Hatzistergos and The Shooters Debacle

Today's Daily Telegraph declares that the once cozy relationship between Labor and The Shooters Party is over. Robert Brown of The Shooters Party is reported as saying:

"Whatever goodwill there was is now gone."

Labor is unable to govern the state now because it cannot obtain passage for its bills. It has held 19 spots in the Legislative Council out of a total of 42. It has relied on Fred Nile and The Shooters in the past to govern. Now Labor is forced into a bizarre situation of negotiating deals with Gordon Moyes, Fred Nile, The Greens and even The Coalition.

The Daily Telegraph reports that there are 13 Bills already before the Parliament awaiting passage, and many more pieces are meant to be introduced between now and November. While a few bills may squeak through, Labor is essentially paralysed in its efforts to govern the state.

On previous occasions the deadlock in Parliament has been discussed on this blog.

What readers need to be really clear about is the back-room story that the mainstream media has failed to fully tell about how the deadlock arose (e.g. see today's edition of The Australian which completely misses out on what is stated here and curiously says that Labor had to placate the Greens in June but never explains why they had to at all).

The problem is all related back to one little item that was included in last year's mini-budget, an item that Labor expected would pass unnoticed by the public and hence sail through Parliament without much dissent. It was announced in the mini-budget that the Public Trustee NSW and Office of the Protective Commissioner would be merged ostensibly to save $100,000 p.a. and to reduce red tape. The proposed merger met with immediate objections from the disability sector in December 2008, and was soon followed by members of the public writing letters of objection to members of Parliament and to the Attorney General.

The greater majority of clients of both organisations were essentially not informed about the proposed merger. As criticisms developed it became apparent that the merger was a measure designed to take the Protective Commissioner off the state budget and for the Public Trustee to use its surplus funds to pick up the tab. For a few years the Protective Commissioner's community service obligation budget has been rising while NSW Treasury's support declined to a pittance.

The acceleration of criticism continued unabated until June 5 when the NSW Trustee and Guardian bill was introduced into Parliament. When the second reading occurred in the Legislative Assembly the formal business debate was rigged so that none of the Independents were allowed to make speeches setting out their objections to the bill. The debate was confined to about 40 minutes in the evening with only 2 Liberal MPs speaking against the bill. It sailed through the lower house only because Labor had the numbers. Within 48 hours of that vote the heat was on in Parliament as disability advocates stepped up their contact with members of the minor parties and Coalition, and as members of the public handed up written submissions containing criticisms of the policy and the bill. It was by no means clear that the minor parties (including the Shooters) would support the bill.

The Attorney General John Hatzistergos and his director general Laurie Glanfield undertook a series of meetings to persuade the minor parties to back the Bill. The Greens had indicated all along that they were not happy with the merger. Clients of the two organisations had not been consulted or advised that a merger was proposed. A large segment of clients have only finally been advised that the merger happened in June via a new organisational newsletter called Connections that has been distributed this week!

Essentially at the eleventh hour a deal was brokered. The Greens gave their support to the merger while requiring Labor to undermine any support for the Shooters' bill on national parks. That was the straw that broke the camel's back. The Shooters were now in a state of conflict with Labor. On Tuesday 23 June 2009 the NSW Trustee and Guardian Bill had a second and third reading (including a Fred Nile amendment to protect employees' positions for a period of 5 years with no forced redundancies). It passed through the Legislative Council that day and was the very last Bill of the session to make it through!

Wednesday 24 June became the notorious day of bedlam as The Shooters refused to vote for any item of Government business. The Government had expected to introduce its sale of NSW Lotteries bill in the Legislative Council. Instead, a very long day of debate occurred on non-government motions. Just after midnight the Legislative Council was left frozen as the last Labor minister walked out leaving the Parliament high and dry.

It really seems to boil down to the lobbying of Hatzistergos and Glanfield that tipped the scales against the Shooters. It was all because of their determination to push the merger through with a formidable zeal that was disproportionate to the issue and the size of the two small agencies. It has been posed before: were they trying to somehow deflect attention from the tracks of budget deficits affecting the Protective Commissioner over several years?

