For an institution that’s already seen as a dumping ground for political cronies, the Administrative Appeals Tribunal appears particularly uninterested in reputation management.
Last week, the Federal Circuit Court found one unnamed senior member had plagiarised swathes of his decision to boot an Iraqi citizen from the country … directly from submissions made to the tribunal by a delegate for Immigration Minister David Coleman.
Jason Pennell. Illustration: John Shakespeare Credit:
The court has criticised tribunal members in the past, most notably former Liberal senator Chris Puplick, whose recent decision was branded “irrational and illogical”. But in this instance, judge Christopher Kendall was particularly scathing. And for good reason.
Entire sections were “almost identical” to submissions made on behalf of the government and conclusions relating to the man’s drug and alcohol abuse was “an almost verbatim copy”. “Save for minor syntactical changes and minor re-wording, [six paragraphs] of the tribunal’s decision in relation to the applicant returning from a Western country are identical to what is found in the delegate’s decision,” Justice Kendall noted. “The sheer extent of copying and resulting similarity between the two decisions is, in the court’s view, unacceptable,” he said.
So who is the mystery tribunal member? Bleak City barrister Jason Pennell. Pennell, a former stockbroker married to ex-Victorian Bar chief Sarah Fregon (now a partner at Deloitte), was appointed to the tribunal by former attorney-general George Brandis in 2017.
Senior tribunal members are on annual salaries of between $329,000 and $391,000.
It’s not the first time a tribunal member has taken a “cut-and-paste” approach to rulings. Two years ago, Refugee Review Tribunal member David Corrigan was found to have transposed three paragraphs from other asylum seekers’ refugee applications into his decision. In one instance, the applicant was referred to as a “68-year-old”. He was in his early 30s.
COMRADES AT ARMS
Relations with Beijing are particularly frosty, care of Prime Minister Scott Morrison’s pursuit of an investigation into China’s handling of the coronavirus outbreak. And despite beef and barley producers being slapped with “unrelated” trade penalties, there’s at least one local group which is maintaining friendly ties with the Chinese government.
It’s the Communist Party of Australia … at least according to an email circulated this week by party member and Maritime Union of Australia operator Paul McAleer.
“The Communist Party of China and the Peoples (sic) Republic of China have generously donated thousands of face masks to the Communist Party of Australia to distribute,” he writes.
“The Communist Party of Australia have determined that these masks should be distributed to vulnerable people throughout our communities.”
A worthwhile effort, no doubt. But here’s hoping the masks aren’t the same faulty products as those seized by Australian Border Force officers last month. Dutch authorities, meanwhile, recalled 600,000 Chinese-made masks in March.
The party’s general secretary, Andrew Irving, did not respond to a request for comment on Wednesday. For the record, the Electoral Commission has twice denied the party registration because it hasn’t been able to prove it has more than 500 members.
KNOW MEANT KNOW
There's no doubt the consultants at American giant Bain & Co like to keep it in the family. Jayne Hrdlicka, a former Bain operator, hadn't been out of the top job at a2 Milk for long before she was drafted in by the associated investment outfit Bain Capital for its Virgin Australia takeover.
Hrdlicka, of course, was a former Qantas executive and ran its budget airline Jetstar. If Bain succeeds in its bid for Virgin, there's every indication she could end up as chief executive Paul Scurrah's successor.
But it seems the Bain connection isn't a one-way street. Hrdlicka also moonlights as chairwoman of Tennis Australia, which recently brought in Bain & Co principal Tim Jolley as chief strategy officer. He's not the only consultant from Hdrlicka's old shop to turn up at the peak tennis body. Bain strategy analyst James Penn is also in the Melbourne Park HQ (figuratively, in this time of the coronavirus). He's working on secondment and assisting the organisation in "navigating the current COVID-19 situation", a spokesman said.
LOST IN TRANSLATION
Late last year, the Department of Prime Minister and Cabinet shelled out some $2.7 million to the Boston Consulting Group for a strategic review of the public service. Now department secretary Philip Gaetjens will have to put his hand back in the wallet to fund some translators.
A slide pack put together by the consultants to brief the department, disclosed under freedom of information laws, makes for both illuminating and puzzling reading. One objective of the document was to "operate as an integrated, high-preforming [sic] review secretariat team".
Then there was the proposal to investigate "mega-trends" including the four "scenarios of the future: #Techsplosion, Devolution revolution, Wikigov and New world (dis)order – and 6 'common success factors' for the APS, common across all scenarios.”