Attorney-General Christian Porter has put out the latest list of re-appointments to the Administrative Appeals Tribunal (AAT) and this time there’s a refreshing dose of honesty.
In the fine print comes the political declaration that the announcement is “Authorised by Christian Porter, Liberal Party of Australia, Parliament House, Canberra” — which seems right given how thoroughly the government has stacked the AAT with ex-staffers, retired politicians and failed candidates.
Two notables stand out: Brendan Darcy, a former adviser to Kevin Andrews, first appointed in 2015, has had his term as a full-time member extended. Former Liberal senator Karen Synon, who joined the young Liberals at 16, has also had her role as a part-time member extended.
For the sake of completeness we should add Porter’s final line: “All of the appointees are highly qualified to undertake the important task of conducting merits review of government decisions'” — though as far as we can tell there was no open appointments process.
The pigs are still working that trough over.
Christian Porter needs to have the AAT stacked with people who owe him, because, when push comes to shove, Porter needs all the help he can muster to prevent any of his obscenely vengeful decisions being really reviewed.
It isn’t every day that an Attorney General in the first world, gleefully demands secret trials and incarceration as a vindictive nasty payback for bringing to light Australia’s theft of massive gas deposits on behalf of Woodside petroleum from one of the poorest nations on earth, Timor Leste.
It is so clearly personal, for this born again Christian originating from an extremely wealthy family of right wing ideologues to make these prosecutions of Witness J, Witness K and a former Attorney General as deliberately destructive, drawn out and objectionably opaque as Porter, misusing his power is currently doing.
Hence the stacking of the AAT, so that if it ever comes for review the person doing so has a large government stipend at risk.
“Hence the stacking of the AAT, so that if it ever comes for review the person doing so has a large government stipend at risk.”
More than this, rat, favours are also usually owed. It’s how mates work with mates.
And repaid too!
The Porter family in Queensland are part of the Clive Palmer remnants of the Joh era.
Just Porter giving us a slightly different slant on what Jobkeeper. Maybe it could be distinguished as rortkeeper.
Did it really take two authors to knock out fewer than 160 words?
Did you actually count them?
In the case of reappointments to the Migration Division of the AAT, there was a vigorous vetting and performance appraisal process overseen by the President and Deputy President of the AAT. The members who were reappointed were recommended by a panel of a retired judicial officer and a HR specialist and a senior lawyer.
Karen Synon was recommended by the panel for a full-time five year Senior Member role but was only extended for three years in a part-time capacity.
You really should FOI her appraisal or STFU with your snide allegations against her. Such a snooty supercilious attitude unbecoming of a journalist.
blind freddy is very knowledgable