No matter. The basic point is Labor is in the mess now because of the weird activity in lobbying all the way up to Tuesday 23 June to save the merger. Thanks to that lobbying The Shooters have had their big dummy spit and Labor is all at sea. So "thank you" Mr Hatzistergos and Mr Glanfield for your fanatical devotion to that merger. That helped to marginalise The Shooters and has further led to the unprecedented paralysis of the Legislative Council on 24 June, and which remains unresolved as of today 4 September. No doubt the Labor Cabinet is doing cartwheels for joy over this paralysis in governance.

How can this government be expected to complete a full-term of office? An election is needed to change the Government and to smash the deadlock associated with a single-issue party.

Whoopee for female senior counsel in NSW

It is comforting to know that the Attorney General's Department is committed to "equitable briefing" of matters from its agencies over to female members of the senior bar. The statistics published yesterday for the first 3 months of 2009 in NSW are so breath-taking! Wow! Isn't it a thrill to know that 14.7% of briefs were referred to female senior counsel, while 25.5% were referred to junior female counsel. Gee that truly represents balance, fairness and an equal share of the briefs! What a meaningless press release!

Upper House Stalemate - Who Caused It?

Members of Parliament resume formal business today in Macquarie Street after the winter recess. The Premier wants his lot "on track". The Legislative Council will re-open for business with the calendar stuck in the final week of June because it ground to a halt.



The fate of Labor rests with figuring out deals either for The Greens or Shooters to come on-side. The Shooters were approached by Graeme Wedderburn about possible trial runs of hunting in national parks. Has everyone forgotten why this predicament came about? The Shooters were dudded because Labor was desperate to pass another bill last June. The Greens agreed to support John Hatzistergos' and Laurie Glanfield's bill as long as Labor dumped on the national parks bill of The Shooters.

As Della Bosca fades into obscurity, one wonders how long will it be before history catches up on Mr Hatzistergos' time as Minister for Health, and in his current run as Attorney General. The problems at the NSW DPP will not vanish overnight no matter how many press releases are issued. Cosmetic make-overs to the surface appearance of the Attorney General's Department will not contain the negative facts about the mess it is in. If only an election could be called!

Richard Ackland on Hatzistergos

Although part of this has appeared on my blog I have added in some things here.

As the saga over John Hatzistergos' war of words with Nicholas Cowdery ensues ... I want to say:

A million thank-yous to Richard Ackland! He has had the guts to tell it like it is about John Hatzistergos' war against Nicholas Cowdery and the DPP. Ackland spells out the truth about the alleged wasted funds by the prosecutors who attended a conference in Brisbane. He points out how the numbers of prosecutors are down, how junior solicitors are carrying grunt work (when they should not), and that the District Courts are in a mess because of fewer employees.

All of these gaps in human and financial resources reflects on John Hatzistergos and his director general Laurie Glanfield. It is not too difficult to infer that they are failing to provide good policy and good administration. The NSW Attorney General's Department is in a mess and these two men are in charge.

Ackland describes Hatzistergos and his media effort to discredit Cowdery as the thorn-in-the-flesh:"Hatzistergos represents a haunted, closed, suspicious, micro-managing sort of politics. And to leak against your public servants is, frankly, the pits."

The extract from Beverley Kingston's essay that is in today's SMH just cements the point about the problems of public administration in NSW generally.

I feel that the efforts of Mr Hatzistergos and Mr Glanfield are way past it in terms of usefulness to the people of NSW. I think it is high time that both Hatzistergos and Glanfield resigned.

Do the Maths Minister

The saga for the DPP continues as Mr Cowdery advises that his Office's budget is already $3 million in deficit. Cowdery quite correctly points to cuts in staff at the DPP but also in the regional courts (and one might add across the entire NSW court system). The Daily Telegraph states that Mr Hatzistergos doesn't like the fact that Mr Cowdery has a life-tenure rather than being on a contract. I've heard quite a few legal practitioners echo that point.

We need not be surprised by that poor state of affairs one bit. The Attorney General's Department is "forbidden" to make a profit, yet it has until recently insisted that its agencies be self-described as business centres. So using rubbery semantics cuts are made all over the place while cloaking it under jargon about efficiency, reducing red tape etc. Nobody believes the Government's claims on that score!

