Is Rex Express Holdings going the begging bowl route again hoping the Australian Government will continue subsidizing its push to firmly establish itself in those commercially desirable major cities domestic-international air routes?

 

UPDATE: 

Sometime on the afternoon or evening of 30 July 2024 REX Express Holdings Limited appears to have informed the media it is going into "voluntary administration" - apparently before it notified the Australian Stock Exchange on which its shares are traded. 

It has made announcements of imminent doom in past years, ceased ticket sales, suspended flights or air routes when seeking a government bailout or an increase in monies received from a government industry funding scheme. 

Based on past behaviour receiving such financial assistance is no guarantee REX will not go ahead and abandon some regional airport destinations.

IMAGE: https://www.rex.com.au/flightinfo/network.aspx

Having built its Australian air routes by bullying regional councils & indulging in what looked suspiciously like corporate extortion at federal level, is the Singapore-based corporation operating REX Airlines, seeking yet another government bailout?

ABC News, 30 July 2024:

Rex Airlines' future uncertain in wake of ASX trading halt

Regional Australian airline Rex has suspended trading on the Australian stock market pending an upcoming announcement.

The ASX-listed company halted trade on Monday ahead of making an announcement dealing with a media report published over the weekend.

It is understood the announcement relates to a piece published in The Australian suggesting the airline has called in a turnaround team from consultants Deloitte.

The pause in trading is expected to remain in place until tomorrow or until Rex releases a statement to the market.

In a comment to the ABC, a spokesperson from Rex Airlines said the company was currently in an ASX trading halt "pending making a material announcement".

"In the meantime it isn't appropriate for us to make any further comments," the spokesperson said.

Transport Workers Union boss Michael Kaine said he had written to Rex as about 2,000 jobs were at risk.

"This is a sign that the aviation industry is broken, it's actually in crisis," he said.

"We're looking forward to hearing back from Rex as a matter of urgency, to try and get some more clarity on this situation.".

Government to 'work with' Rex

Asked whether the federal government would help keep Rex in the air if required, Prime Minister Anthony Albanese said it was "an important airline" and he was "very hopeful that they'll see their way through".

"We have sought information from the airline through [Minister for Transport] Catherine King, who came to see me about this today … we will continue to monitor what happens there," he said.

"There are a range of communities in New South Wales, in Queensland, in South Australia and right around the country that rely upon Rex … so it's important," he said.

The prime minister said the airline had come through COVID and received substantial government support, "and we will remain vigilant when it comes to this airline and continue to work with them".

"We want to see not just those jobs maintained, but we also want to see those communities continue to have access to aviation that's so important for their economy and for their way of life," he said.....

The Australian, 27 July 2024, p.25:

Rex calls in turnaround specialists

Stories abound of instability in the nation’s aviation sector. Budget airline Bonza fell into administration in April. The mooted listing of Virgin Australia keeps faltering, and now Qatar Airways wants to gobble up a strategically important part of it.

And what of Regional Express? Its executive chairman, Lim Kim Hai, was hot-swapped in June for deputy chair John Sharp, a former transport minister in the Howard government. Lim had served as executive chairman for 21 years, and aside from brief remarks issued by the company acknowledging his “extraordinary service”, no further reason was provided for this sudden and startling tweak to the board.

Seething, as you would expect, Lim went on to requisition a shareholders meeting to remove Sharp and three other directors from the board: Lee Thian Soo, Ronald Bartsch and Jim Davis. No reasons were provided for that development either.

This upheaval is taking place just as Rex finds itself in a spot of serious financial bother, so serious, it seems, that Margin Call hears that the airline has invited a turnaround team from Deloitte to rifle through its books and try to stop the proverbial plane from crashing into the mountain.

Leading that team are Sal Algeri and Richard Hughes, memorable for their role in the recovery of Virgin Australia after that airline slid into voluntary administration in 2020. Deloitte didn’t respond to questions about Rex and Rex itself declined to comment. “Given Rex is a public company, we do not respond to press or market rumours or speculation,” a spokesman said.

