Quotes of the Week

“Director of Public Prosecution, Ms Marianne Ny, has today decided to discontinue the investigation regarding suspected rape (lesser degree) by Julian Assange.” [Swedish Prosecution Authority, media release, concerning the seven year investigation of Wikileaks founder Julian Assange, 19 May 2017]  

This is the single greatest witch hunt of a politician in American history! [U.S. President  Donald  J. Trump tweeting on 18 May 2017 after discovering that the official FBI investigation into Russian interference in the 216 presidential election had been widened]

If you can pay rent, buy food for a week, pay for phone etc and buy drugs on $267.80 a week, you should be made treasurer. [@mrumens, commenting on Turnbull Government plan to drug test unemployment benefit recipients, 11 May 2016]

This is a government of poor data ethics. Hand-waving at risks associated with sloppy data-architecture. Self-congratulatory culture of applause over a mediocre to disastrous experience of digital governance. Vindictive and retributory exploitation and commodification of citizen data. The Australian government isn’t a fit and proper data custodian.  [Internet activist and journalist Asher Wolf writing at medium.com on 9 May 2017]

The standout demographic characteristic of One Nation voters was their lack of education. The typical One Nation voter didn’t finish school, much less, as Marr put it, “set foot in a university”. [Mike Seccombe writing in The Saturday Paper, 6-12 May 2017]

Clarence Valley NSW: a timely reminder as widespread rain again hits the Australian east coast

Australian Bureau of Meteorology probability forecast for 19 May 2017 as of 18 May here.

The Daily Examiner, 8 May 2017, p.3:

THE flood protection around Grafton is not as robust as many people believe warns a local emergency management specialist.

The Clarence Valley Council’s emergency management officer Kieran McAndrew said up-to-date modelling showed Grafton levees capable of withstanding a one in 25-year flood.

“Many people are under a misunderstanding the levees provide one in 100-year protection,” he said.

“They don’t. They were designed to provide that level of protection, but better modelling in the 50 years since they were constructed shows they only ever provided on one in 25-year protection…..

Mr McAndrew said recent major flooding in the Tweed and Richmond and moderate flooding in the Clarence had revealed the lack of understanding of flood protection in and around Grafton. He said there was a danger of complacency in the community……

“If there was a prolonged overtopping event in Grafton it would be much more serious than Lismore because in Lismore there are hills people can reach from the CBD. We don’t have that luxury in Grafton. And because of the volume of water in the Clarence, flood heights fall much more slowly. It means the city would be inundated for much longer.”

He said the Clarence Valley Council had applied to the NSW Government for a grant for a project to determine the floor heights of all properties in flood-prone areas around Grafton. The data would help residents understand the potential impact of a levee overtopping on their property.

Will Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull's lack of judgement place Australia at risk?

Prime Minister and Liberal MP for Wentworth, Malcolm Bligh Turnbull, was happy to say this to the Australian people on 20 April 2017, during an interview with ABC TV 7.30 current affairs host Leigh Sales:

“I do. I trust the judgment, the wisdom of the American government, the president and the vice president.”

Two days later he meets with U.S. Vice President Pence in Sydney and showers him with uncritical praise of American policy.

Two weeks after that he was in the United States meeting with President Donald Trump and expressing solidarity with his government.

Of that visit the prime minister stated; “It was great for Lucy and I to meet with the president and Mrs Trump. Again, that was more family than formal.”

Given the following, one wonders if Australia should trust the current U.S. government as much as Turnbull professes he does.

The Washington Post, 15 May 2017:

President Trump revealed highly classified information to the Russian foreign minister and ambassador in a White House meeting last week, according to current and former U.S. officials, who said Trump’s disclosures jeopardized a critical source of intelligence on the Islamic State.

The information the president relayed had been provided by a U.S. partner through an intelligence-sharing arrangement considered so sensitive that details have been withheld from allies and tightly restricted even within the U.S. government, officials said.

The partner had not given the United States permission to share the material with Russia, and officials said Trump’s decision to do so endangers cooperation from an ally that has access to the inner workings of the Islamic State. After Trump’s meeting, senior White House officials took steps to contain the damage, placing calls to the CIA and the National Security Agency.

“This is code-word information,” said a U.S. official familiar with the matter, using terminology that refers to one of the highest classification levels used by American spy agencies. Trump “revealed more information to the Russian ambassador than we have shared with our own allies.”

The New York Times, 15 May 2017:

In fact, the current official said that Mr. Trump shared granular details of the intelligence with the Russians. Among the details the president shared was the city in Syria where the ally picked up information about the plot, though Mr. Trump is not believed to have disclosed that the intelligence came from a Middle Eastern ally or precisely how it was gathered.

