By Stephen Brook and Kishor Napier-Raman
SPOTTED: Disgraced former SAS soldier Ben Roberts-Smith at the footy in Melbourne over the weekend. Outside the MCG’s famed Olympic Room among the Tigers fans, complete with ticket and hospitality wristband.
It is barely six weeks since Australia’s most decorated living soldier lost his full court appeal to overturn the landmark Federal Court decision in his defamation case that he was involved in murderous war crimes in Afghanistan. Roberts-Smith is now seeking leave to appeal the full court ruling in the High Court.
Ben Roberts-Smith (standing) in the crowd during Sunday’s game between Richmond and Adelaide at the MCG.Credit: Getty Images
Meanwhile, his appearance to witness Richmond’s similarly heavy loss to the Adelaide Crows on Sunday sparked surprise among Tigers fans and the club’s staff alike. The latter scrambled to find out if the club had invited the former soldier to the match.
Calls to the club and Roberts-Smith’s former employers at Channel Seven drew blanks, as did a check with the litigious former soldier’s lawyers. It appears he bought his own ticket, club sources said.
Roberts-Smith was not always so interested in Richmond. Back in 2012, a year after he was awarded the Victoria Cross, he was revealed as the new No.1 ticket holder for the Fremantle Dockers. He toured the club gym and met players and officials.
He also predicted a big 2012 season for the Dockers.
“They’re set up pretty well,” he said. “I wouldn’t be surprised if we easily make the finals and hopefully from there they can go all the way.”
For the record, the Dockers lost the semi-final that year to … Adelaide.
Premiers non-committal on Hemmesworld
What will it take for some elites to fall out of love with billionaire Justin Hemmes’ Merivale group?
On Monday, this masthead revealed the restaurant empire was being investigated by the Fair Work Ombudsman over alleged underpayment and exploitation of Mexican staff.
This follows last year’s revelations that female staff working at the exclusive Level 6 of Hemmes’ Ivy pleasure palace in Sydney were subject to widespread sexual harassment by cashed-up patrons in an environment described by one insider as “one step away from being a brothel”.
Justin Hemmes at flagship Merivale venue the Ivy in Sydney.Credit: Louie Douvis
But after the latest revelations, there was caution in Melbourne, where Hemmes’ aggressive expansion includes buying a CBD car park worth more than $100 million with grand designs to transform it into a southern outpost of Sydney’s Ivy hospitality precinct, complete with Melbourne versions of restaurants Mimi’s and Totti’s.
The expansion plan has proved highly controversial with local traders and the nearby Melbourne Club, which is so worried about the trees in the club’s garden that it is seeking to block the plan.
When asked on Monday if she would be dining or drinking at a Merivale venue in light of the investigation, Premier Jacinta Allan said: “Well, it’s not a question of my personal dining interests.
“It’s a question that every employer in every industry is required to comply with the law, and that includes the fair payment of wages and the fair delivery of conditions to employees.”
Which is not a direct yes or no, but then again that is often JA’s style. We had her pegged as more Squires Loft than Totti’s anyway.
NSW Premier Chris Minns wouldn’t rule out visiting a Merivale establishment when asked if he would still feel comfortable eating at Hemmes’ restaurants.
“I wouldn’t put a ban on them; it would be reasonable for me as a consumer or even as the premier to wait for those inquiries [by independent bodies],” he said at a morning press conference.
On Tuesday, this masthead published a report on the criminals who swelled the membership ranks of Merivale’s private club Level 6 as billionaire Hemmes fostered his political connections.
Canberra comeback kid
The post-election Canberra shuffle continues, and it’s a hearty CBD hello to born-again staffer Matthew Chesher, who will be zipping down the Hume Highway from his senior post with NSW Transport Minister John Graham (dealing with a pesky trains dispute) to the nation’s capital.
Chesher starts this week as Social Services Minister Tanya Plibersek’s chief of staff, replacing Dan Doran, who is bowing out after a 14-year stint (that’s loyalty – and maybe a record).
Social Services Minister Tanya Plibersek.Credit: Getty Images
Possibly relevant fact: Chesher is married to Verity Firth, a vice president at the University of NSW and friend of Plibersek (they go bushwalking together – cute).
Chesher has bounced around the NSW Carr, Rees and Keneally governments in various senior positions, including as chief of staff to Anthony Albanese’s ex, Carmel Tebbutt. He also had a lengthy stint at the MEAA journos’ union as director of legal, policy, and industrial issues.
Long-standing readers might recall that in 2011 Chesher was pinged by an undercover drug cop in a Sydney park.
Firth was NSW education minister at the time in Kristina Keneally’s NSW government. Chesher resigned as chief of staff to the road minister the day after he was sprung. He pleaded guilty to possession of one tablet of ecstasy and received glowing references from senior ALP politicians. No conviction was recorded.
Look, we are not encouraging the use of party drugs, but if we had been a staffer in the dying days of the Keneally government, we would have been looking to get lit as often as possible.
And Plibersek’s own spouse, Michael Coutts-Trotter, has been frank detailing his journey from convicted heroin smuggler to the top ranks of the NSW public service. As CBD has stated before, we love a comeback kid.
CORRECTION – An earlier version of this story incorrectly referred to Merivale being investigated by the Fair Work Commission. The company is being investigated by the Fair Work Ombudsman
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