Rex’s troubles are not necessarily with its regional routes, which are said to be profitable, but with its expansion into the prized city destinations of Sydney, Melbourne and Brisbane, known in the industry as the Golden Triangle (a misnomer, by the way, the route connecting them forms no obvious triangle).

An expansion into those capital city markets began in 2020, its market share remains in the single digits, and the whole jolly has cost the business dearly. Deloitte’s partners are in a fever attempting a restructure solution as a rescue package. That too, we hear, is teetering towards failure.

Where to from here? Rex’s Golden Triangle dilemma could become intractable enough to push the airline into administration. Whether or not that occurs, the appearance of Deloitte’s clean-up team at least provides a plausible explanation for the airing of linen about to start in the boardroom.

After all, it was Sharp who said last year that profitability mattered more than market share, a remark made only after Rex posted a loss of $16.5m for the half to December 2022. Its latest results weren’t quite as fugly – a $3.2m loss for the half to December 2023....

AAP General News Wire, excerpt, 29 July 2024:

Rex reported a loss of $3.2 million for the first half of the 2023-24 financial year in February, compared with a $16.5 million loss in the prior period, saying escalating costs, particularly for fuel, made it hard to predict full-year profitability.....

The Australian, podcast, excerpt, 30 July 2024:

Anthony Albanese hails the importance of struggling Rex’s regional routes and promises to examine rescue packages, but questions the airline’s foray into competitive big city routes....

BACKGROUND

The Australian Stock Exchange 2024 announcement list re Regional Express Holdings Limited (REX) contained the following:

* 11.03.24 10:02.am ASX Release - REX announces partnership with UAE's national airline Etihad which entrenches REX passenger plane landing rights at Sydney and Melbourne airports as a connecting carrier of Eithad ticket holders.

* 06.06.24 8:33am Change to the Board - Deputy Chairman John Sharp ceases that board role & becomes Non-Executive Chairman. Kim Lim Hai ceases to be Non-Executive Chairman but remains a Non-Executive director & a significant shareholder in the company.

* 12.07.24 9:50am General Meeting of Members - Kim Lim Hai serves notice of a general meeting of members at which he will request the removal of six named directors as well as the majority of any directors that may have been appointed fron 5 May 2024 to the end of the general meeting.

* 29.07.24 9:50am Market Release - Pause in trade of Rex securities

* 29.07.24 10:17am Market Release - Trading Halt in Rex securities at own request until 31.07.24 and pending an announcement.

A LITTLE LOCAL BACKGROUND

North Coast Voices, 1 June 2022

Today REX Airlines began to abandon Northern Rivers regional airports - yet again

On 31 May 2022 Regional Express (REX) airlines confirmed that it was withdrawing airline services from Lismore and Grafton on 1 June 2022 and from Ballina on 2 July 2022.

At the same time it announced cessation of service to Kangarooo Island.

Very predictably this withdrawal again - as it has so often in the past - coincided with the cessation of federal government funding which heavily subsidizes REX.

The phrase 'shakedown merchant' comes to mind.

Opinion: "Those with the loudest voices do not speak for all Jews in Australia"

Sarah Schwartz and Max Elliott Kaiser writing in The Sydney Morning Herald, 6 February 2024:

Those with the loudest voices do not speak for all Jews in Australia.

Today, talk about antisemitism is everywhere - in newspapers, conversations between friends, and especially on social media. Many Jews feel scared. They are told to see antisemitism in the scarves worn in solidarity with Palestine, in the words "Free Palestine" voiced at protests, and in the stickers calling for the boycott of Israeli products.

But while reports of antisemitism have increased in Australia since Hamas' October 7 attack on Israel - as have those of anti-Palestinian racism and Islamophobia - none of these are examples of it. They are instead legitimate expressions of support for Palestinians who are facing overwhelming levels of violence and displacement.