At the same time, the Office of the Public Guardian had a deficit of $68,000 in 2007-2008, and its estimated deficit for 2008-2009 was $125,000. Seems small but it is an office with some 70+ employees that is supposed to be providing life-style decision-making for people unable to do so for themselves. We must wait on the 2008/09 Annual Report being published, as well as the Auditor General's report later this year to see if things have improved there.

The Office of the Protective Commissioner was carrying a $4.4 million deficit in 2008-2009.

No doubt the same problem has beset other agencies controlled by the Attorney General.

Funny that nobody is asking "why" the Minister Mr Haztistergos and his departmental Director General Mr Glanfield seem to be happy to approve budget deficits sometimes year after year. Not sure how one can reconcile a deficit with being capable of delivering better value, better service and being efficient.

Distracted Cabinet - Eyes off the ball of NSW

What a bad state of affairs. The Police minister is busy politicking and cannot resolve the pay claim for the state's police force. Maybe the Attorney General should talk to the Police minister: after all he is worried that the DPP is not prosecuting enough rich crooks. Badly paid police and under-resourced operations -- no wonder the state's coffers under the Crimes Confiscation Act are not robust!

Then again with the stalemate in the Legislative Council it probably doesn't matter much. Labor is impotent to govern!

Mr Cowdery vs Mr Hatzistergos: DPP Sock it to the AG

On four occasions over recent weeks I have drawn attention to the yawning chasm that exists between Mr Nicholas Cowdery the NSW Director of Public Prosecutions and Mr John Hatzistergos the NSW Attorney General (one, two, three, four).

Today's article by Lisa Carty in the Sunday Herald shows that things have deteriorated. By anyone's reckoning the strong inference from this article is that Mr Hatzistergos dislikes negative publicity. Well, sir, that's too bad! Here the public has every right to stand beside Mr Cowdery in calling a spade a spade. Your department is in a state of perpetual crisis because:

1. Employees are under-resourced and over-worked and many positions remain vacant
2. Budgetary cuts
3. Extravagant expenditure on corporate consultants ($10,933,326.33 spent from 2000-2008), the blow-out in costs on building the Parramatta Justice Precinct, the blow-out in implementing the JusticeLink computer system, and so on.
4. The administrative policies and decisions to outsource work that ends up increasing costs and impeding services.
5. Both the Office of the Protective Commissioner and the Office of the Public Guardian were running in deficits in 2006/07, 2007/08 and in 2008/09.
6. Lawlink is not an efficiently organised website.

Need we go on because the woeful list gets longer?

How much money was spent by the NSW Attorney General's Department in hiring the 200-seat Metcalf Auditorium at the NSW State Library on 1 April 2009 and 5 June 2009 so that Mr Laurie Glanfield and his merger implementation team could speak to less than 30 "stakeholders" in the disability sector?

Mr Hatzistergos is quoted:
''The DPP has always argued it should be independent … I think it is fundamental to that independence that they are able to manage their resources. I haven't had this problem with any other agency I have had to deal with where there are these constant demands for additional resources because 'We can't cope'.''

I beg your pardon sir! All of the agencies controlled by your department are in crisis and have not been given the employees and funds they need to serve the public. The man who wields the decision-making power about employee levels is the Director General Mr Glanfield. In various instances he also has the authority to approve the budgets of some agencies inside the Attorney General's Department. One might infer that it would be far more interesting for the public to have detailed explanations from Mr Glanfield justifying the decisions he has made concerning restrictions on staff, outsourcing, deficiencies in the shared corporate services, and so on.

So before Mr Hatzistergos begins accusing Nick Cowdery of not being competent to run the DPP's budget, he ought to recall that "people who live in glass houses should not throw rocks".

The article incredibly includes this ridiculous bit of mud-slinging:

"Ironically, his [i.e. Cowdery's] performance in relation to proceeds-of-crime cases has been a sore point with Mr Hatzistergos, who says the value of property and cash seized from criminals has fallen despite Mr Cowdery being given a bigger budget."

