Any hopes that the government was quietly backing away from its war on whistleblowers have been dashed after the Commonwealth signalled it would push ahead with the prosecution of Australian Tax Office (ATO) whistleblower Richard Boyle.
Boyle is facing life in prison for his role in exposing unethical debt collection practices inside the ATO. Three external reviews corroborated many of Boyle’s concerns.
The Commonwealth signalled it may walk away from the case in March, but told a hearing on Thursday it would instead push ahead with the charges.
“This is a deeply disappointing development,” Human Rights Law Centre senior lawyer Kieran Pender told Crikey.
“From the start, this prosecution has been profoundly wrong and unjust, taken against an Australian who spoke up against wrongdoing in the tax office and has been vindicated with subsequent reform to ATO practices.”
Disclosure laws ‘broken’
Boyle is relying on the Public Interest Disclosure regime in his response to the alleged offences, which have hung over him since he went public with his concerns three years ago.
That regime allows for whistleblowers to speak out to the media if they have tried and failed to raise issues internally, which is what Boyle did when he took his complaints to Fairfax/ABC after he believed the ATO ignored his concerns.
Commonwealth Director of Public Prosecutions (CDPP) Sarah McNaughton told Senate estimates last month that the government was considering dropping the remaining charges against Boyle. It had already dropped 42 of the 66 charges against him in June after internal reviews revealed the ATO failed to fully investigate Boyle’s concerns.
Since Boyle’s persecution began, three separate reviews of the ATO have backed up his claims about unethical practices and went some way to show the information he disclosed was in the public interest.
This includes reports by the Inspector-General of Taxation and Australian Small Business and Family Enterprise Ombudsman. A Senate investigation into the ATO’s internal investigation of the claims later found it had been superficial.
Crikey put questions to the CDPP about why it decided to push ahead with the case.
The latest development is a blow to the other whistleblowers being prosecuted by the government, including barrister Bernard Collaery and his client, former intelligence officer Witness K.
While Boyle’s case has not involved the same degree of politicisation as Collaery, it again shows how hostile the government is to public servants who speak out, and just how broken Australia’s whistleblower protections are.
“The fact that Richard Boyle can be prosecuted and faces life in prison for his whistleblowing underscores the Public Interest Disclosure Act‘s major failings and the need for urgent reform,” Pender said.
“Boyle did the right thing — he spoke up internally and, only when those channels failed, he went to the ABC. The crushing emotional and financial burden it has placed on Boyle, a brave Australian who spoke up about wrongdoing in the public interest, is deplorable.”
This is why we need effective whistleblower protection laws. It’s also why the supporters of Julian Assange are wasting their time appealing to the federal government to support his release.
We need such laws, but the government does not, and so here we are. And while you’re right enough that it is delusional to imagine appealing for the release of Assange might get him released, there is still reason to do it. If politicians, and particularly ministers, receive few or no messages supporting Assange they will be quick to exploit it as evidence that locking up Assange is simply following the public’s will.
Dear Sinking Ship Rat, The person in subject is Richard Boyle. Not Julian Assange. Whilst I agree with you in regards to Assange, please do not wander off from one of the most important issues that Richard Boyle represents. The discusting attitude and oppressive approach the ATO has taken towards an Australian citizen who stood for all Australians and faces life imprisonment for service to the nation.
Thanks for the lecture, but I was replying to Patton, and since that is where Assange was raised I was not wandering off the point. Perhaps you might address the original comment?
Or any recent “Labor” government – Gillard decreed him guilty, sight unseen as did Krudd, Marles, Bowen & that other waste of Shadow front bench space whose name escapes me.
Blessedly.
If the ATO or the other govt, the govt, think the people of Australia have forgotten this sorry saga then they are horribly mistaken. Boyle spoke up on behalf of all Australians regarding the ATO internal shenanigans and oppressive procedures and he is looking down the barrel of life imprisonment? Jesus wept. Deplorable is a massive understatement.
The problem is that a lot of Australians, perhaps most, really don’t know about this, and a lot don’t care – ‘it doesn’t affect them’. In the same way that it seems that some Australians don’t seem to know about or be troubled by the egregious behaviour of members of the federal government on so many issues. How many know or care that the prime minister’s mentor, according to his own testimony to a Royal Commission, made the decision not to report a pedophile to the police or worry about what that implies about our prime minister and those who elected him to that position. The only way to get through it to keep telling people what is going on because the ALP and the LNP are suspect.
Why, for instance, do some politicians (of any party, and too many of them are duds) or some un-named bureaucrat get to tell us what we should know about what they are doing?
Keep, prodding and poking, asking the questions until they get so tired of you that they lock you up, and they will try but it is probably the only way to get anywhere.
I couldn’t agree more- how many scandals does the likes of Angus Taylor have to be associated with before some mud sticks? Our PM shrugs it all off- and where is the Opposition? Or are they not getting air time?
Her Majesty’s Loyal Opposition is hiding under the doona of wedgie fear.
Don’t imagine they would not, have not and WILL not do the same, given the chance.
See Dreyfus’ bureaucrat written PIDA – the provisions of which Boyle followed to the letter.
The continued persecution (the purpose has always been persecution, not prosecution) of Boyle, McBride, Colleary and Witness K make be ashamed to be Australian.
Boyle has been basically proven completely correct. But being correct about the government’s perversion and incompetence is not enough for the nasty and vindictive Porter or the simply incompetent and vacuous Cash. He is simply ‘guilty’ of publicising that perversion and incompetence.
More fundamentally, is not strange and wicked that anything about the policies and operations of the ATO should be secret? A department funded by citizens to get a substantial proportion of each citizens’ revenue to fund the machinery and finances of government. Resources used to persecute a citizen who tells fellow citizens that the ATO uses profoundly unethical oppressive methods against citizens who run small businesses. WTF. Can be secret about that?
Hopefully, the irony in all this will be that prosecution comprehensively fails and is ordered to pay Boyle’s costs and substantial damages that are not taxable.
50% of the damages settlement should come directly from the pocket of the minister who failed to do their job properly and openly….ministerial responsibility desperately required but utterly absent in this despicable government
“50% of the damages settlement should come directly from the pocket of the minister who failed to do their job properly…”
I’ve been saying that ever since Kevin Andrews put Dr Haneef in detention despite evidence that cleared him. Goodness knows how large that damages settlement was.
And Andrews ‘leaked’ falsities against Dr Haneef… so I guess he could not be said to have breached security.
Although, come to think of it, mendacity is the only competency displayed by this shower of a government.
Try 99% – that might prove to be persuasive for such vexatious litigation.
Der Prozess IS the punishment.
If it ceased tomorrow, or last week, Biyle has already been bled dry emotionally, financially & socially.
Par for the course – it’s amazing how often – always – the CDPP seeks to portray W/B as disgruntled.
Any decent employee should be.
Along with Parramatta rugby league sports scientist, Tahleya Eggers, Richard Boyle should be in the conversation for Australian of the year.
This is apparently how we treat genuine courage in this country nowdays.
It’s all about revenge for being shown up to be duplicitous and conniving, certainly so in the case of the government’s pursuit of Witness K. Sadly I think Mr Boyle is just collateral damage in this LNP/IPA war against transparency. It is so in keeping with all the other revolting self-interest displayed by most members of this government, to the detriment of democracy and the well-being of the populace.How long before we can shunt them? Too long…