When Australia's pro-Israel lobby groups mischaracterise these expressions as antisemitic, they produce fear and demonise Palestinians and their supporters. These accusations rely on a conflation of Jews and Israel - that any criticism of the state of Israel is seen as an attack on all Jews. This conflation reflects the view, promoted by Israel, that Jewish identity and safety worldwide is inextricable from Israel and its "security". Any criticism of Israel's use of brute force against Palestinians in the name of this security is by default deemed antisemitic.

As proud Jews who are committed to combating real racism, we know these are not the same thing. Jewish people have identities separate from the state of Israel and our cultures and practices are far older than Zionism. The truth is that the Jewish community is not a monolith. We might better speak of multiple Jewish communities with unique histories, diverse expressions of Jewishness, and - in our view increasingly - conflicting views on Israel. Jews here and around the world, particularly those with personal connections to Israel, are still reeling from the killing of more than 1100 people in Israel, the majority civilians, on October 7. Many Jews also abhor the violence Israel has since meted out to Palestinians in Gaza. More than 27,000 people have been killed, according to Gaza's health ministry, many of them children and most of them civilians, and 2 million have been displaced from their homes.

Almost 1000 Jewish people in Australia have signed an open letter condemning Israel's collective punishment of Palestinians in Gaza, calling for a ceasefire and stating that: "Our Jewish values are incompatible with the unjustified cruelty and reckless disregard for human life and dignity that the Israeli government is displaying."

A survey in June 2023 found disagreement between Jews in Australia in relation to Israel's control over Palestinians in the West Bank. Irreconcilable differences of opinion between Jews are widening, yet the broader Australian public could be forgiven for thinking all Jews agree.

This is in part because most so-called Jewish representative organisations in Australia refuse to represent this diversity of opinion between Jews and have become explicit Israel lobby groups. One of these organisations, the Executive Council of Australian Jewry, prepares a regular report on rising antisemitism in Australia.

In its December 2023 report, cited widely in the media, it brings attention to many real incidents of hate against Jews such as graffiti in November on a block of flats saying "kill jews, jews live here".

However, disgusting instances such as this are also lumped in with legitimate political expressions of solidarity with Palestinians, criticism of Israel and criticism of Zionism as a political ideology. Examples include graffiti and placards reading "Zionism = racism" and "end the Palestinian Holocaust" being considered antisemitic, as was the protest chant "intifada, intifada", which means "uprising" in Arabic.

The Israel lobby's conflation of these types of incidents has meant that claims of antisemitism are being exploited to stifle legitimate criticism of Israel's actions in the Gaza Strip and West Bank.

The Australian public now knows there is a concerted effort by organised pro-Israel lobbyists to target individuals who publicly criticise the state of Israel.

Leaked messages from WhatsApp groups reveal campaigns to target actors who wore the keffiyeh - a scarf worn in solidarity with Palestinians - for a curtain call; broadcaster Antoinette Lattouf, who reposted content on Gaza; and doctors who engaged in political action in support of healthcare workers in Gaza. We should all be concerned when political lobbying crosses over into intimidation aimed at suppressing legitimate expression in a democratic society.

The baseless weaponisation of accusations of antisemitism by various lobby groups aims to undermine the movement for a just future for Palestinians, but it also undermines the fight against antisemitism. The history and concept of antisemitism risks becoming confused and devalued amid a very real fight worldwide against genuine anti-Jewish racism and an increase in fascist activity. It will lead to real instances of antisemitism being dismissed.

We are proud of being Jewish. We are the descendants of Jews who fled violence, horror and racism. We grew up hearing stories of Holocaust survivors. For us, honouring our ancestors means fighting against racist violence wherever it appears. Doing all we can to stop Israel's overwhelming violence against Palestinian civilians, found to be a plausible case of genocide by the International Court of Justice, is an ethical imperative precisely because of our Jewishness and our histories.

We write these words knowing we will face backlash. Palestinians face the worst targeting from lobbyists. However, the state of Israel, and groups that lobby on its behalf, have no qualms about going after fellow Jews. In order to maintain that their actions are for the benefit of all Jews, they must silence and discredit Jewish dissenters.