Since when does the DPP have control over which criminals are successfully arrested by the NSW Police? Are the NSW Police somehow derelict for failing to bust "rich criminals"? The confiscation of assets gained by criminal activity is a matter that the DPP prosecutes and the proceeds upon conviction are placed in the hands of the NSW Trustee and Guardian (formerly Public Trustee NSW). However the facts of life are these: It is usually the small-time crooks who are busted and successfully prosecuted. That's why the level of value in property and assets seized is usually small. In the cases where rich criminals are under investigation those dudes often have hidden assets overseas and the resources do not exist for either the NSW Police or DPP to pursue. Who do you think you are trying to fool, Mr Hatzistergos?

Mr Hatzistergos has set Mr Laurie Glanfield the task of reporting on the DPP. Good grief!

One can imagine more disinformation about the DPP being distributed in future press releases.

When Governments Fail ... The Public Must Lead

The Sydney Morning Herald has taken the bit between the teeth in inviting the public to participate in an inquiry about Sydney's abysmal transport problems. It is, as with many things, a mixed bag of "yes it's time", yes it involves the Herald also seeking to score good points with a diminishing number of subscribers and to trump its competitors.

However, allowing for those foibles, the point is valid: the public must by-pass the ineffectual state Government and the hubris of departmental executives.

Yesterday I pointed to the frustration felt over the decade long failure of the State Government and of the NSW Attorney General's Department to act on repeated pleas for legal reforms. The structural changes made by that department in the past five years have not made any smashingly great difference in improving services.

So in like manner the groundswell of public opinion needs to link up from the single-issue of transport, and even the specialised focus of the needs of the disabled, to cover most portfolios in the State Government. There is no public faith left in this Government. There is much entrenched suspicion about the way the Attorney General's Department is being administered.


There are two famous political slogans that could apply here to the public groundswell over this state Labor Government and more narrowly to the Attorney General's Department:

* Gough Whitlam's "It's Time"

* Barack Obama's "Change is coming ... Yes, we can"

Are you listening Mr Rees? Are you listening Mr Hatzistergos?

Not Happy John (Hatzistergos)

Those of us who work for the promotion and protection of human rights in Australia are not happy with you Mr Hatzistergos and your department. You are a member of the Australian Labor Party in NSW and you are an elected member to the Legislative Council of the NSW Parliament. Are you genuinely without partisan favour truly representing the citizens of NSW?

Since at least 1999 your state parliamentary colleagues concerned with the portfolios of the Attorney General and Disability Services have had countless representations made from human rights advocates and disability organisations to undertake thorough and proper legal reforms. Your predecessors have been repeatedly asked to reform various acts like The Guardianship Act and the now defunct Protected Estates Act. Nobody did anything. In 2004 the former Protective Commissioner (and former ALP member for Earlwood) Mr Gabb listened to requests for reforms. He even wrote about it in the 2004 Annual Report of the Office of the Protective Commissioner:

"During 2003-2004 OPC reviewed the Protected Estates Act in consultation with a wide cross section of stakeholders. Recommendations for reform were forwarded to the Attorney General's Department in June 2004 for its consideration. I am hopeful our efforts and the efforts of those who helped us will bear fruit in 2004-2005 with an improved legislative framework within which to provide our services." (OPC Annual Report 2004, p. 5).

Mr Gabb was obliged to report to the Director General of the Attorney General's Department, Mr Laurie Glanfield. He handed up his report. So what happened to Mr Gabb's recommendations that were forwarded to the Department? Can you explain what was the over-arching reason to account for why no action was taken to introduce legal reforms? Can you explain why Mr Glanfield in his role of approving the budgets of the OPC agreed to deficits being created in the past couple of years? Why would this Department, which has had administrative control over the OPC and the Office of the Public Guardian for years, allow the Community Service Obligations budgets to go into debt?

Today was the closing day for public submissions to the NSW Legislative Council's Social Issues Committee on substitute decision making. The time-frame for allowing submissions was rather short and not well advertised. The time-frame by which the Social Issues Committee must report to parliament likewise places it under pressure to make its deliberations known by February 2010. How under the sun can comprehensive law reforms in several pieces of legislation be seriously examined and then acted on in such a short period of time?