General McMaster did not address that in naming the city, in Islamic State-controlled territory, Mr. Trump gave Russia an important clue about the source of the information.

Like the United States, Russia is also fighting in Syria, where it has stationed troops and aircraft. The two countries share some information, but the cooperation is extremely limited, and each has widely divergent goals in the civil war there.

Russia’s primary focus has been propping up the government of the Syrian president, Bashar al-Assad, not directly battling the Islamic State. The United States, in contrast, views the Islamic State as the primary threat, and is aiding rebels who are fighting both the Islamic State and the Syrian government.

The Washington Post, 16 May 2017:

H.R. McMaster, the president's top security adviser, repeatedly described the president's actions in a press briefing just a day after a Washington Post story revealed that Trump had shared deeply sensitive information with Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov and Ambassador Sergey Kislyak during an Oval Office meeting last week.

"In the context of that discussion, what the president discussed with the foreign minister was wholly appropriate to that conversation and is consistent with the routine sharing of information between the president and any leaders with whom he’s engaged," McMaster said. "It is wholly appropriate for the president to share whatever information he thinks is necessary to advance the security of the American people. That’s what he did."

McMaster refused to confirm whether the information the president shared with the Russians was highly classified. However, because the president has broad authority to declassify information, it is unlikely that his disclosures to the Russians were illegal — as they would have been had just about anyone else in government shared the same secrets. But the classified information he shared with a geopolitical foe was nonetheless explosive, having been provided by a critical U.S. partner through an intelligence-sharing arrangement considered so delicate that some details were withheld even from top allies and other government officials.

McMaster added that Trump made a spur-of-the-moment decision to share the information in the context of the conversation he was having with the Russian officials. He said that "the president wasn’t even aware of where this information came from" and had not been briefed on the source.

McMaster's pushback came just hours after Trump himself acknowledged Tuesday morning in a pair of tweets that he had indeed revealed highly classified information to Russia — a stunning confirmation of the Washington Post story and a move that seemed to contradict his own White House team after it scrambled to deny the report.

Trump's tweets tried to explain away the news, which emerged late Monday, that he had shared sensitive, “code-word” information with the Russian foreign minister and ambassador during the White House meeting last week.

Trump described his talks with the Russians as “an openly scheduled” meeting at the White House. In fact, the gathering was closed to all U.S. media, although a photographer for the Russian state-owned news agency was allowed into the Oval Office, prompting national security concerns.

The Atlantic, 16 May 2017:

Would the president have so abjectly tried to impress representatives of any other country? He blabbed because he bragged, and he bragged because he values Russia’s and Putin’s goodwill so bizarrely much. As the economist Justin Wolfers noted, if officials had not revealed the truth to the media, the Russians would now genuinely have damaging kompromat on Trump: the secret of a dereliction of duty that would have gotten anybody else in government fired, if not indicted.

On 18 May 2017 the Full House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform has set a 9.30am 24 May 2017 hearing date to investigate if President Trump interfered in an FBI probe into the his election campaign's ties to Russia.

Even in the face of Trump’s intelligence disclosures to the Russians Turnbull declares his trust in the current U.S. Government.

As a member of the top-secret Five Eyes global surveillance and intelligence sharing group Australia is potentially affected by Trump’s loose lips and, it is becoming increasingly possible that a prime minister who trusts Trump is an additional risk to his own country's national security.

And people wonder why their council rates keep rising

Council rates don't just rise because the dollar value of lots in a local government area increase or because a council needs to play catch-up with its infrastucture build and road maintenance debts.

Rates may also rise over time because of other cumulative costs. Including the cost of too many people vandalizing or illegally dumping on property owned or managed by a council.

Here is a classic example. The result of someone obviously wanting to take a vehicle somewhere a vehicle was not meant to go.

There are timber bollards at both ends of a walking track at the rear of the Bowling Club in Iluka, a quiet little village at the mouth of the Clarence River.

Replacing, repositioning or re-erecting these bollards costs Clarence Valley Council money in the form of material and/or manhours. 

I am reliably informed that this is the third time this has happened in the last four weeks and that these bollards were also vandalised around 18 months ago.

 Photographs of vandalised bollards supplied

Now the majority of people living in the NSW Northern Rivers region are rightly proud of the greenspaces within their towns and villages and the natural forests inbetween.

So the next time you see someone doing something like this - report it to your local council and if appropriate then call the police.

Remember, doing so just might save you some money in the long run.

How is Trump faring under the weight of six separate investigations?

The U.S. Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) has been investigating Russia’s involvement in the U.S. presidential campaign since July 2016 and in December that year the U.S. Office Of National Intelligence began a review of Russian activities and intentions in recent U.S. elections (report). 

The U.S. Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) reportedly began an investigation into Russia’s potential meddling in the US election last year as well.