Every Jew we know who has spoken out against Israel has faced threats, social exclusion, intimidation, campaigns for sacking or attempts to discredit them. We are called "self-hating", "Kapos", "Nazi sympathisers", or "fake Jews". Lattouf's Jewish lawyer Josh Bornstein was even called a "traiter" [sic] by a participant in the Lawyers for Israel group which advocated for the broadcaster's sacking.

We are part of a growing number of Jewish people who have spoken out against Israel's actions. Antisemitism is a real threat, but the cynical misappropriation of this term is causing unnecessary fear and shutting down critical dialogue around Israel's war. We are proud of our Jewishness, and we refuse to let those with the loudest voices speak for all Jews in Australia.

Sarah Schwartz is a human rights lawyer and lecturer at the University of Melbourne. Dr Max Elliott Kaiser is a historian, expert on antisemitism and author of Jewish Antifascism and the False Promise of Settler Colonialism.

Ballina Shire Council State of Play 2023: in performance sadly just like every other tier of government as year's end approaches

Ballina Shire Council 
 IMAGE: NBN News 19.06.23

Ballina Shire Local Government Area has an estimated resident population of approx. 46,850 men, women & children (.iD Community:demographic resources, 2022), with a population density of 96.47 persons per square km across its total area of 485.6 sq. km – give or take what the sea hasn’t taken at the last high tide.

It is ‘managed’ by a Council comprised of nine councillors elected to represent three wards and a popularly elected mayor. Bringing the mix of often competing interest to ten local politicians, as well as a non-political council administration and staff running at around 336 permanent full time, part time and temporary staff (excluding casual staff).

Ballina Shire Council is blessed or bedevilled by at least 11 standing committees, at least one reference group and. sits on at last glance 11 other regional organisations including Rous Water and the Northern Rivers Joint Organisation.

That works out to be one elected politician and administrative employee for every 135 Ballina residents/ratepayers, operating within an annual budget that doesn’t appear to fudge its numbers.

So, in 2023 the shire should be running like a well-oiled machine. However this is regional local government we are looking at and, it can be as dysfunctional as the other two tiers of government.

The Echo online newspaper discusses Ballina Shire Council....

30 October 2023

Ballina’s bouncing boundaries

Many people assume that in a civilised country like Australia, electoral boundaries are all taken care of by impartial officials, but in Ballina, it turns out councillors have some say in deciding their own ward boundaries within the shire.

As the local population changes, this has led to an ongoing kerfuffle, with the latest chapter occupying much of the latest Ballina Council meeting.

Defying staff suggestions, Cr Rod Bruem and his allies are continuing to push for a new boundary adjustment which they say is based on common sense geographical boundaries.

This includes moving North Ballina to A Ward, moving Cumbalum to A Ward, moving areas of Newrybar west of the motorway to C Ward, and moving areas of East Ballina (north and north-east of the Richmond River) to B Ward.

After the latest period of public consultation, there were a grand total of two submissions in support of this idea and 55 objections, for reasons including; perceived councillor disadvantage, too many people being impacted, little benefit, high cost, poor forward planning, perceived political interference, and the fact that there is greater variance between the population of wards under the Bruem approach than via the original staff proposal (flying in the face of the whole reason for boundary adjustments).

In the meeting, Cr Bruem blamed the ‘green left Echo newspaper’ for stoking misunderstandings about his proposal among the general public.

He said accusations from critics that his new boundaries amounted to gerrymandering were ridiculous and unfounded, later claiming that he was actually correcting earlier gerrymandering by the 2007 council. He described the current ward division in Ballina as being like the way Berlin was carved up during the Cold War.

Cr Bruem said that residents had tried to have him thrown out of the recent Cumbalum Residents Meeting (this is one of the main areas to be affected by the proposed change) and he had to be rescued by Cr Kiri Dicker.