Many of us are jaded and frustrated with the NSW Labor Parliaments that have existed since 1999, and with your Department.

The public have a right to know that a decade has elapsed while the Labor Government has not really taken our worries seriously. The public needs to know that your Government approved budget deficits that crippled the OPC so that a merger was hastily announced to cover over the tracks.

The public needs to know that there was no consultation with advocates and disability groups over the final version of the 2008 IPART report on OPC fees, and on the OPC merger meetings of 1 April and 5 June, 2009. The meeting in February over the IPART report, and those concerning the merger were, it seems, hastily assembled to give the appearance of being consultative. Your Merger Implementation Team never asked us to contribute to the processes but simply gave us short presentations about what you wanted us to know about the merger plans. That really was pathetic!

So, you can be sure that people will be waiting on the Government's response to this Inquiry on substitute-decision making. The 2011 election will bring the matter into focus, as will the reporting done by Australian disability advocates to the United Nations concerning the failures of your government to conform state laws to ratified UN conventions on human rights.

Newcastle Justice Precinct

Just discovered this new blog . Read its insouciant finger-jab at John Hatzistergos and Laurie Glanfield over the proposed Newcastle Justice Precinct.

Public Feedback on Freedom of Information

Check out Peter Timmins' blog post about the NSW Law Reform Commission wanting public feedback about Freedom of Information applications. Timmins ponders "why" the NSW Law Reform Commission seeks feedback after the matter has been previously examined. Timmins says:

"In all this it seems, some issues concerning access to personal information were or may have been missed, although the Commission's Points for Discussion seems to be searching for problems rather than laying them out. In any event the Commission would welcome before the end of the month any input on past experience or the likely effect of the new legislation on applications for this type of information."

The public can drop off comments on the blogspot of the NSW Law Reform Commission (see here).

Hatzistergos vs Cowdery (Again and Again)

Seems like tit-for-tat is the name of the game where the NSW Attorney General locks horns with Mr Nicholas Cowdery. Mr Hatzistergos has denied approval for the DPP Mr Cowdery to attend yet another international conference. So Mr Cowdery, as usual, is paying for it out of his own pocket and taking leave-without-pay.

Funny this Department can afford to indulge in a grand scheme to create another centralised edifice: a Newcastle Justice Precinct at the drop of a hat. Funny the Attorney General's Department could afford to hire out the 200-seat Metcalf Auditorium at the State Library for one hour on 1 April 2009 and again on 5 June 2009 to speak to fewer than 30 people on both occasions. Yet the penny-pinching occurs whenever Cowdery's name passes over the desk!

Who is really wasting the public purse in the Attorney General's Department?

Attorney General's Inappropriate Press Release

Lawlink contains press releases concerning the Attorney General's Department and its agencies issued usually under the name of the NSW Attorney General. What the public expects from that section of the Lawlink site is information concerning the Department's brief over law and justice and the services it provides, and about legislation and proposed legislation.

So it is fair to ask if the Minister should be issuing a press release as a cheap scoring trick over his political rivals and placing it on the department's website? The latest example is Mr Hatzistergos' claim that the Liberal Party's policy on the appointment of judges involves plagiarised material from a Melbourne law journal.

Is that the best Mr Hatzistergos can do with his personal staff's time - have them scanning material to find out if Mr Greg Smith or Mr Barry O'Farrell have engaged in plagiarism? What kind of obscurantist activity is that? Why does such a press release have to be on a departmental site as opposed to a political party website?

Perhaps then Mr Hatzistergos ought to issue a press release "outing" the NSW Labor Government's generous borrowing of interstate policies concerning the Super Department scheme (model 1 uplifted from the Liberal Jeff Kennett; model 2 from Qld Labor Premier Anna Bligh).

This kind of political trivia may be appropriate on Mr Hatzistergos' personal website or that of the ALP. It really is dubious putting a cheap political point scoring press release on a departmental website that is supposed to be about advising the public of new and existing services. One could infer that this is (a). wasting public resources of a government department to further a side-issue; (b). represents a misuse of a departmental website by a minister.