In January 2017 the U.S. Senate Intelligence Committee began an ongoing investigation into Russian involvement in the 2016 election campaign.

By March 2017 the U.S. Senate Committee on the Judiciary’s Subcommittee on Crime and Terrorism had commenced hearings in an investigation into “Russian Interference in the 2016 United States Election”.

In addition to this it is reported that U.S. Treasury Department’s Financial Crimes Enforcement Network is investigating payments involving Trump campaign advisor Paul Manafort and bank accounts in Cyprus related to money-laundering allegations and, that in April 2017 the Department of Defense Inspector General commenced an investigation to determine if Lieutenant General (Retired) Flynn accepted payments in violation of the Emoluments Clause, implementing laws, Defense regulations, including payments from Russian entities.

UPDATE 10.13am 18 May 2017- matters are moving fairly quickly and the U.S. Full House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform has set a 9.30am 24 May 2017 hearing date to investigate if President Trump interfered in an FBI probe and, earlier today Associated Press reported:

7:30 p.m. [US Eastern Daylight Time, 17 May]

Former FBI Director Robert Mueller says he accepts the responsibility of being appointed as a special counsel to oversee a federal investigation into potential coordination between Russia and the Trump campaign to influence the 2016 election.

In a short statement, Mueller says, “I accept this responsibility and will discharge it to the best of my ability.”

His law firm, WilmerHale, says he resigned immediately upon his Wednesday appointment by the Justice Department. Spokespeople declined to comment further.

The appointment came amid a growing Democratic outcry for someone outside the Justice Department to handle the politically charged investigation.

It follows the revelation Tuesday that fired FBI Director James Comey wrote in a memo that Trump had asked him to end an investigation into former national security adviser Michael Flynn. End of update.

U.S. President Donald Trump’s public reaction to these investigations has been confined to furious tweeting and disjointed justifications in the odd speech or interview. Although his peremptory sacking of three bureaucrats, New York Federal Prosecutor Bharara, Acting U.S. Attorney General Yates and FBI Director Comey, also appears related to the fact that the investigations are just not going away.

On 12 May 2017 a beleaguered Trump released this one-page letter from a law firm¹ while once again tweeting that the story was fabricated. The letter has a narrow focus on transactions listed in his personal tax returns as it tries to avoid the elephant in the room:

1. MOSCOW, May 2, 2016: Morgan Lewis has been recognized by Chambers & Partners’ 2016 Chambers Europe guide as Russia Law Firm of the Year. The prestigious honor was announced at the publication’s recent annual awards dinner in London, where firms from 24 countries were recognized. See: https://www.morganlewis.com/news/chambers-partners-names-morgan-lewis-as-russia-law-firm-of-the-year. 

The Wall Street Journal reported on 12 May 2017:          

A unit of the U.S. Treasury Department that fights money laundering will provide financial records to an investigation by the Senate into possible ties between Russia and President Donald Trump and his associates, the Wall Street Journal reported on Friday, citing people familiar with the matter.

The Senate Intelligence Committee asked for the records from the Treasury’s Financial Crimes Enforcement Network late last month, the Journal cited the people as saying.

One person said the records were needed to decide whether there was collusion between Trump associates and Russia during the 2016 campaign, the Journal said.

Media outlets in Britain and the United States have also been hunting for information and been joined by a Dutch film company whose 1:22hr made-for-television documentary, The Dubious Friends of Donald Trump - Parts 1 & 2, became available on the Internet this month.

On 10 October 2016 Forbes published an article which featured one of the individuals found in that documentary:

Felix Sater is not a name that has come up much during the presidential campaign. That he has a colorful past is an understatement: The Russian-born Sater served a year in prison for stabbing a man in the face with a margarita glass during a bar fight, pleaded guilty to racketeering as part of a mafia-driven "pump-and-dump" stock fraud and then escaped jail time by becoming a highly valued government informant.

He was also an important figure at Bayrock, a development company and key Trump real estate partner during the 2000s, notably with the Trump SoHo hotel-condominium in New York City, and has said under oath that he represented Trump in Russia and subsequently billed himself as a senior Trump advisor, with an office in Trump Tower…..

It wouldn't have taken much vetting to get the scoop on Sater. FORBES retained a highly regarded global-risk-assessment firm to conduct a background check, using only what was available to it in 2007--the year the Trump-Bayrock relationship was promoted. The investigative firm (it asked not to be named for fear of political repercussions) discovered many facts that we're revealing here and others that have come out before, including felony convictions and organized crime ties. Such due diligence on Sater could have been done for $5,000.

In April 2017 The Wall Street Journal reported that former Bayrock manager, USSR-born Sater and wealthy, Kazakhstan-born property developer and Bayrock principal Tevfik Arif are in a nasty legal dispute that has Sater suggesting he could publicize the other’s controversial past—and warning that the bad headlines could tarnish the president.

