Des Houghton: Corruption going unchecked as whistleblowers silenced | Opinion
Whistleblowers who attempt to reveal official corruption in Queensland have effectively been silenced despite the two powerful watchdog agencies, writes Des Houghton.
Des Houghton
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Despite the rise of powerful watchdog agencies like the Crime and Corruption Commission and the Ombudsman, your rights continued to be trampled.
The Palaszczuk-Miles government has left the Public Interest Disclosure (PID) regime in ruins.
Whistleblowers who pointed out negligence or wrongdoing in the public service and government utilities have not been thanked; they have been persecuted.
Hundreds of PIDS remain unresolved, with some I know containing allegations of official corruption.
Retired Supreme Court judge Alan Wilson KC reviewed PID laws in 2022 and made many recommendations to Attorney-General Yvette D’Ath, who this week announced she would not contest the next election.
She described the review as “game-changing”. However, dithering D’Ath has not introduced a single recommendation from the Wilson review. Not one.
I’m told this is because the public service is pushing back.
So are some government-owned corporations who challenge Right to Information requests and engage in delaying tactics by conducting pointless internal reviews into allegations of misconduct without making the findings public.
Fellow Queenslanders, I hate to be the bearer of bad news, but you are being treated like monkeys.
Your complaints against government departments are sent back for investigation to the very departments accused of integrity breaches in the first place.
The continuing lack of protection for whistleblowers rankles Greg McMahon from the Queensland Whistleblowers’ Action Group.
“Whistleblowers play a vital role in our democracy by maintaining the integrity and accountability of public and private institutions,” he told me.
“Unfortunately, this high- energy effort by Mr Wilson to reform a low-energy PID Act has failed to address a major flaw with protections against reprisals that are scaring whistleblowers into silence and hindering efforts to expose corruption.”
McMahon’s action group seeks a stand-alone integrity body answerable only to Parliament with powers to order the reopening of cases dismissed by the CCC and the Ombudsman. Hmmm. I think if the CCC and the Ombudsman were meeting their statutory obligations, such an integrity body would be superfluous.
To add to the integrity fog, we now have several directors-general and their highly paid deputy D-Gs and assistant D-Gs praising ALP policies daily on social media.
Innocent enough, you may say, but to my mind this junks the ideals of independence enshrined in the public service codes of behaviour.
In their reports to Parliament both Tony Fitzgerald and Peter Coaldrake warned of the dangers of a politicised public service, and the lack of accountability that inevitably follows.
Queensland Health especially does not like the media spotlight and last year proposed new laws to stop journalists writing about shortcomings in the hospital and health system.
One executive went so far as to advocate criminal penalties against whistleblowers who tip off journalists about medical mistakes.
The proposed laws would have muzzled reporters and would have stopped a whistleblower exposing DNA testing bungles in the State Government forensic science lab that saw rapists and murderers go free.
Health Minister Shannon Fentiman, meanwhile, has an army of spin doctors whose job is to find photo opportunities that show her in a good light and to counter the negative publicity around ambulance ramping, bed shortages and surgical waiting lists. Previous health ministers Steven Miles and Yvette D’Ath also failed to deliver meaningful health improvements.
And while positive achievements in Health should be applauded, I’m getting a little tired of Fentiman being photographed with patients, often children, who later appear on her social media feed, sometimes unnamed.
In my opinion the children appear like props in an ALP political campaign.
News editors are becoming cynical about these staged events. And who can blame them?
They feed the perception in the media of an overwhelming desire by the Miles’ ministers to hide problems rather than fix them.
Despite all the regulators, crime watchdogs and ethical standards units promising accountability, Queensland has become renowned for failing to correct massive injustice to ordinary people.
Queensland Rail is having a rough time attempting to crush war hero Marcus Saltmarsh, who simply wants to build a block of units at Alderley in Brisbane for 11 disabled people and 22 others.
He is resisting attempts by QR to make him pay for an upgrade to a level crossing across the road that fails to meet national safety standards and is listed as one of the five most dangerous crossings in Queensland.
Saltmarsh claims he has been repeatedly misled by QR.
Last week, the indefatigable Saltmarsh won another round, receiving a case file number and a notification by the CCC that his complaints are being investigated.
Meanwhile, surgeon Shaun McCrystal is still waiting for the results of a CCC investigation into the mishandling of a PID he made concerning allegation of wrongdoing after he was fobbed-off by government departments and agencies who covered-up his complaints – verified by independent experts – that a neighbouring apartment block was being built too close to his Yeronga home and is a fire hazard.
The indefatigable McCrystal saga took a dramatic turn when former premier Annastacia Palaszczuk referred her own Director-General to the CCC for allegedly being too slow to deal with his PID. In a letter to McCrystal before leaving office, Palaszczuk confirmed her Director-General of the Department of the Premier and Cabinet, Rachel Hunter, had “summarily dismissed” his PID.
In her letter Palaszczuk told McCrystal the material had in fact been “assessed as a public interest disclosure”.
“As the allegation involves a failure to comply with the Public Interest Disclosure Act, it may amount to corrupt conduct, if proven,” Palaszczuk wrote. “Therefore, I am providing the information to the Crime and Corruption Commission under Section 36 of the Crime and Corruption Act 2001 for appropriate consideration and action.”
How many others in high office have failed to comply with the Public Interest Disclosure Act that says whistleblowers must be kept abreast of investigations.
Last week McCrystal wrote to CCC chair Bruce Barbour seeking a progress report.
In Townsville, Mark Agius exposed failures by the building regulator QBCC, after winning a six-year legal battle against a builder after he discovered his home was riddled with defects and not built to the proper cyclone safety standards.
Agius is yet to hear from the QBCC as to why it did not compel the builder to right the mistakes.
And he said a PID he made in 2021 remains unresolved. Agius was told in writing his case was referred for an external legal review, with the CCC to be the final arbiter in determining whether it should investigate allegations of wrongdoing or allow the QBCC to investigate itself.
The indefatigable Agius has heard nothing from the CCC or the QBCC about his PID.
The CCC did not return calls.
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