QAnon conspiracy theories end up in the Federal Court of Australia

The Guardian, 29 August 2020:

In May, Anne Webster, a first-term Nationals MP from Mildura in regional Victoria, quietly launched a defamation action in the federal court over a series of posts and videos about her on social media site Facebook. 

According to a statement of claim seen by Guardian Australia, posts made about the federal MP in April claimed, without any factual basis, that she was “a member of a secretive pedophile network” who had been “parachuted into parliament to protect a past generation of pedophiles”. 

Within weeks of the case being filed, Justice Michael Wheelahan made urgent orders for the defendant to remove the posts, labelling them “vile” and describing the legal action as “one of those exceptional cases” where the court could order the removal of the allegedly defamatory material before a trial. 

“Given the potency of the allegations [in the] online posts, the scandal created may well reach quarters that cannot be known … this is one of those rare cases where damages may not be an adequate remedy,” Wheelahan said. 

Webster’s case was filed against a woman named Karen Brewer, an Australian who the court believes may now live in New Zealand. Though she is basically unknown outside of the online communities in which she spends much of her time, Brewer – which may not be her real name – is one of Australia’s leading conspiracy agitators. 

Brewer’s personal Facebook page, which has thousands of followers, is a petri dish of beguiling theories and vicious abuse. In the steady stream of live videos and posts she feeds to her thousands of followers each day, Brewer rails against vaccinations, fluoride, and the cabal of Freemasons she believes controls Australia’s parliament, judiciary, media and bureaucracy as part of an extensive paedophile protection racket....

Though Australia’s conspiracy landscape is complex, increasingly the thread that unites these groups is a messy Antipodean adaption of QAnon, a sprawling and baseless internet conspiracy theory born in the online messaging board 4chan in 2017. 

Wide-ranging and preternaturally bewildering, QAnon adherents are loosely tied to the belief that, as the Guardian put it this week, “a cabal of Satan-worshipping Democrats, Hollywood celebrities and billionaires run the world while engaging in pedophilia, human trafficking and the harvesting of a supposedly life-extending chemical from the blood of abused children”. 

Evangelical in its zeal, adherents believe a multitude of spin-off theories, including that Bill Gates is using Covid-19 to implant microchips in people and that the ongoing lockdown in Victoria is a cover for the premier, Daniel Andrews, to install 5G technology throughout the state. 

Though Brewer is not outwardly affiliated with QAnon, many of her beliefs line up with the conspiracy. Webster’s defamation claim, which also includes her husband and a not-for-profit women’s organisation called Zoe Support Australia that they founded together in Mildura, alleges the posts falsely accused the couple of founding the women’s organisation to “access young children on behalf of a secretive pedophilia network”.

To date, social media companies have had little success controlling the growth of QAnon on their platforms.

Last week, Facebook announced it had taken down or restricted 790 groups, 1,500 ads and 100 pages tied to QAnon, and blocked more than 300 hashtags used by its followers on Facebook and Instagram. It followed Twitter’s announcement of a broad crackdown on about 150,000 accounts linked to the conspiracy in July.

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But those steps have had little effect. On Twitter, QAnon followers successfully hijacked a save the children hashtag after the purge and in Australia the Guardian noticed little if any impact on local QAnon groups after Facebook’s crackdown.

In fact, a recent report by the Institute for Strategic Dialogue found QAnon’s following was growing considerably in Australia.

“We found that the US was consistently the largest QAnon content-producing country, followed by the UK, Canada and Australia,” the report stated.

Though most of QAnon’s lore is specifically catered to a US audience (QAnon’s followers believe the US president, Donald Trump, is secretly working to thwart the network of paedophiles and their “deep state” collaborators), its inherent adaptability means it’s capable of hoovering up pre-existing conspiracy theories into its swirling illogic.....

Coalition shields firebrand MP Craig Kelly from censure for spreading Covid misinformation

Read moreIn Australia, its adherents have had no trouble retrofitting the theory to suit our politics.....

Karen Brewer
Snapshot taken from a YouTube video
30 August 2020

On 19 May 2020 there was a hearing in the matter of Webster v Brewer (No 2) [2020] FCA 727.

There was no appearance at that hearing by counsel for 52 year-old Ms. Brewer.

The Court accepted that Ms. Brewer had been properly notified of the hearing date, court details and had received the statement of claim & revised statement of claim.

On 19 May the Court reaffirmed Orders of 8 May - the following is an excerpt from those Orders.