Cr Bruem claimed he was simply acting based on electoral commission principles, and reducing confusion, by seeking to follow easy to understand geographical boundaries in his proposed ward boundary adjustments. If there were going to be unfortunate political ramifications for his opponents, such as Cr Jeff Johnson (Cr Bruem denied this), then that was nothing to do with him.

Cr Johnson called on councillors to follow their previous unanimous decision to accept staff-suggested ward boundaries back in February, as had already been supported by the electoral commission. He said Cr Bruem’s last minute change was ‘politically motivated’, and a waste of council resources and ratepayers’ money.

New low

He said the recent majority decision to proceed with the Bruem changes was ‘a new low for this council’ in his fifteen years there.

‘It may seem trivial, but I believe that for a councillor or a group of councillors to overturn a unanimous decision and to draw up a different electoral boundary is not the precedent that we want to set,’ said Cr Johnson.

‘It compromises this council as a whole. That is not why we’re here.’

He went on to say that far from simplifying things, the proposed changed would lead to greater confusion, as well as increasing the population differential between wards, from 4.85 per cent to 7.68 per cent, meaning the whole issue would likely have to be revisited again in the near future…..

In the end, Mayor Cadwallader again used her casting vote to decide the issue in Cr Bruem’s favour, with Crs Dicker, Johnson, Meehan, Chate and Johnston voting against.

27 October 2023

Fireworks over C Zone debate in Ballina

Yesterday’s Ballina Shire Council meeting saw accusations and insults hurled across the chamber as councillors split down the middle on the contentious issue of conservation zones.

The question boils down to whether rural landowners should be able to decide for themselves if there are C zones on their properties, (‘opting in’), or whether these areas should be identified in collaboration with council staff on the basis of evidence and negotiation, as part of the modernisation and integration of rural zones.

Progressive councillors brought on a rescission motion in an attempt to undo the previous (very tight) decision to support opt in C zones, noting that council staff and the Department of Planning and Environment have expressed concerns about Ballina Council’s direction on the issue.

Conservation or conservation zones?

There was a surprising deputation from koala activist Maria Matthes, who said, ‘I almost can’t believe that I am speaking against conservation zones, but this is about conservation and not conservation zones.’ She suggested that inconsistencies in the application of conservation zones risked alienating landholders, with potentially negative implications for wildlife corridors, especially when weedy areas are identified as holding conservation value.

‘I would like to see Ballina Council go back to where it should have been 11 years ago, with the new biodiversity strategy in hand, and bring landholders along for the biodiversity conservation journey,’ she said.

During the following debate, Cr Jeff Johnson said he’d seen some bad decisions on council over his last fifteen years, ‘but the proposal to make a major decision on property zoning classifications before the end of an extensive public consultation period, or reporting back to council, has to be one of the worst.’

He said the recent feedback from the state government indicated that the new approach failed every test. ‘I’m shocked at the way this final process has been hijacked; that proper process isn’t being allowed to be followed.’

Cr Johnson said council staff had already alleviated concerns about C zones from Cr Eva Ramsey and others, when they made it clear ‘that no existing farming practices or areas would be impacted, or would be proposed to be impacted by the zoning review.’…..

Mayor Cadwallader later defended her use of the casting vote [in favour of opt-in C Zones], declaring she was supporting the status quo and would ‘vote for common sense every day of the week.’…..

26 October 2023

Country mayors call for regional crime inquiry

Ballina Mayor Sharon Cadwallader will use a mayoral minute in today’s Ballina Shire Council meeting to call for a parliamentary inquiry into crime, law and order in regional NSW, in line with a recent report from the Country Mayors Association.

Supported by the Police Association of NSW, the report also calls for an increase in funding, to enhance front line policing in regional communities in need….

Mayor Sharon Cadwallader will this morning be asking her colleagues to endorse the recommendations of the Country Mayors Association report, and requesting member for Ballina Tamara Smith to consider supporting the establishment of a parliamentary inquiry into rural crime….

Mayor Sharon Cadwallader will this morning be asking her colleagues to endorse the recommendations of the Country Mayors Association report, and requesting member for Ballina Tamara Smith to consider supporting the establishment of a parliamentary inquiry into rural crime.

