Meg Webb calling for transparency over review of public officer legal help funding

A review determining whether any of the 26 public officers provided taxpayer funded legal help during the Commission of Inquiry should be paid back needs to be released, MLC says.

Independent MLC for Nelson Meg Webb speaks to the media on parliament Lawns in Hobart on Monday, February 3, 2025.

An independent MLC has called on the government to release a report into whether any public officers who received legal help at the Commission of Inquiry should be required to repay the government.

Sam Tatarka, OAM, was commissioned to conduct the review in December 2023 after concerns some of those who received legal assistance did not act in good faith in carrying out their official or employment functions or duties.

A government spokesman said the government “has received Mr Tatarka’s report and is considering it”. He did not say when the report was received.

Independent Member for Nelson Meg Webb demanded the government provide an immediate update on the review.

Independent Member for Nelson Meg Webb says government should provide an update on the review immediately. Picture: Nikki Davis-Jones

“The parliament was subsequently informed in November last year the government anticipated receiving the review’s report in December. But since then, all we’ve heard is radio silence,” she said.

“How can it take so long to ascertain whether there are appropriate grounds to require any of those 26 recipients of public funded legal assistance, and who may have been subject to findings made by the Commission of Inquiry, to repay any of those taxpayer-funded legal fees?

“The government has had months to volunteer an update in a transparent manner, but instead it appears to be hoping we have all forgotten about the matter of the 26 state servants who were granted publicly funded legal assistance during the Commission of Inquiry.”

The Commission of Inquiry into the Tasmanian Government’s Responses to Child Sexual Abuse in Institutional Settings ran from 2021 to 2023.

Originally published as Meg Webb calling for transparency over review of public officer legal help funding