THE COURT ORDERS THAT: 

PENAL NOTICE TO: 

KAREN BREWER IF YOU (BEING THE PERSON BOUND BY THIS ORDER): (A) REFUSE OR NEGLECT TO DO ANY ACT WITHIN THE TIME SPECIFIED IN THIS ORDER FOR THE DOING OF THE ACT; OR 
(B) DISOBEY THE ORDER BY DOING AN ACT WHICH THE ORDER REQUIRES YOU NOT TO DO, YOU WILL BE LIABLE TO IMPRISONMENT, SEQUESTRATION OF PROPERTY OR OTHER PUNISHMENT. 

ANY OTHER PERSON WHO KNOWS OF THIS ORDER AND DOES ANYTHING WHICH HELPS OR PERMITS YOU TO BREACH THE TERMS OF THIS ORDER MAY BE SIMILARLY PUNISHED. 

 IN THESE ORDERS: 

 a) the respondent’s Facebook account is accessible at the URL address ‘https://www.facebook.com/karen.spiers.336’. 
b) the “First Post” is the post uploaded to the respondent’s Facebook account on or about 26 April 2020 at 6.21am. 
c) the “First Video” is the video post uploaded to the respondent’s Facebook account on or about 26 April 2020 at 2.01pm. 
d) the “Second Post” is the post uploaded to the respondent’s Facebook account on or about 27 April 2020 at 5.14am. 
e) the “Second Video” is the video uploaded to the respondent’s Facebook account on or about 30 April 2020 at 6.13pm. 
f) the “Third Post” is the post uploaded to the respondent’s Facebook account on or about 8 May 2020 at 5.42am. 
g) the “Third Video” is the video uploaded to the respondent’s Facebook account on or about 8 May 2020 at 6.00am. 
h) the “Fourth Video” is the video uploaded to the respondent’s Facebook account on or about 8 May 2020 at 7.44am.

THE COURT ORDERS THAT: 

Upon the applicants giving the usual undertaking as to damages (see Practice Note GPN-UNDR), until further order, the respondent by herself or by her servants or agents, or howsoever, be restrained from publishing or causing to be published in any form, or maintaining online for downloading, or uploading so as to make available for publication online: 
a)the First Post; 
b) the First Video; 
c) the Second Post; 
d) the Second Video; 
e) the Third Post; 
f) the Third Video; 
g) the Fourth Video; and any other matter to the same purport or effect as any of the above matters to the extent that such other matters identify the applicants, whether expressly or by implication.

Berejiklian Government bows to National Party slash & burn mentality in its media release but the Final Report of the NSW Bushfire Inquiry tells another story

In which the NSW Nationals through Deputy-Premier & MLA for Monaro John Barilaro insert into a government media release their dislike of national parks and unexploited Crown land. 

NSW GOVERNMENT, media release, 25 August 2020:

The NSW Government has released the independent NSW Bushfire Inquiry, which examined the causes, preparation and response to the devastating 2019-20 bushfires.

All 76 recommendations will be accepted in principle, with further work to be done on specific timelines to give communities assurance that changes will be made to keep them safe.

Any issues not covered in the report that are still relevant to the protection of property and life will also be further examined.

Resilience NSW, led by Commissioner Shane Fitzsimmons, has been tasked with coordinating and overseeing the implementation of the Inquiry’s recommendations as the government finalises its approach.

Premier Gladys Berejiklian thanked former NSW Police Deputy Commissioner Dave Owens and Professor Mary O’Kane AC for their hard work on this report.

“The NSW Government has worked in lock-step with the RFS and Resilience NSW to ensure the state is as prepared as it can be to face the next fire season, but the learnings from this Inquiry will help us further improve our preparedness and response,” said Ms Berejiklian.

“The NSW Government has already delivered more than $45 million in additional funding, announced in May 2020, to fast-track hazard reduction and deliver upgrades to our firefighting capability.

“This was a terrible bushfire season and we will look at all the steps we can take, especially in relation to helping people protect their property.”

The findings of the report show that there is an opportunity to strengthen governance and responsibility, which we are in the process of addressing.

The report also acknowledges the significant contribution of both climate change and the vast expanse of the state’s bushland towards these devastating fires.

Deputy Premier John Barilaro said all 76 recommendations in the Inquiry are based on the harsh lessons learnt from the catastrophic bushfires of last summer.

“Last bushfire season was unlike anything we have ever dealt with before and we need a government response to match,” Mr Barilaro said.

“Things like strategic hazard reduction and better land management no matter the tenure are essential when it comes to keeping our communities safe.”

Minister for Police and Emergency Services David Elliott said NSW is more prepared than ever before for the 2020-21 fire season.

“We have already begun implementing the Inquiry’s recommendation to replace and retrofit the fleet, with 120 new trucks and 70 refurbished trucks to be rolled out before the end of the financial year,” Mr Elliott said.