The first point of the mayoral motion of 26.10.23 was as follows:

That, Council calls on all members of the NSW Parliament to commit to bipartisan support to establish a Parliamentary Inquiry into and report on the rate of crime in all categories reported on by the Bureau of Crime Statistical and Research (BOCSAR) in Regional, Rural and Remote New South Wales, specifically focussing on the inequity between Metro and Regional Local Government areas.

Happy to provide busy work for the NSW Parliament in duplicating the detailed crime demographics produced by BOSCAR up to June 2023 covering every local government area in the state at both metro, regional and local level, Ballina Shire councillors found something they could all agree on.

FOR VOTE - All Councillors voted unanimously.

ABSENT. DID NOT VOTE - Cr Rodney Bruem

Tweet of the Week

 

The Reserve Bank of Australia has made an ad, and it’s surprisingly honest and informative. #Budget2023 #auspol pic.twitter.com/Ar6FQIWLP2

— theJuiceMedia (@thejuicemedia) May 6, 2023

 

State of Play 2023: Royal Commission into the Robodebt Scheme in entering the final tranche of public hearings

 

Public hearings in the Royal Commission into the Robodebt Scheme have been underway since 31 October 2022.

Currently Hearing Block 3 is coming to an end and the final round of public hearings, Hearing Block 4, is due to commence on 20 February 2023.

This week evidence has been heard from a number of significant political & public service 'operatives': 

former Senior Media Adviser, Office of the Minister of Human Services (Aug 2016-Nov 2017), Rachelle Miller; 

former Agency Spokesperson, Department of Human Services (2000?-May 2019) & current Agency Spokesperson, Services Australia, Hank Jongen; 

Liberal MP for Aston & former Minister for Human Services (8.2.2016 to 20.12.2017), Alan Tudge; and, 

former Liberal MP for Pearce & former Minister for Social Services (21.9.2015 to 20.12.2017), Christian Porter.

However, before addressing their sworn testimony, a review of last week's hearings may be in order from journalist Rick Morton.

The Saturday Paper, 28 January 2023:

Evidence heard during one of the most incendiary weeks at the robo-debt royal commission has revealed the extraordinary lengths two federal government departments went to in order to cover up a multibillion-dollar crime that spanned years.

By early 2017, two years after the Centrelink debt fabrication scheme had begun, there were two external agencies with prying eyes threatening to expose the legal fiction on which the entire program rested.

The Commonwealth Ombudsman was investigating, and damning decisions were also coming back in greater numbers from the Administrative Appeals Tribunal.

Both the Department of Social Services and the Department of Human Services adopted a “pattern of behaviour” that would deliberately mislead the ombudsman, ignore directions from the AAT and conspire to keep the government’s dodgy decisions in-house by refusing to ever challenge them past a first-round loss with the tribunal.

It was this latter strategy – according to Emeritus Professor Terry Carney, who sat on the AAT and a predecessor tribunal for decades until the former Coalition government suddenly ended his tenure in 2017 – that was the main reason robo-debt was “able to operate for so long and at such costs to applicants”.

His evidence and the other evidence given this week is the clearest account yet of the extraordinary efforts the government and its departments went to in the name of continuing a scheme that they knew was unlawful and was raising fake debts. Tens of thousands more people were dragged into the mess while this was known.

“Had there been a public ventilation of what the AAT was ruling, there wouldn’t have been an instant change to, or abandonment of, the scheme,” Carney told the hearing on Tuesday.

“But it would have been a lot quicker than the three or more years that nearly half a million people had to suffer the raising of unlawful debts against them.”

The fact the Commonwealth never appealed against a single decision was “unprecedented”, Carney said. This was even more startling a strategy when it became clear lawyers and appeal branch managers in the Department of Human Services (DHS) knew what was going on and did nothing to change course.

"Everybody needs to understand how many thousands of people were affected so badly by a system that was put in by a government department."