Trump is a former partner in certain relevant business ventures involving Bayrock, Arif and Sater - including Bayrock being an investor in Trump SoHo in 2005. Trump and unnamed co-defendents settled a case involving alleged fraud related to the sale of SoHo condos in 2011.

 In 2008 Donald Trump Jr publicly admitted these links to Russian financing:

“And in terms of high-end product influx into the US, Russians make up a pretty disproportionate cross-section of a lot of our assets; say in Dubai, and certainly with our project in SoHo and anywhere in New York. We see a lot of money pouring in from Russia. There’s indeed a lot of money coming for new-builds and resale reflecting a trend in the Russian economy and, of course, the weak dollar versus the ruble”.

In March 2017 in Richard Roe et al v United States et al a motion to intervene was lodged in an attempt to have the court unseal judicial records in part on the grounds:

 “To seek to vindicate the public’s right of access to the record in this proceeding, which includes documents critical to understanding a story of pressing political consequence: President Donald Trump’s connection to Felix H. Sater, who is well known as a conduit to Russian oligarchs and organized crime”.

So how is President Trump coping with information coming out of either these six U.S. investigations or civil court cases and the resultant media storm?

Trump is quoted as telling three Time magazine journalists that “I’m now consumed by news.” He is also various described in mainstream media as being frustrated, visibly angry or seething with rage, as well as complaining in a Fox News
interview of “a level of hostility that’s in­cred­ible, and it’s very unfair.”

Calls for Trump's impeachment are beginning to mount.

BACKGROUND

These are two of the matters Treasury has investigated previously with regard to Donald Trump.

United States Department of Treasury, Financial Crimes Enforcement Network, media release, 6 March 2015:

WASHINGTON, DC – The Financial Crimes Enforcement Network (FinCEN) today imposed a $10 million civil money penalty against Trump Taj Mahal Casino Resort (Trump Taj Mahal), for willful and repeated violations of the Bank Secrecy Act (BSA). In addition to the civil money penalty, the casino is required to conduct periodic external audits to examine its anti-money laundering (AML) BSA compliance program and provide those audit reports to FinCEN and the casino’s Board of Directors.

Trump Taj Mahal, a casino in Atlantic City, New Jersey, admitted to several willful BSA violations, including violations of AML program requirements, reporting obligations, and recordkeeping requirements. Trump Taj Mahal has a long history of prior, repeated BSA violations cited by examiners dating back to 2003. Additionally, in 1998, FinCEN assessed a $477,700 civil money penalty against Trump Taj Mahal for currency transaction reporting violations.

"Trump Taj Mahal received many warnings about its deficiencies," said FinCEN Director Jennifer Shasky Calvery. "Like all casinos in this country, Trump Taj Mahal has a duty to help protect our financial system from being exploited by criminals, terrorists, and other bad actors. Far from meeting these expectations, poor compliance practices, over many years, left the casino and our financial system unacceptably exposed."

Trump Taj Mahal admitted that it failed to implement and maintain an effective AML program; failed to report suspicious transactions; failed to properly file required currency transaction reports; and failed to keep appropriate records as required by the BSA. Notably, Trump Taj Mahal had ample notice of these deficiencies as many of the violations from 2012 and 2010 were discovered in previous examinations.

Director Shasky Calvery expressed her appreciation to the Internal Revenue Service, Small Business/Self-Employed Division, which performed the examinations of Trump Taj Mahal, for their contributions to the investigation and for their strong partnership with FinCEN. She also thanked the Commercial Litigation Branch of the U.S. Department of Justice for their assistance with this enforcement action.

Trump Taj Mahal petitioned for bankruptcy in September 2014. That bankruptcy remains pending. The Bankruptcy Court approved of Trump Taj Mahal’s settlement on March 4, 2015.

FinCEN seeks to protect the U.S. financial system from being exploited by illicit actors. Its efforts are focused on compromised financial institutions; third-party money launderers; transnational organized crime; terrorist and other security threats; significant fraud; and threats to cyber security. FinCEN has a broad array of enforcement authorities to target both domestic and foreign actors affecting the U.S. financial system.

FinCEN's mission is to safeguard the financial system from illicit use and combat money laundering and promote national security through the collection, analysis, and dissemination of financial intelligence and strategic use of financial authorities.

NOTE: Trump Taj Mahal Associates, LLC ,Trump Entertainment Resorts, Inc., Trump Entertainment Resorts Holdings, L.P., Trump Plaza Associates, LLC, Trump Marina Associates, LLC, Trump Entertainment Resorts Development Company, LLC, TER Development Co., LLC, and TERH LP Inc. filed for bankruptcy protection on 9 September 2014 in the United States Bankruptcy Court in the District of Delaware (Bankr. Ct. Dist. Del. Case No. 11-12103 (KG.