JusticeLink - on line, late, expensive, will it work?

After many years of delay and enormous costs the grand-plan of the Director General of the NSW Attorney General's Department for the local courts to electronically serve the public is finally being rolled out. JusticeLink goes live in the local courts.

It has had some limited usage already in the Supreme Court. If it works it should be a useful tool. However, as JusticeLink is hosted on LawLink, it will be prone to technological glitches because LawLink is a very poor website. While JusticeLink may be an ambitious and expansive service it is not exactly a "world first" as various state court systems in the USA have already developed similar services on a less grand scale.

The IT system may assist the Courts in NSW but with these riders:

1. The Courts are under-staffed and under-resourced (go figure who is responsible for the budget cuts known as "efficiency");

2. IT is only as good as it is maintained and backed-up by a well resourced service.

3. The NSW Attorney General's Department has all of its agencies under pressure due to the public sector policies and practices instituted in it over the past 5 years.

JusticeLink is no genie out of the bottle while the above points remain in a state of perpetual crisis.

Bourke Court House Furore

Anne Susskind's article in the Law Society Journal (August 2009, p. 23) on the refurbishment of Bourke's court house records the dismay and outrage of various legal practitioners. She records the scathing comments of barrister John Cranston Thompson concerning alterations to the public gallery:

"The aesthetics of it ... the way they chose to do it, is quite ugly."

While local solicitor Doug McKay asserts there was "no logic whatsoever" to the refurbishment, and that it constitutes "a slap in the face for the local community." McKay described the alterations to the public gallery as resembling "two rudely constructed box-like rooms" and that the doors and fittings looked "like a toilet". Biting and caustic!

The Bourke Shire Council's general manager Geoff Wise was puzzled that the Council "had not been in any way associated with the development approval process for works on the 109-year-old heritage-listed court-house."

Susskind notes that the refurbishment was organised by the Attorney General's Department.

Quite right! The decision to maintain, refurbish or sell all land and building assets (such as court houses) rests in the hands of the "Asset Management Branch" which reports directly to the Director General Mr Glanfield. This is all part of the shared corporate services policy and practices instituted since 2003-04 in the NSW Attorney General's Department. Apparently the Asset Management Branch can do a better and more cost-effective job than could the staff who used to do this work in the various agencies and branches.

Unfortunately, legal practitioners do not have the time to read such dazzlingly dull publications like the 2007-08 Annual Report of the Attorney General's Department. The refurbishment of local court houses is part of a capital works project called Courts 2010:

"The infrastructure of the state's courthouses is being given a major upgrade. Court facilities are being brought up to modern design standards in the areas of security ... As part of the Courts 2010 project, court registries are undergoing a major facelift to promote a more modern, client focused service." (pp. 20 & 22).

The Annual Report of 2007-08 reports that Bourke court house was one among several to have the audio-visual link (AVL) technology installed so that prisoner's can make appearances without the necessity of being transported to court over bail applications and other matters. The Annual Report refers to upgrades in Inverell, Nowra, Dubbo, Goulburn, Armidale, Coffs Harbour, Newcastle and Wollongong.

The discontent in Bourke is understandable. Various sources imply that the Assets Management Branch conducts its work in a brusque manner. Sources claim that employees at a given location are the last to know -- there is no consultation just abrupt last minute notification that work is proceeding.

If one shifts from the local court houses, one can always inspect the e-tendering nsw site under the section dedicated to the NSW Attorney General's Department. There one can see examples of various and previous building tenders, along with tenders for consultants, printing of stationery and so on.

In the future we can probably expect to see the sale of other assets held by other agencies absorbed into the Attorney General's Department. One very likely target will be the former Public Trustee NSW's Beaux arts style building at 19 O'Connell Street. It was alluded to in the various points raised by Shadow Attorney General Mr Greg Smith's speech in opposing the merger on 17 June 2009.

A sale may be justified now on the basis that the new organisation, the NSW Trustee and Guardian, has its headquarters at the Parramatta Justice Precinct. So the CBD presence can be rationalised and reduced to a smaller customer service centre, while ostensibly redistributing employees to Parramatta or to new urban and regional branches.

