Ex-Palaszczuk adviser Travis Dawson claims reprisals by top staffers over shares disclosure

A one-time adviser to former premier Annastacia Palaszczuk who is suing the state must file a new claim after what a judge described as a ‘parade of inadequate pleadings’.

Annastacia Palaszczuk with her former chief of staff David Barbagallo, who was cleared by the CCC of corrupt conduct in relation to share ownership. File picture

A one-time senior policy adviser to former premier Annastacia Palaszczuk who is suing the state for damages claiming he was sacked and suffered reprisals by several of her top advisers, must file a new claim as his entire pleading has been struck out.

Fourteen months after Travis Dawson launched his claim against the state government in the Supreme Court in Brisbane seeking damages for lost income and superannuation, he has again had his pleading struck out and been ordered to try again.

In a decision handed down on Wednesday by Justice Glenn Martin, it was revealed that Mr Dawson is suing under the Public Interest Disclosure Act seeking damages and aggravated damages for alleged reprisals.

He alleges reprisals were made against him by Palaszczuk’s ex-chief of staff David Barbagallo and her former deputy chief of staff Denise Spinks, ex chief of staff Jim Murphy and executive manager Troy Mitchell.

Mr Dawson states in his latest claim that he honestly believed the information he was reporting as a public interest disclosure “was grounds for Mr Barbagallo’s termination based on: the information they received from Mr Nibbs (and) their own search of parliamentary records”.

The disclosure related to “Mr Barbagallo’s share ownership”, the decision states.

Mr Dawson refers to himself with the pronoun “they” in his pleadings.

In September 2020, the Crime and Corruption Commission cleared Mr Barbagallo of corrupt conduct in relation to his ownership of shares in a company awarded a $267,500 taxpayer-funded co-investment from the Queensland Business Development Fund.

But the CCC said he breached the code of conduct for ministerial staffers by not disclosing his directorship of the company.

Mr Dawson alleges in his claim, which is now struck out and must be repleaded, that he allegedly had “communications” with “the Crime and Corruption Commission” before the reprisals.

Justice Martin struck this paragraph out as “irrelevant”.

Mr Dawson also alleges Ms Spinks and Mr Barbagallo took reprisal action against him by “deliberately not giving him a job” when they were “controlling the reallocation of staffing following the election”, the decision states.

Mr Dawson alleges this was a bid to “to hide the reprisal … behind the large number of ministerial staff movements”.

But Justice Martin stated that Mr Dawson must give further specifics about this allegation as his pleading does not give the state government “an opportunity to understand” the allegation made against it.

Mr Dawson also alleges that Mr Murphy, Ms Spinks and Mr Mitchell took reprisal action by attempting to terminate Mr Dawson’s employment after the November 2019 election

He also alleges a telephone conversation he had with Mr Murphy around 24 March, 2020, was a public interest disclosure.

It was Mr Dawson’s fifth and latest attempt to plead his claim, and he is self-represented.

“He commenced this matter in November 2023 and there has been a parade of inadequate pleadings since then,” Justice Martin noted in his published reasons for striking out the latest attempt.

The state government accepts that in Mr Dawson’s latest attempt at a damages claim he “appears to allege that” he has suffered loss and damage when reprisals were taken against him for making several public interest disclosures”.

The case is due back in court later this year.

Originally published as Ex-Palaszczuk adviser Travis Dawson claims reprisals by top staffers over shares disclosure