United States Department of Treasury, Financial Crimes Enforcement Network, media release, 28 January 1998:

The Department of the Treasury’s Financial Crimes Enforcement Network (FinCEN) announced today that Trump Taj Mahal Associates (TTMA) has paid a civil money penalty of $477,000 for failing to file reports required by the Bank Secrecy Act (BSA). TTMA is located in Atlantic City, New Jersey, where it operates the Trump Taj Mahal Casino Resort.

The $477,000 settlement amount is for BSA violations which occurred at the casino from April 1990 through December 1991. The violations are based on failures to file Currency Transaction Report by Casino forms (CTRCs) within the time period prescribed by the BSA.TTMA was cited for these BSA violations as the result of an Internal Revenue Service (IRS)compliance examination.

Settlement of the final penalty amount was influenced by TTMA’s otherwise laudable BSA compliance programs and its cooperation with Treasury Department Officials during the casino’s IRS examination and final settlement of the matter with FinCEN.

During the 12 years that casinos have been required to comply with Treasury’s anti-money laundering requirements, the industry has experienced dramatic growth and expansion. Today, close to $500 billion a year is wagered at casinos in the United States.

In announcing the penalty, FinCEN’s Director Stanley E. Morris, indicated that BSA compliance by casinos is essential to Treasury’s efforts against money laundering and other types of financial crime. "It is Treasury’s intention to ensure that casinos -- including the ones located in the newer gaming jurisdictions -- are complying with Treasury’s preventive programs," Morris said. "Casinos are cash-intensive businesses, and many offer a wide variety of financial services, similar to banks. Without effective safeguards, they may be vulnerable to money laundering."

Director Morris also commended the IRS’s Examination unit in Mays Landing, NJ for its BSA examination of TTMA and its attention to BSA compliance by the casinos located in Atlantic City, NJ.

The BSA requires casinos and other financial institutions to file reports of cash transactions in excess of $10,000 and to institute preventive compliance programs to safeguard against abuse of its financial services by casino customers. The reporting and recordkeeping information required by the BSA are extremely useful to the government’s efforts in criminal, tax and regulatory investigations and proceedings.

Today’s penalty is the twelfth levied by Treasury against casinos in Atlantic City, New Jersey (NJ). With this penalty, Treasury has collected almost $2.2 million in civil penalties against the 12 casinos in Atlantic City over the past five years.

How the NSW public hospital system still fails those with mental health issues

“To see a mentally ill person in 2014 at a public hospital in NSW treated in such an appalling manner is really beyond comprehension. The sight of the deceased wandering the corridor naked and covered in excrement while the senior nurse is seen to mop the floor apparently oblivious to her is horrific. While this appears not to be a system failure it is clearly a serious human failure. It is for another place to take such disciplinary proceedings as appear necessary.” [Excerpt from a NSW coronial inquest judgment delivered on 7 September 2016]

ABC News, 12  May 2017:

The daughter of a woman who died after she was left to wander the halls of a New South Wales hospital while naked and covered in faeces says nurses there lied to her about what happened.

Miriam Merten died in 2014 from a brain injury after she fell over more than 20 times at the Mental Health Unit of Lismore Base Hospital, on the state's north coast.

A coronial inquest heard she was locked in a seclusion room for hours, and when the two nurses supervising her unlocked the door they allowed her to wander around naked, covered in faeces.

She continued to fall over outside the seclusion room.

Coroner Jeff Linden found she died from "traumatic brain injury caused by numerous falls and the self-beating of her head on various surfaces, the latter not done with the intention of taking her life".

"The sight of the deceased wandering the corridor naked and covered in excrement while the senior nurse is seen to mop the floor, apparently oblivious to her is horrific," he said.

The state's chief psychiatrist Murray Wright said he was equally shocked.

"I can't speak for what was happening in the minds of those nurses but I think it's an absolutely appalling incident," he said.

Ms Merten's daughter, Corina Leigh Merten, said she only found out exactly how her mother died when a journalist contacted her recently.

She said that at the time of her mother's death, nurses gave her a different version of how her mother died.

"I was in school, in Year 12, my dad came and picked me up and we went straight to the hospital," she said.

"At the time they told me she slipped and fell in the shower."

Now 20, Corina Merten said she did not know the coronial inquest was on.

"I'm so disappointed that it took a reporter for me to know what actually happened to my mum," she said.

ABC News, 13 April 2017:

The New South Wales Health Care Complaints Commission said it had found that two nurses caring for a patient who later died from a brain injury kept no record of about 20 falls captured on CCTV.

The woman, known as Patient A, was filmed wandering naked and covered in faeces in Lismore's Adult Mental Health Unit in mid-2014.