Of course while the building may not fetch many millions in a sale, nonetheless a"fire sale" may be required since the new organisation's financial needs will require constant injections of funds. As Treasury has slashed its subsidising of what used to be the Office of the Protective Commissioner, it is no wonder that Barry Collier said in Parliament that in 2010 that IPART will be asked to explore "sources of funding".

This will follow the "logic" of the sale of the South Australian Public Trustee's building in 2007 (which then became a tenant in the building it used to own), and likewise the Public Trustee in London. It may well be the ambition of some senior bureaucrats who look longingly on relocating their offices to 19 O'Connell Street, and if a sale is organised then leases may be taken out in conjunction with a sale.

Keep your eyes peeled on the e-tendering site or wait for the "for sale" signs on different buildings controlled by the Attorney General's Department as the first notification that something is happening!

John Hatzistergos' Track Record

Check out the post here that draws attention to John Hatzistergos' decisions as the Minister for Health (10 August 2005 - 2 April 2007). Perhaps we should not be surprised then by subsequent history in his time as NSW Attorney General? Better get used to the public nagging about the track record of NSW Labor Government and its ever-changing cabinet!

Family Court Backlog in NSW - Mirror Image of Departmental Calamity

In an unprecedented move to clear case backlogs at the Family Court in NSW, various judges from around Australia will fly in during September to hear cases. The Sunday Herald reports:

"The cases, some more than four years old, have built up after five judges left the court's busiest registry and only one was replaced."

Notice that there is a shortage of judges. The Family Court of Australia is administered at the Commonwealth level of government.

Journalists in legal affairs also need to turn the spotlight on the state courts in NSW. The entire court system in NSW is in crisis due to under-resourcing, with staff stretched beyond the limits. The behind the scenes picture in NSW belies the rhetoric and PR of the NSW Attorney General's Department about how efficient and quick everything is, how better service exists etc. If journalists will start digging they will soon discover the catastrophic state of affairs that exists in the NSW Attorney General's Department in its entirety (including every single agency that is controlled by it). The public policies and practices that exist under Mr John Hatzistergos' watch and that of his senior departmental advisors are the root of the problem.

NSW DPP Under the Gun: Right Question, Wrong Target

The Director of Public Prosecutions (DPP) is under the gun in a Sydney Morning Herald article. The NSW Attorney General John Hatzistergos is apparently unhappy with the DPP. One reason is probably because Nicholas Cowdery speaks his mind and he frequently embarrasses Mr Hatzistergos' administration.

The SMH reports:

"there was great pressure on the Crown prosecutor and the judge to ensure cases were resolved quickly yet this expediency was often at the expense of those affected by the crime."

What the SMH reporter has not followed up on in that observation is where does the "great pressure" emanate from? It is certainly not Mr Cowdery.

The tap-root source of the problem lies in the public administration policy at the Attorney General's Department that has emerged in recent years. It is reflected in the abstract and often fatuous "performance indicators" used to measure "efficiency" throughout the entire Attorney General's Department and all the agencies that have been swallowed up into its Napoleonic belly. Performance indicators are so artificial and usually yield statistics that have no context. Ever heard of the sad case of the statistician who drowned while trying to cross a river that had an average depth of only three feet?

It is reflected in the "shared corporate services" policy where functions have been stripped off agencies and handed over to under-resourced and over-worked small units at the Parramatta Justice Precinct. The "great pressure" can be traced to Senior Executives who have to justify their own existence in having their contracts renewed: so every once in a while some blinding flash of light occurs - presto I have an idea to justify my existence and another layer of red-tape is created.

If the money spent by the Attorney General's Department on corporate consultants each year was applied to employing new staff and supporting infrastructure well things would be much better.

So the "great pressure" to clear up court cases quickly has a lot to do with the public administration policies in the whole department. Who leads and drives the policy is easy to identify: it is the Director General of the department. Pity the SMH journalist failed to chase the Director General Mr Glanfield to query his public administration strategies!