Under Commonwealth model litigant obligations and separate responsibilities enshrined in social security law, the federal government is required to have “due regard” to AAT decisions and should act to contest them where it involves a significant matter of law or policy or where different decisions create “inconsistencies” in the application of policy.

Former DHS appeals branch manager Elizabeth Bundy, a qualified lawyer, told the Royal Commission into the Robodebt Scheme on Tuesday that she probably didn’t read one of Professor Carney’s adverse tribunal decisions that was explicitly sent to her for monitoring “because it was very long and legalistic”.

Emails between Bundy and a lawyer in her team, Damien Brazel, sent in late March 2017, show they understood the significance of the Carney decision because it involved the use of income averaging from the “manual” pilot stage of robo-debt, a domain they say they believed was not an issue.

“We need to escalate this ASAP,” Bundy wrote to Brazel on March 24, suggesting they should inform DHS deputy secretary Malisa Golightly.

The following day, a Saturday, at 8.35pm, Darren Zogopoulos, a manager in DHS, emailed about a “third set aside … decision” with a note of alarm.

“This one is very interesting,” he wrote. “I would be concerned of [sic] legal services didn’t contest this. If they don’t, it will open up Pandora’s Box.”

Not only did they not contest this or any other decision, however, but DHS lawyers met some of the decisions with institutional arrogance……

It is helpful to go through this time line in detail.

The sequence of events begins around January 11, 2017, when DSS officials – including former director of payment integrity and debt strategy Robert Hurman – became aware of the ombudsman’s investigation.

From this date, the fuse of bureaucratic panic was lit.

Within hours, Hurman had been sent the only written advice his department had ever sought about the legality of the scheme: the 2014 advice written by Simon Jordan and second-counselled by senior lawyer Anne Pulford, which was unequivocal in its statement that the fundamental basis of robo-debt was illegal.

What to do?

Greggery laid out the department’s blueprint for deception.

“I suggest to you there was a common understanding within DSS – from the time the ombudsman’s investigation was received – to go on the front foot and defend the scheme as being both lawful and accurate in raising debts,” he said to Hurman.

“There was a pattern of behaviour from the start by people within DSS, of which you were a part, and it was designed to establish the lawfulness of the scheme in the representations that it made to the ombudsman, irrespective of the true position.”

Hurman responded that they “were trying to show it in a positive light”, a description that rankled the senior counsel.

“Yes,” Greggery said, “but it’s a bit hard to put a positive light on something that you understood was being conducted unlawfully according to the advice that had been given in 2014.”

Hurman and colleagues commissioned a new set of legal advice from Pulford, the same lawyer who co-authored the 2014 advice, only this time the answer to ostensibly the same proposition was that income averaging could be used to raise a debt.

This “2017 advice” wasn’t delivered until later in January. Six days before it arrived, on January 18, DSS officials attended a walkthrough with DHS leadership about the robo-debt scheme. About the same time then ministers Alan Tudge and Christian Porter were making public statements asserting the lawfulness of the program.

Although Hurman was on leave for this January 18 walkthrough, he authored an email that stated DSS staff were “comfortable that the current process is lawful and clear”.

Greggery asked how this could have been so. The walkthrough happened after the 2014 advice had been recirculated, noting the scheme was unlawful, and before the new Pulford advice had been received.

“So how could you be satisfied, or how could you represent that senior department staff were comfortable that the current process was both lawful and clear,” Greggery pressed, “in circumstances where you had been given contrary advice?”

Initially, Hurman had believed the original advice should be withheld. After a tense back and forth between the policy and legal teams, a decision was made to send both to the ombudsman.

However, on February 23, Greggery said, Hurman learnt that only the 2017 advice had gone to the ombudsman. The legal opinion acknowledging the scheme was likely unlawful was not sent. Former branch manager Russell de Burgh, Hurman’s boss, accepts that the 2017 advice was the only document the department ever had that could be construed as suggesting the scheme was even remotely lawful…….

Read the full article here.