CCTV footage showed that in the seven hours before she was transferred to intensive care she fell 24 times.

For most of that time she was alone in a locked room, but nursing records of her confinement made no mention of any falls.

During a five-hour period in the seclusion room, no-one entered to check the patient's temperature, pulse, respiration or blood pressure.

Patient A was not offered any food or water and had no access to a toilet.

The woman died from a brain injury the following day.

The HCCC found the two nurses charged with her care guilty of professional misconduct.

Far too late to benefit Miriam Merten, Health Minister Brad Hazzard said the State's Chief Psychiatrist and a parliamentary committee would review whether failures in mental health care persist.

See: Civil and Administrative Tribunal New South Wales, Health Care Complaints Commission v Borthistle [2017] NSWCATOD 56 decision concerning “Patient A” and Health Care Complaints Commission v Burton [2017] NSWCATOD 57 decision concerning “Patient A” .

NSW Health Care Complaints Commission (HCCC), Annual Report 2015-16:

Each year complaints relating to mental health make up around 12% of all complaints received by the Commission.

In 2015-16, there were 759 complaints in this category.

This means that over the five years from 2011 to 2015-16 the Commission has received 3,051 complaints concerning mental health….

Over the last five years the Commission received:

807 complaints about medical practitioners;

647 complaints about psychologists;

438 about mental health services in a public hospital and 299 about psychiatric hospitals;

302 about nurses; and,

220 about community health services.

In addition to the 12% of all health complaints being listed as complaints concerning mental health providers, another 5.4% of all health complaints are complaints concerning psychiatry providers.

This annual report also stated that 21% of all mental health complaints between 2011-12 to 2015-16 related to professional conduct and 31.9% related to treatment.

Of the mental health complaints received in 2015-16 there were:

46 referred to professional council;

40 resolved during assessment;

55 referred for local resolution;

23 investigation conducted by the HCCC;

46 referred to the HCCC's Resolution Service;

12 discontinued with comments;

7 referred to another body/person; and

226 discontinued with no reasons stated.

Case study included in HCCC Annual Report 2015-16 at page 58:

The Commission investigated a complaint against a mental health inpatient unit in a regional public hospital. The key facts were that:

* Patient A was scheduled under the Mental Health Act 2007 (NSW) with a dual diagnosis of schizophrenia and alcohol abuse

* The patient was difficult to manage due to lack of insight, non-compliance with medication and high level aggression.

* The decision to co-locate the patient in a double room with Patient B – both unpredictable and potentially violent patients – without any a risk assessment.

* On a night shift, required observations either not carried out at all or were not carried out in the manner required, but staff signed off that all care level checks were completed

* Overnight Patient B was killed by Patient A.

The investigation found that care and treatment of Patient A was inadequate. His care plan was ineffective, rigid and failed to improve his condition. There were lost opportunities in terms of appropriate, alternative ways to manage and treat him. Furthermore, his safety and that of others was put at risk through the decision to co-locate him with patient B and because staff failed to carry out the required observations.

SANE Australia 2013 report:

A Mental Health Council of Australia study (2011) found that people with mental illness reported similar levels of stigma from health professionals as from the general community.

Some of the study’s key findings are that:

* Almost 29% reported that a health professional had ‘shunned’ them. These figures rose to over 50% for people with post-traumatic stress disorder and borderline personality disorder.

* Over 34% had been advised by a health professional to lower their expectations for accomplishment in life.

* Over 44% agreed that health professionals treating them for a physical disorder behaved differently when they discovered their history of a mental illness.

NSW Health Care Complaints Commission decisions recorded in 2016 & 2017 re other nursing staff complaints relating to treatment of patients with a psychiatric illness:

RNs Haridavan Pandya and Sumintra Prasad – Unsatisfactory professional conduct, 2 February 2017, concerning their care of a mental health patient at Bungarribee House mental health unit in Blacktown hospital on 28 February 2014.

RNs Abraham Thomas and Donna Hayden, and Ms Julie Rumble – Unsatisfactory professional conduct, 11 May 2017,concerning the death of a mental health inpatient at Dubbo Mental Health Inpatient Unit on 28 February 2014.

Mr Stephen Woods – disqualified from being registered as an enrolled nurse for a period of 12 months, 16 May 2016, concerning a physical and verbal attack of a patient in the Mental Health Intensive Care Unit at Hornsby Hospital on 9 April 2014.

Mr Neil Mullen (RN) – Unsatisfactory professional conduct – Reprimand and conditions imposed, 18 July 2016, concerning care of care of nine patients in the Shellharbour Hospital mental health unit on 30 and 31 July 2014. 

Mr Mike Siebe Greive - Registered Nurse - Disqualified for 18 months, 30 March 2016, concerning a female mental health patient at the Hornsby Hospital Adult Mental Health Unit between October and December 2013. 