NSW FOI 180 Degrees Opposite to QLD & Canberra

The NSW Attorney General Mr John Hatzistergos holds the office of the first law officer of the state. His primary duty is to defend and uphold law and justice over against his secondary commitment to the Labor Party and its policies.

During the Howard era many lawyers quite rightly pointed to the tension between duty and political loyalty in the case of Philip Ruddock as federal Attorney General. Ruddock opted to support Howard's Pacific solution on refugees in direct contradiction to his duty to uphold the national laws (and international covenants signed by Australia) concerning refugees. The problem in his case went even further as he appeared to choose ideology over against even the beliefs of his faith where defending the oppressed/refugees has a long and honourable heritage.

Here in NSW Mr Hatzistergos' loyalty to conservative Labor policies is fairly clear. His personal political philosophy about the supremacy of Parliament trumps all consideration of human rights jurisprudence - a field that he seems to misunderstand judging by the straw-man arguments he routinely draws out of the hat when asked on the subject.

Peter Timmins has summed up the deliberations of a national conference this past week about Freedom of Information in Australia. He points out the direction being taken in Queensland, together with the Federal government view, is a very positive one. He also notes how the direction taken by Queensland is 180 degrees opposite to that of NSW. The stance taken right now in NSW is worrying -- the government seems keen to ensure that it is very difficult to obtain information that might otherwise embarrass it. As chief law officer Mr Hatzistergos is supposed to promote democracy and the laws defending freedom. He is meant to set aside party bias and personal political philosophies. When a government in a democracy chooses to clamp down on the availability of information and uses weasel words to justify it, one begins to wonder what is it that they are afraid of being disclosed/revealed?

If the Ministers of the Crown are worried about circling the wagons to defend themselves from public scrutiny, then the public are quite right in questioning the government's motives. Beyond that, one can also ponder why the Director-General of any government department is likewise unwilling to release information. The public service is about serving the public -- it is not an elite club for wannabe political animals. If a Director General is running a particular programme of administrative changes and holds meetings where no minutes are written down, where committee members are intimidated, and where no paper trail exists: well one can ask if that level of secrecy is a cloak for rather venal motives. Do we have Freedom of Information? Or is it more likely Freedom From Information? Public administration policy and practices in the NSW public sector must be brought out into the open. Ministers should not be worried: what is there to hide? Directors General of departments: what are you hiding and why are you hiding data?

CROWN SOLICITOR'S OFFICE NSW RESTRUCTURED

The NSW Crown Solicitor's Office (CSO) is administratively part of the NSW Attorney General's Department. On 1 July 2009 CSO announced it has undergone a restructure. Its website assures us that these organisational "changes aim to further improve our clients' experience with and access to our services."

The website shows a new organisational chart and it indicates that CSO has a marketing division. Why CSO needs to "market" its services is not entirely clear to me. However one can be sure that the CSO employees are stretched to breaking point in what is demanded of them. There was a tacit admission of this in the 2007-08 Annual Report of the Attorney General's Department:


"The Crown Solicitor’s Office is assessing the recommendations made by
beyondblue, the national depression initiative, in its review of the CSO’s current
practices for managing workplace mental health, with a view to implementing them in
2008–09."(page 67)

While it is important that stress and depression be recognised and treated, the prior question is how does the public administration policy and practices affecting CSO provide the seed-bed out of which such mental illness arises? In other words, why are the employees whose numbers are fewer and fewer expected to do more and more? Why are employees working beyond the standard hours to the point where work is done until late at night and even on weekends (all of which is not remunerated)?

Is there a culture of fear among employees about losing their jobs if they complain? Why does such fear exist in the first place? Does this fear of being abused and bullied and of vendettas come from senior bureaucrats in the upper echelons of the public sector?

It is one thing to treat the symptoms of stress. It is another to go back to the tap-root source of it all and to apply weed-killer. Weed-killer is obviously needed to root out the bad personnel. hideous attitudes, unworkable policies and unrealistic work practices insisted on by those at the top in the public sector. Why does the NSW Attorney General Mr Hatzistergos preside over such a regime and do nothing to clear out the problem among those directly underneath him?