Privilege protects privilege.
So it seems after further revelations today about how Alan Tudge pressured an ABC journalist to delete a photo taken in a Canberra night spot that, according to Four Corners’ bombshell report on Monday, would have embarrassed and compromised Christian Porter.
Any minister of the Crown learning that a colleague may have placed themselves in a position to be compromised should have immediately alerted the prime minister, possibly for referral to intelligence agencies. Public Bar in Manuka is a well-known locale for politicians, staffers and journalists, the latest in a succession of such nightspots in Canberra.
Don’t think people connected to foreign intelligence services weren’t mingling there on Wednesday nights as well. Who else took a photo of Porter, more surreptitiously?
In any event, Tudge, a child of Melbourne privilege — elite Haileybury, Melbourne University, Harvard — sought to protect another child of privilege, Christian Porter, whose offensive frat house behaviour as a young man — as opposed to his alleged continuing partying these days — was well documented by the ABC.
Significant as it is in itself, the incident is the perfect symbol for what party boy Porter himself is doing for Alexander Downer.
Downer ordered ASIS to bug the cabinet rooms of the Timor-Leste government in 2004 in order to give Australia an advantage over the fledgling state in negotiations over resources in the Timor Sea. The advantage gained would accrue to resources company/de facto government agency Woodside. After leaving politics, Downer took a job with Woodside. His DFAT secretary of the time, Ashton Calvert, took a directorship.
Porter’s authorisation of the prosecution of Witness K and Bernard Collaery for revealing ASIS’ crime is intended to punish them for exposing Downer and the Howard government. Porter’s conduct in the prosecution, however, is designed to cover up Downer’s role.
He has sought to make the trial secret, he has repeatedly intervened in proceedings (separately from the DPP; Collaery and K face two legal oppositions — the barristers of the DPP, and Porter’s barrister trying to keep as much as possible secret); Porter has so stymied and delayed the trial of Collaery that his barrister has been twice chided by magistrates for delays.
There is a key question in this trial about Downer: what authority did he have to authorise ASIS’ conduct? Did prime minister Howard, his cabinet or the National Security Committee approve it, or did Downer decide himself? We may never publicly learn the answer to that crucial question because Porter is trying to keep it secret.
Privilege protecting privilege.
Only, instead of demanding the deletion of a photo, Porter is trashing basic rights like open trials and long-standing norms like the Commonwealth’s status as a model litigant.
Porter’s conduct has had enormous impacts on K and Collaery — two men who have served their country and protected its national security in ways Porter could only dream about as he sleeps off another big night on the dance floor. K remains unclear exactly as to what he is being asked to plead guilty to, having indicated that, given his health and the mental toll Porter’s vexatious prosecution has inflicted, he wants the whole thing done with.
Collaery’s practice has been wrecked and he is living on borrowings. The process has so far dragged on for more than two years, with 42 hearings so far without a trial date in sight — the majority driven by Porter’s interventions.
It includes the juvenile tactic of requiring Collaery to travel interstate to view, but not retain, the allegedly secret brief directed against him. All while Porter, according to footage aired by the ABC, carried on carousing, and allegedly compromising himself as a national security risk far worse than even the fantasies claimed by the prosecution of K and Collaery.
The bugging of Timor-Leste and the persecution of K and Collaery are the biggest political scandal of recent decades in Australia. That the press gallery seems to have been mostly uninterested in it — or have fallen for Porter’s tactic of dragging things out so long people forget about it — doesn’t change that.
It’s been a raw demonstration of the ugliness of how power is used in Australia by well-connected corporations, their political shills and the parties that protect and enable them. Power used at the expense of the people of Timor-Leste. Power used at the expense of K and Collaery.
And despite Porter’s efforts at secrecy, at least some of it has occurred in plain sight at the ACT Law Courts building, in full view of the press gallery if they wanted to come five minutes down the road.
Like Porter’s alleged behaviour in Public Bar, in full view five minutes in the other direction from Parliament House.
If you’re not enraged by the smug, smirking indecency of it all, you might want to check your moral compass. It’s an obscenity.
I absolutely agree BK. The treatment of Timor Leste, Witness K and Bernard Collaery by A-G Porter, acting on behalf of the LNP government, is outrageous and obscene.
These people are appalling. The time for a strong independent federal ICAC is way over due.
So these creeps are role models for our up and coming would be politicians?
Most are University educated without a real understanding of what is going on in real world.
They believe they are smarter than most along with being above reproach, hiding there dirty dealing in the grubby Parliament House
What waylaider said.
University/Young Liberal politics. Like Abbott putting his hand around the throat of a young woman and pushing her against a wall; student politics! Many of these born-to-rule p###ks have never done a day’s real work, going from student politics straight into staffer jobs or the IPA, then plum conservative electorates, followed years later by huge super payouts and overpaid, bludgey, conflict-of-interest jobs with big corporations. ‘We’re nation builders’, Downer himself whinged when his IPA-fellow daughter was sensibly rejected by his old electorate.