Registered Nurses Wendy Kennedy, Christopher Parker and Jisnu Dowsett cautioned and Stewart Thompson reprimanded by a Nursing and Midwifery Professional Standards Committee, 1 June 2015, concerning care of a patient at Lismore Adult Mental Health Unit’s eight bed High Dependency Unit on 19 and 20 February 2013.  The patient was found deceased in his room on the morning of 20 February 2013.

Mr Ronnie Obusan - finding of unsatisfactory professional conduct – reprimand and conditions, 19 January 2016, concerning the nurse’s interactions with a patient in the mental health unit at Nepean Hospital in 2012. 

I'm sure NSW residents would all like to believe that each and every time they present at a public hospital they will be treated with professional care and respect.

Unfortunately that is not always the case as prejudice, discrimination and racism are rarely acknowleged by government as existing within the state health care system and are therefore tolerated by default.

“Stigma against people who have experienced a mental illness is deeply entrenched in our culture. It finds expression everywhere from the Parliament to the front bar. From courtrooms and pulpits to playgrounds it is possible to hear people who experience mental illness cast in an unfair light.”  [National Survey of Mental Health and Wellbeing Bulletin 6, Carr & Halpirin 2002, Stigma and discrimination]

FACTS OF THE MATTER: Trump, Russia and the 2016 U.S. presidential election

FACTS UNDER OATH

GRAHAM: OK. Do you stand by your testimony that there is an active investigation counterintelligence investigation regarding Trump campaign individuals in the Russian government as to whether not to collaborate? You said that in March...

COMEY: To see if there was any coordination between the Russian effort and peoples...

GRAHAM: Is that still going on?

COMEY: Yes.

GRAHAM: OK. So nothing's changed. You stand by those two statements?

COMEY: Correct. ……

SEN. RICHARD BLUMENTHAL, D-CONN.: Thanks. Thank you Mr. Chairman. Thank you Director Comey for being here and thank you to you and the men and women who work with you at the FBI for their extraordinary service to our country, much of it unappreciated as you've wrote so powerfully in your opening statement. You have confirmed, I believe, that the FBI is investigating potential ties between Trump Associates and the Russian interference in the 2016 campaign, correct?

COMEY: Yes.

BLUMENTHAL: And you have not, to my knowledge, ruled out anyone in the Trump campaign as potentially a target of that criminal investigation, correct?

COMEY: Well, I haven't said anything publicly about who we've opened investigations on, I briefed the chair and ranking on who those people are. And so I can't -- I can't go beyond that in this setting. [FBI Director James B. Comey responds to a questions from Senator Lindsey Graham (Republican-South Carolina) and Senator Richard Blumenthal (Democrat-Connecticut) during the U.S. Senate Judiciary Committee investigation into “Oversight of the Federal Bureau of Investigation”, commencing 10am US EDT 3 May 2017, transcript published in The Washington Post]

With respect to the Russian investigation, we treated it like we did with the Clinton investigation. We didn't say a word about it until months into it and then the only thing we've confirmed so far about this is the same thing with the Clinton investigation. That we are investigating. And I would expect, we're not going to say another peep about it until we're done. And I don't know what will be said when we're done, but that's the way we handled the Clinton investigation as well…….

In that particular investigation, my judgment was that it — that the appearance of fairness and independence required that it be removed from the political chain of command within the Department of Justice, because as you recall, it seems like a lifetime ago. But that also involved the conduct of people who were senior-level people in the White House, and my judgment was that even I, as an independent-minded person, was a political appointee and so I ought to give it to a career person like Pat Fitzgerald.

The Russians used cyber operations against both political parties, including hacking into servers used by the Democratic National Committee and releasing stolen data to WikiLeaks and other media outlets. Russia also collected on certain Republican Party- affiliated targets, but did not release any Republican-related data. The Intelligence Community Assessment concluded first that President Putin directed and influenced campaign to erode the faith and confidence of the American people in our presidential election process. Second, that he did so to demean Secretary Clinton, and third, that he sought to advantage Mr. Trump. These conclusions were reached based on the richness of the information gathered and analyzed and were thoroughly vetted and then approved by the directors of the three agencies and me. [JAMES R. CLAPPER JR., former Director Of National Intelligence August 2010–January 2017, giving evidence before the U.S. Senate Judiciary Committee investigation into “Russian Interference in the 2016 United States Election”, commencing 4.30am AEST 9 May 2017, transcript published in The Washington Post]

When the Intelligence Community obtains information suggesting that a U.S. person is acting on behalf of a foreign power, the standard procedure is to share that information with the FBI. The Bureau then decides whether to look into that information and handles any ensuing investigation, if there is one.

