Rita Panahi: Daniel Andrews, his ministers and staff could face manslaughter charges
Never has the expression “hoist with his own petard” been more apt. Members of the Victorian government and bureaucracy could face industrial manslaughter charges over the hotel quarantine fiasco, writes Rita Panahi.
Rita Panahi
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One down, seven to go. The resignation of hapless health minister Jenny Mikakos is a start but by no means the end of a reckoning that should see every single member of the Crisis Cabinet, including the Premier, stepping down in disgrace.
Joining them should be the well remunerated department heads who oversaw gross incompetence on a scale unparalleled in the history of this state.
Counsel assisting the hotel quarantine inquiry, Ben Ihle, summed up the calamity when he said: “The failure by the hotel quarantine program to contain this virus is (to date) responsible for the deaths of 768 people and the infection of some 18,418 others ... One only needs to pause and to reflect on those figures to appreciate the full scope of devastation and despair.”
Dan Andrews says the buck stops with him. Why should Mikakos take full responsibility for the quarantine program when it was Jobs Minister Martin Pakula’s department that selected the security companies, giving the bulk of the work to a questionable outfit that was not on the government’s approved list of contractors?
Pakula’s department gave Unified Security a $44 million payday primarily because the identity politics-obsessed far Left Andrews government was more concerned with one of the company owner’s Indigenous heritage than the ability of the firm to carry out their work safely.
The Premier and his team of incompetent senior ministers and bureaucrats may soon have more to worry about than the findings of the Coate inquiry. The prospect of facing prosecution for industrial manslaughter charges grows stronger by the day.
Indeed, it was the fear of facing criminal charges that saw so many struck with selective memory loss, according to commentator Robert Gottliebsen.
“The Victorian politicians and public servants caught in the hotel quarantine saga do not have amnesia but rather have a genuine fear that any admission of liability will cause them to be prosecuted under Victorian law,” he wrote.
“Some of those involved in the quarantine fiasco were actually part of the plotting that designed one of the most vicious industrial manslaughter acts in the Western world.”
Members of the Victorian government and bureaucracy could be prosecuted under occupational health and safety laws that carry prison terms of up to 25 years. Never has the expression “hoist with his own petard” been more apt.
Labor’s industrial manslaughter laws came into effect on July 1 this year after passing the upper house in late November. According to WorkSafe Victoria: “... for the purposes of workplace manslaughter, conduct will be considered ‘negligent’ if it involves: a great falling short of the standard of care that a reasonable person would have taken in the circumstances, and a high risk of death, serious injury or serious illness.”
Just as terrifying for the bureaucrats and responsible ministers, under the act negligent conduct also includes “a failure to act” such as failing to adequately manage, control or supervise employees, or failing to “take reasonable action to fix a dangerous situation, where failing to do so causes a high risk of death, serious injury or serious illness.”
Under Victorian law, any citizen can request WorkSafe, and then the Director of Public Prosecutions, to prosecute individuals for breaching the state’s OHS laws.
On Tuesday WorkSafe Victoria was sent a letter by Ken Phillips, executive director of Self Employed Victoria, requesting a number of individuals including the Premier, ministers Pakula and Lisa Neville, Mikakos, and 16 top public servants, a number of departments and Victorian Trades Hall Council, be prosecuted under the Occupational Health and Safety Act 2004.
The public servants named in the letter include Chief Health Officer Brett Sutton and deputy Annaliese van Diemen, Department of Premier and Cabinet secretary Chris Eccles, State Controllers Jason Helps and Andrea Spiteri, Health and Human Services secretary Kym Peake, Jobs, Precincts and Regions secretary Simon Phemister, Emergency Management Commissioner Andrew Crisp, former police chief commissioner Graham Ashton and incumbent Shane Patton, plus several other bureaucrats alleged to have failed in their duty to provide a safe worksite.
Phillips believes that the evidence heard at the Coate inquiry shows that the government caused the second outbreak and thus is culpable under the Act.
The next step will see WorkSafe chief Colin Radford, a former staffer of Steve Bracks, John Brumby and Tim Holding, either undertaking prosecutions or writing to Phillips to explain why the matter is not proceeding. If the latter occurs, Phillips can request the DPP to prosecute. Expect to see this process drag on well into 2021.
IN SHORT: Medical experts say wearing a mask when outdoors and socially distanced from others has no health benefits but Dan Andrews knows better. The Premier admits his mask edict goes beyond health advice, yet he expects Victorians to be masked even when alone at the beach. Another daft captain’s call.
Rita Panahi is a Herald Sun columnist