Cannot get out of my mind Downer in high heels and stockings wearing a dress, back in the day. I still have nightmares about it.
He said it was some kind of event he was heading to, more akin to his usual regalia!
You might want to give your memory a spring clean of accretions – Lord Downer only put the fishnet & high heel on one leg, a good natured favour to a young snapper during a friendly interview.
There was no dress and only a single leg.
Such is how myth is born.
Indunn,my memory does not need a spring clean, it needs a overhaul a oil change and grease and someone to clean out the cobwebs.
There is a saying to store memories in a vault in the brain, my vault is full and needs reconfiguration.
Imagine what the world will be like when we oldies, who remember things without recourse to the intertubes, are gornnnn.
There has never been something so ephemeral, nor as malleable, as digital records.
History shows that we didn’t manage all that well when things were carved in stone to guard against revisionism, deliberate or otherwise.
How well has the modern era progressed? Modern technology has opened up a whole new world and is it so grandiose, is it a step forwards when kids would rather play on line games rather than play outside, when instead of walking to stores or driving you order online?
To revise means you study and learn, it is not something stored on a computer as lifes lessons learned are from mistakes made and no computer programme has artificial intelligence to gauge all the mistakes that have changed the course of history.
Downer’s role in the oppression of East Timor has always been a running sore but we should not forget that the ALP is complicit in this and has effectively acted to protect Downer, and others, as well.
Australians can rightly be ashamed of the actions of the political parties that claim to ‘represent’ them. I doubt that many Australians would claim to be satisfied with being ‘bullies’ especially when doing so involves criminal acts.
Agreed Unimpressed, I am a long time Labor supporter, but their failures to act decisively in the past and currently is really testing my loyalty.
Is anyone organizing crowd funding to support Collaery and K? I will gladly contribute.
Porter is pure slime, shame on Turnbull for being stupid enough to give him the AG job.
I despair more and more with all these know all journalists ( nothing will please them or they agree with) and the beard stroking pipe puffing armchair experts. These guys run a government in a miserable world full shoncks and criminals. What is it that you need to know all the time. You want to stick your noses into everything that goes on and can you lot imagine the chaos when your so-called valued opinions are asked for everything single decision that needs to be made when you get your way. That’s where democracy falls apart. It can’t be done, obviously. You chose the candidates for government and the ones with the most votes gets the job, whether he/she is part of your persuation or not.Then leave them to it and/or chucked them out on the next election. I’m sure all your mental healths are under great stress with your daily sniping, critisicing, opinionating and self delusioned knowledge of it all.
Fairmind, there’s a gofundme campaign.
https://au.gofundme.com/f/support-bernard-collaery
And, yes, not only are these prosecutions a national disgrace; so, too, is the complicity of the ALP in the legislation that has enabled them.
Yep found that not not long after posting and threw in a hundred…would have liked to do more, but so many campaigns to support these days with our corrupt and reckless “conservative” governments.
Ta, George.
Wowww THAT would put the cat among the pigeons or the rats – except rats have the purpose of cleaning up rubbish and these guys serve no purpose at all except their own. A crowdfunding that took off would be a serious slap in the face and a publicity nightmare that could make them re-think????
The antipathy to Timor began under Whitlam.
Indeed, what was it that drove the ALP to continue the protection. I can’t see why they didn’t end this farce and in fact set a royal commission onto it. There are more skeletons than closet in this one.
Thanks for keeping the spotlight on this Bernard.
We know (from Collaery) that DG ASIS conspired with persons in the ACT to bug the Timorese Cabinet, under the ruse that the construction was Foreign Aid. Collaery did not say what roles Downer and Howard played in the orders.
ASIS’ role was presumably confined to the gathering of intelligence. But that intelligence revealed not only Timor’s bottom line for the division of Greater Sunrise. It crucially revealed that Timor was unaware of the presence of gases including $10-12bn of helium. Collaery has published this fact but the media has not grasped its significance.
We know both Downer and Howard were active in the negotiations and the ostentatious celebrations, in flight over the Timor Sea.
We know that the treaty, uniquely among all resource treaties, was silent about the gases, effectively donating them to Woodside and partners.
We know that Timor L’Este has claimed $5bn for its share of the helium from Greater Sunrise donated by the treaty to Woodside and partners. Timor claims it was defrauded.
We know Woodside is a major perpetual donor to major political parties and that Her Majesty’s loyal Opposition has been prominently silent about the scandal.
What the Australian media has yet to publish is that the same Greater Sunrise deal that gave away Timor’s gas also gave away Australia’s gas. $10-12bn of publicly owned resources was donated to Woodside and partners. It would be worthy of an investigation by Federal ICAC whether that donation is consideration for Woodside’s perpetual donations to major political parties and whether that is treasonous.