“I would like to thank all our emergency personnel and volunteers who made us all proud over this relentless bushfire season.”

Read the Final Report of the NSW Bushfire Inquiry

Find out about the NSW Bushfire Inquiry and public submissions

[my yellow highlighting]

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

In which the conclusion was reached that when it came to bushfires, precautionary hazard reduction had limited value and, assumed land management practices in national parks and state forests or on private land did not significantly influence whether a fire started or a fire's outcome.

FinalReport of the NSW Bushfire Inquiry, 31 July 2020, excerpts, pp. 49, 52-53, 56:

2.2.2.1 Fuels on different types of land

Another common theme in the feedback to the Inquiry has been that fuel is managed better (or worse) on different types of land, with national parks in particular being criticised for ‘locking up’ land and allowing fuel to accumulate putting other landowners at risk, and that activity such as grazing should have been allowed in the parks to manage fuel loads.

The Research Hub examined this question using the Bees Nest fire in northern NSW as a case study to see whether aspects of fuel structure in forests – in terms of its cover and vertical connectivity – differed between different tenures: conservation estate (national park and State conservation area), State forest and privately owned land. These aspects of fuel cover and vertical connectivity are the factors considered likely to influence the likelihood of high intensity crown fires occurring.

The analysis used airborne LiDAR imagery to look at vegetation cover of the understorey (0.5-5 m height), lower canopy (5-15 m height) and upper canopy (greater than 15 m height).

In summary, this analysis showed that fuel cover and vertical connectivity between fuel levels were similar across different land tenures, and that there was no clear influence from inferred different management practices (for example, logging in State forests or grazing on private land) on the fuel properties of the forests on different land tenures. Therefore, in this case study area in northern NSW, the resultant bush fire hazard may have been similar across land tenure and the forest flammability (represented by measures of fuel structure) did not appear to have been a significantly influenced by different land management regimes.

The Inquiry notes that this work is only one case study and, as noted in the Research Hub’s report, relies on certain assumptions about management practices on the different tenures, and does not exclude the possibility that variations in logging and livestock grazing practices (e.g. different harvesting treatments, stocking rates etc.) could result in different results, or that different forest types might respond differently. However, as an initial case study, this points to some important issues that should be examined further in a more detailed investigation of the information generated from the 2019-20 fires across NSW.

2.2.2.2. Would more hazard reduction have helped?

…..In general, recent bush fires (unplanned fires) appeared to have a greater influence on preventing fire spread than recent prescribed burns, and while some recent prescribed fires had an influence on reducing fire severity, many had no obvious influence on fire severity. These effects are shown for the three case study areas in Figures 2-11, 2-12 and 2-13.

Overall, this work concluded that prescribed burns can reduce the severity of subsequent bush fires. However, “this effect is less than that of wildfires, it is short lived, and it is less effective under severe fire weather conditions”, findings that are consistent with much of the available literature…..

Another important question is whether fuel load or age had an impact on the number of successful ignitions. Certainly, dryness had an impact on the efficiency of ignitions by lightning (i.e. many lightning strikes resulted in ignitions because the fuel was so dry).

While this question cannot be answered with certainty for the 2019-20 season, research by Penman, Bradstock and Price (2013)123 on the Sydney basin found that, on days of Severe or Extreme fire risk, with a Forest Fire Danger Index (FFDI)124 value greater than 50, the likelihood of ignition in younger fuels (recently burnt areas) is still high. This work found that fuel reduction is likely to influence lightning ignitions on days with low values of the FFDI – however, it notes that days with low FFDI values are not the conditions when large, serious bush fires tend to occur.
[my yellow highlighting]

Court of Appeal rejects Adani's application to search an activist's home & Supreme Court orders Adani to pay $106.8 million to four companies - in part due to its own "serious dishonesty"

ABC News, 27 August 2020:

Mining company Adani secretly sought to raid the Brisbane home of an activist to seize evidence but failed twice, court documents have revealed.

Adani and its Carmichael Rail Network applied for a search order, known as an Anton Piller order, against Benjamin Pennings in June this year.

It claimed Mr Pennings had possession of "confidential information on a computer at his home" which was being used in a concerted campaign of "intimidation and conspiracy" against the Galilee Basin coal project.

As part of the application, Adani claimed Mr Pennings had information to which only company executives and other select staff and contractors had access.

Anton Piller orders are searches carried out without notice to the defendant to ensure that evidence cannot be destroyed and is preserved to be used in judicial proceedings.

Adani's court application and subsequent appeal in July were also heard ex parte, meaning they were both heard without notice.

Adani has described Mr Pennings as the "principal" of a group of political activists called the "Galilee Blockade", whose objective is to prevent the development of the mine and railway.

