the rule of law for Queensland public servants.

  • Unnerving questions of character, Stephen Matchett, Forum, p. 36 Review, The Weekend Australian, April 11-12.

 

Monday 13 April, 2009

24 managers at middle to senior levels who had been accused of workplace bullying talked to Adelaide University psychologist Moira Jenkins.

The research was part of her PhD on workplace conflict management.

"Bullying is not a black-and-white issue," says Jenkins. "Some of the people I interviewed had experienced unfairness in the way the allegations were investigated; some were bullies and had got away with it lightly.

Most were crushed by what happened. ... Being labelled a bully can have long-term consequences," she says.

In her study, Jenkins found performance or behavioural issues with subordinates were often the precursor to a bullying complaint against managers.

 

"Performance issues" can also be fabricated by abusive managers to pay people back for doing their job properly or for complaining about workplace abuse.

 

My concern about this study would be - how would a psychopath respond to these questions?

My bully was such an amazingly convincing "spinner" - even I believed her at first.

And she certainly seemed to believe what she was saying at each given moment, even if it directly contradicted what she had said the moment before.

She even managed to persuaded the Director-General of Education that she deserved his sympathy and support.

How does this research deal with the evidence of a psychopath?

Are they classified as innocent victims?

Or as psychopathic liars?

And if somebody is a psychopath - are they really lying?

Or do they honestly believe the stories that they are continually changing?

Source: Sticks And Stones Will Break My Bones But Names, a thematic analysis of what it means to be accused of workplace bullying, by Moira Jenkins, Helen Winefield and Aspa Sarris, University of Adelaide.

  • Bully for who?, Lucinda Schmidt, Sydney Morning Herald

 

9 April 2009

Each day in New York 700 teachers do not go to work in schools.

They go to sit together in "rubber rooms", a sort of prison for teachers.

Imagine being trapped in a room day after day for months and perhaps years with a group of very disturbed and depressed people.

It is hard to believe that American teachers are being treated this way in 2009.

http://www.mobbingportal.com/rubberroom.html

 

Saturday 4 April, 2009

Allan Kessing was accused of leaking two highly-confidential Australian Customs Service reports to The Australian newspaper in 2005, sparking the biggest overhaul of airport security in the country's history.

Kessing was found guilty by a NSW District Court jury in March 2007 and given a suspended sentence.

Kessing said the Rudd government's proposed laws would limit protection to whistleblowers who pass issues to their superiors and not those who go public, unless there was an imminent threat to public health or safety.

"Why would the person who has suppressed it be inclined to investigate it?

"It is laughable."

 

Exactly.

The CMC and Education Queensland repeatedly allowed the people that I had complained about to investigate themselves and "find no evidence" of their own misconduct.

The problem is systemic.

There is a systemic indifference to corruption.

And the workplace abuse of Queensland teachers continues to this day.

 

"From what my ex-colleagues in Customs tell me, no, in fact just recently there have been problems at the airport and all my ex-colleagues have been told, "say nothing to anybody otherwise the same thing will happen to you as Alan Kessing'." 

"I've done my best, I've fought the government and they've broken me.

"Personally, no. But financially, yes," Kessing said.

  • Kessing critical of whistleblower laws, AAP, The Sydney Morning Herald