Given its sensitivity, even the existence of a counterintelligence investigation is closely held, including at the highest levels. During my tenure as DNI, it was my practice to defer to the FBI Director – both Director Mueller and Director Comey – on whether, when, and to what extent they would inform me about such investigations. This stems from the unique position of the FBI, which straddles both intelligence and law enforcement. As a consequence, I was not aware of the counterintelligence investigation Director Comey first referred to during his testimony before the House intelligence committee on March 20th, and that comports with my public statements. [JAMES R. CLAPPER, former Director of National Intelligence, giving evidence before the U.S. Committee On The Judiciary Subcommittee On Crime And Terrorism United States Senate investigation into “Russian Interference in the 2016 United States Election”, 8 May 2017, transcript]

I had two in-person meetings and one phone call with the White House Counsel about Mr. Flynn. The first meeting occurred on January 26, called Don McGahn first thing that morning and told him that I had a very sensitive matter that I needed to discuss with him, that I couldn't talk about it on the phone and that I needed to come see him. And he agreed to meet with me later that afternoon.

I took a senior member of the national security division who was overseeing this matter with me to meet with Mr. McGahn. We met in his office at the White House which is a skiff (ph) so we could discuss classified information in his office. We began our meeting telling him that there had been press accounts of statements from the vice president and others that related conduct that Mr. Flynn had been involved in that we knew not to be the truth.

And as I - as I tell you what happened here, again I'm going to be very careful not to reveal classified information…..

So I told them again that there were a number of press accounts of statements that had been made by the vice president and other high-ranking White House officials about General Flynn's conduct that we knew to be untrue. And we told them how we knew that this - how we had this information, how we had acquired it, and how we knew that it was untrue.

And we walked the White House Counsel who also had an associate there with him through General Flynn's underlying conduct, the contents of which I obviously cannot go through with you today because it's classified. But we took him through in a fair amount of detail of the underlying conduct, what General Flynn had done, and then we walked through the various press accounts and how it had been falsely reported.

We also told the White House Counsel that General Flynn had been interviewed by the FBI on February 24. Mr. McGahn asked me how he did and I declined to give him an answer to that. And we then walked through with Mr. McGahn essentially why we were telling them about this and the first thing we did was to explain to Mr. McGahn that the underlying conduct that General Flynn had engaged in was problematic in and of itself.

Secondly, we told him we felt like the vice president and others were entitled to know that the information that they were conveying to the American people wasn't true. And we wanted to make it really clear right out of the gate that we were not accusing Vice President Pence of knowingly providing false information to the American people.

And, in fact, Mr. McGahn responded back to me to let me know that anything that General Flynn would've said would have been based -- excuse me -- anything that Vice President Pence would have said would have been based on what General Flynn had told him.

We told him the third reason was -- is because we were concerned that the American people had been misled about the underlying conduct and what General Flynn had done, and additionally, that we weren't the only ones that knew all of this, that the Russians also knew about what General Flynn had done.

And the Russians also knew that General Flynn had misled the vice president and others, because in the media accounts, it was clear from the vice president and others that they were repeating what General Flynn had told them, and that this was a problem because not only did we believe that the Russians knew this, but that they likely had proof of this information.

And that created a compromise situation, a situation where the national security adviser essentially could be blackmailed by the Russians. Finally, we told them that we were giving them all of this information so that they could take action, the action that they deemed appropriate.

I remember that Mr. McGahn asked me whether or not General Flynn should be fired, and I told him that that really wasn't our call, that was up to them, but that we were giving them this information so that they could take action, and that was the first meeting.

[SALLY C. YATES, former Deputy U.S. Attorney-General & former Acting Attorney-General January 2015-January 2017, giving evidence before the U.S. Senate Judiciary Committee investigation into “Russian Interference in the 2016 United States Election”, commencing 4.30am AEST 9 May 2017, transcript published in The Washington Post]

‘ALTERNATIVE FACTS’

[https://twitter.com/realDonaldTrump/status/861712617299210240 & https://twitter.com/realDonaldTrump/status/861713233786404864]

via @SeanMcElwee 

HOLT: Monday, you met with Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein. Did you ask for a recommendation?
TRUMP: What I did was, I was going to fire. My decision. I was not...
HOLT: You’d made the decision before they came into the room?
TRUMP: I was going to fire Comey. There’s no good time to do it by the way.
HOLT: In your letter, you said, ‘I accept their recommendation.’ 
TRUMP: Oh, I was going to fire, regardless of recommendation. He made a recommendation, he’s highly respected — very good guy, very smart guy. And the Democrats like him, Republicans like him. He made a recommendation, but regardless of recommendation, I was going to fire Comey. [Excerpt from NBC News Lester Holt interview with Donald Trump on 11 May 2017]