In rejecting Adani and Carmichael Rail Network's appeal last week, the Court of Appeal ruled the evidence was "wholly inadequate to justify the order sought".

"The appellants have failed to establish the likelihood that Mr Pennings has any confidential information or that he has any confidential information stored at his home," the Court of Appeal judges said.

"They have failed to establish the likelihood that the use of any confidential information has resulted in any loss."

The Court of Appeal also raised concerns about the impact of a search order could have had on Mr Pennings' partner and children.

"Surely, to permit a search of a defendant's house, with the humiliation and family distress which that might involve, lies at the outer boundary of the discretion," the Court of Appeal judges said.

"This is because, for reasons that anyone can understand, the 'shock, anger, confusion' and the 'sense of violation and powerlessness' will be much greater in such a case and may be suffered not only by someone who is proved in due course to be a wrongdoer, but by entirely innocent parties as well."……

Read the full article here.

BACKGROUND

Mining Pty Ltd & Anor v Pennings [2020] QCA 169 (17 August 2020)

The Adani Group appears to have been the applicant or been named as a respondent in around seven court cases between 2013 and 2020.

This is the latest:

Adani Abbot Point Terminal Pty Ltd v Lake Vermont Resources Pty Ltd & Ors [2020] QSC 260 – 26 August 2020. Adani ordered to pay $106.8 million.

Excerpts from the judgment:

“[197] The applicant’s conduct was deliberate, not just heedless or indifferent ⁸¹ to the position of the remaining users. The applicant was fully cognisant as to the effect its behaviour would have in increasing the fixed costs to the remaining users. It desired that effect in order to advantage itself financially. That is, to achieve a gain for itself, the applicant engaged in calculated behaviour to the disadvantage of the respondents.⁸² This is evident in the timing and structure of the QCPL transactions.”

“[203] The applicant’s behaviour in attempting to disguise or camouflage the true basis of its dealings with QCPL involved dishonesty – [117] ff and [122], and so far as this proceeding is concerned, involved serious dishonesty – [98] and [121].”

PACIFIC HIGHWAY UPGRADE: flooding fears surface in the Clarence Valley in 2020

ClarenceValley Independent, 26 August 2020:

As the new highway nears completion across the Lower Clarence, fears have been raised about what happens during a flood, due to the highway apparently acting as a dam at various locations.

The areas around Ferry Park to Shark Creek (where rising floodwater first breaks the river’s banks) and Chatsworth Island (where long sections of the highway “act like a dam wall”) are locations where floodwater behaviour will be affected.

And, with the Bureau of Meteorology announcing that there is a 70 per cent chance of La Nina developing (“roughly three times the average likelihood”), which “typically increases the chance of above average rainfall across much of Australia during spring”, the flood modelling in Pacific Complete’s Hydrological Mitigation Report,Glenugie to Devils Pulpit could be put to the test sooner, rather than later.

In general terms, according to a letter from Transport NSW, in answer to an enquiry by Chatsworth Island resident Shane Williams, changes to flood behaviour across the Clarence River regional catchment are as follows:

• A minor increase in flood level to the west of the highway;
• A minor decrease in flood level to the east;
• A minor increase in flood duration to the west and also to the east in some areas; and,
• No perceptible change in flood velocity or direction.

The mitigation report states in the overall flood impact assessment that resultant increases in flood levels across the floodplain are“considered minor and generally meet the limits set by the flood management objectives”.

On flood duration, the report states that, overall, any changes in duration “meet the limits set by the flood management objectives (less than five percent increase)”, however, at “some small localised areas … between Maclean and Iluka Road … the flood duration is predicted to be affected by more than five percent”.

“Under existing conditions, most of the land within the Clarence River regional floodplain is flooded for more than 72 hours for the 20, 50 and 100-year ARI (average recurrence interval) events,” the report states.

“For the 5-year ARI event, areas around the fringe of the floodplain are flooded for a range of durations from less than six hours up to 72 hours.”

The report states that “there are small increases in flood level between five millimetres to 15 millimetres in the Clarence River main channel” and that “there are no impacts to the township of Maclean in the 5 and 20-year ARI flood events, as the Maclean levee is not overtopped”.

While the levee “is overtopped under both existing and future conditions for the 50-year ARI event … and a large part of Maclean is flooded”, the report notes that “further analysis” of the 50-year ARI event is incomplete and that “mitigation measures are under investigation”.

At Harwood “a minor increase in flood levels upstream due to the bridge piers” is an expectation……

Read the full article here.

BACKGROUND

Glenugie to Devils Pulpit hydrological mitigation report update - Maclean levee 2017 [PDF]