I am more than concerned that the opposition has not said a word about the government’s appalling behaviour regarding Collaery and Witness K when it is so bleeding obvious to anybody who can read that Downer and others were in it up to their necks. The legislation put up by the Howard government went far too far but was brushed through by a lame opposition that still happens to be lame. The future of this country really hangs in the balance if this legislation that allows politicians to destroy anyone who dares to embarrass them or threaten them in any way is not rescinded or modified.
Thanks CEOfaim for the info most of which I haven’t seen before. To further draw the attention to what can only be perceived differences between the Laberil parties a Buzz Feed articles describe that ta newly released portion of the Mueller report concluded there NO evidence Wikileaks had any knowledge of the provenience of the DNC leaks.
“Prosecutors investigated Julian Assange, WikiLeaks, and Roger Stone for the hacking of Democratic National Committee servers as well as for possible campaign finance violations, but ultimately chose not to charge them, newly released portions of the Mueller report reveal”.
So much for the Russians dunit.
Labor set adrift Assange and anybody else the yanks don’t like.
Don’t take this as a rationalisation of the ALP’s stance on Assange, Mark, but were you aware the Senate passed a motion earlier this week condemning the persecution of Assange?
Twas only the Coalition and Lambie who voted against it. Do yourself a search for it, and you’ll see very, very scant coverage of it. Google is really battling when they can’t prevent the ‘World Socialist Web Site’ from appearing at the top of the search results (piece was written by Oscar Grenfell, who I believe is based in Sydney).
I submit that news apropos of Keane’s very sound condemnation, above, of ‘the gallery’ for being complicit in the sorts of frauds being perpetrated by the likes of ‘The Water Porter’.
‘Freedom of the Press’?
To do what, exactly?
Thank you David but too little too late, whether they prosecute Assange or not they have successfully destroyed his life, his organisation. Sorry but names are my weak suit but I watched an interview with a whistleblower who set up the NSA where he stated that because of the download speed of the file it could not have been an internet grab but an inside job. He went to the trouble of using all the internet services in the US to demonstrate the fact. I had seen the same information from a guy in NZ who the US is trying to extradite for his download website who was saying this very thing 2/3 years ago.
I only say this because Laberil have had no intention in ever having any meanful assessment of this issue but some belated token gesture.
No argument, Mark – just highlighting the media’s complicity in not only waving Porter’s criminality on by, but also in the destruction of Assange’s life.
Would that be Kim Dot Com, currently safely ensconced in Aotearoa?
Good to see someone else understands the importance of the Helium.
Interrogating the interwebs for news on the ‘Helium shortage’ makes clear it’s no laughing (gas) matter.
Yes, David, the helium is valuable and increasingly so. This was OUR helium, yours and mine, donated in the spirit “we look after our mates”.
Donated by people elected to manage our interests. Is that not treason?
It is no laughing gas, This corrupts the very essence of government.
“Publicity is the soul of justice,” Bernard Collaery, has noted. Yet Australia withdrew from ICJ denying Timor an independent umpire. And Porter tries for a secret trial. As BK points out, Downer was Foreign Minister so the construction in Timor was his project. Would ASIS accept an instruction to act illegally from Downer? Who else was in on the joke? Who is in whose pocket?
Just think what $10-12bn could buy us…
Australia withdrew from the ICJ, just as the Yanks did the ICC (and sanctioned the heads of the ICC), and Johnson’s rat government in Limeyland – with the support of Corbyn’s replacement, Sir Herr Kier Stormer Starmer (the bastard who was in the State Prosecutor’s chair when Assange was handed to the Yanks for extradition) – is processing a bill that will deliver immunity for Limey war criminals for crimes committed overseas.
This is a White, Anglo-European, exceptional privilege, kultchural consensus thang.
Is now about the right time to discuss ‘the Enlightenment’?
Did you know the French have only recently agreed to return the 3 dozen odd heads severed by the Frog Foreign Legion in the 19th century, in one of the innumerable battles for Algerian independence. ‘Conservative estimates’ have it that 1.5 million Algerians lost their lives to the Frogs fighting for their independence, over 150 odd years.
The Frogs have long been prone to remove the heads of ‘opponents’, and to publicly display them as ‘lessons’, at home and abroad.
Until recently, those heads were still on public display in the Land of the Frog, and then were on less public display.
Terrorism is a ‘learned behaviour’, and what goes around, tends to come around.
Many people still believe ‘disarming'(and the lesser ‘dishanding’) by machete in the Congo was African kultchural justice at work.
The machetes were made in Belgium, and ‘recommended’ by Belgians.
Pardon me if I’m teaching any oldies to suck eggs but spooks the world over do not need ”instructions” to act beyond their remit & the law.
It’s part of the mindset, not just imbued by the secret squirrel bubble but the nature of the individuals to whom this sort of job appeals.
In another life I had (far too much) opportunity to rub shoulders with these types, from multiple agencies. foreign& domestic.
It was widely acknowledged, within that bright, shining, if not hallowed space, that the best agents were, not to put too fine a point on it, weird.
Lord Acton’s Axiom applies, with the added wrinkle of unbridled secrecy.