A letter to Assistant Secretary Matt Hall of the Attorney-General’s Department re unreported breaching fatalities
On December 12th 2011, the ACMA’s broadcasting investigating unit wrote to me indicating that another one of my complaints against the 7 Network will be investigated. By what I presume is just a coincidence, Julia Gillard chose the same day to announce that she was promoting Tanya Slibersek out of Human Services and that Brendan O’Connor would replace Ms Slibersek as the Human Services Minister.
The web URL below links to a news story about an 18 year mother, Sarah McKinley, who shot dead an intruder, Justin Martin, who was allegedly armed with a knife. Ms McKinley was not charged with any crime as it is lawful in Oklahoma to use deadly force against persons who unlawfully enter a home. However, the second intruder, Dustin Stewart was charged with felony murder because he was involved in a crime that resulted in the death of a person.
What is significant about the McKinley case is that South Australia has a similar law that could apply to all persons who have been engaged in the concealment of post breaching fatalities, especially those fatalities that occurred as a direct consequence of Howard Government’s misuse of Breaching legislation through the establishment and enforcement of Performance Indicator targets. In simple terms, Tony Abbott wants to be the next Prime minister and I want Tony Abbott to be investigated by SAPOL and the AFP in regard to the unreported breaching quota fatalities that Centrelink has deliberately concealed.
Given you job title and rank, I am sure that you fully understand the legal point that I am making in the above comment.
However, what is important for me is that instead of raving about Felony Murder and the Josiah Finch case in my blogs, I now have a text book example in a format that people without legal knowledge can understand. I can now use Internet URLs of the McKinley case as a teaching tool to get the point across to welfare recipients and the families of deceased breaching victims that what happened to Dustin Stewart should also be happening to the federal bureaucrats and federal politicians who have for decades successfully misused their lawful authority to deliberately conceal post breaching fatalities.
http://www.dpp.sa.gov.au/03/2005-2006.pdf
This URL will download an SA Director of Public Prosecutions annual report that on page 7 contains R v Finch, an SA-DDP summary of the Josiah Finch Felony murder trial. )This URL was provided to me by a member of Josiah’s family.)
Prove the Debt – The 6 Week Rule Scam
I have recently posted a YouTube video in which I explain how a member of my extended family was ripped off by Centrelink officials who refused to apply the 6 week rule and then threatened to take stern action to recover the money if Tom lodged an appeal. The 6 week rule places a legal obligation upon Centrelink to prove that a genuine, recoverable debt exists, i.e. Prove the Debt, but Centrelink does not do this. Instead, the targeted victim receives a letter of demand which state that X% of the fortnightly welfare payment is to be ‘deducted’ until the alleged debt is to be repaid. These Centrelink letters are objective evidence that Centrelink is engaged in wholesale fraud and my recommendation to readers of this blog is that you keep any such letter from Centrelink in a safe place and make several photocopies to use if or when filing a fraud complaint against Centrelink with the Commonwealth Ombudsman, your federal MP, or on Centrelink’s own fraud hotline.
Mr. Hall, since the ‘Tom Hanks” case appears to involve Nonfeasance, Malfeasance, Intimidation and Coercion for the purposes of extorting repayments that should have waived under the 6 week rule. I strongly recommend that you look at this video and factor in the implications for your handling of my complaints. For privacy’s sake I use the name ‘Tom Hanks’ in the YouTube video.
(Blog Readers – The real name is deleted to protect the privacy of the victim of the 6 week rule scam.)
You could choose to nothing about it since the complaint does not come from Tom; however, I strongly recommend that you implement what the Americans refer to as the ‘Cova Ya Ass’101 protocol, and kick the issue upstairs. Allowing ‘Tom Hanks’ to be scammed is hardly a good career move, especially since it is not the only verifiable example of how Centrelink rips off welfare recipients.
Appended material.
In the appended material is a detailed letter outlining another way in which Centrelink staff can easily defraud welfare recipients? Readers of the blog posted version of this letter to you will not have access to that letter which highlights the stalling, delaying tactics that represent the deliberate by misuse of lawful authority by some Centrelink CSO’s.
Stonewalling is the oldest white collar crime in the book; it has been around since the first bureaucracy was established thousands of years ago. These days the legal terms Nonfeasance and Malfeasance can be used to describe these S.O.P. bureaucratic tactics which have unfortunately been used against welfare recipients for decades. Some Centrelink CSO’s can and do stonewall perfectly valid claims simply by refusing to acknowledge that the claim is legitimate. In fact, some CSO’s perceive is that it is their ‘right’, ‘responsibility’ or ‘duty’ to deliberately deny such claims.
While Peter Costello may have called these bureaucratic tactics, “sound economic management”, I call them fraud. This activity involves both Nonfeasance and Malfeasance for the purpose of deliberately defrauding a welfare recipient of legitimate entitlements. Given that Centrelink has been tasked with recovering billions of dollars in “savings”, this is an easy way to ‘save’ money by avoiding the payment of legitimate benefits. This is a variation on the fraudulent activity reported to the Independent Pearce Inquiry by Centrelink staff about a decade ago. Back then, when Centrelink was breaching people at the rate of 3 per minute, the Administration Appeals Tribunals were overturning these breaches in 6 out of every 7 cases. (Check the official records.)
Some Centrelink CSO’s who secretly testified to the Pearce Inquiry reported that they were instructed by their managers/supervisors to deliberately delay the applications to the Administration Appeals Tribunals for 6 weeks! Such delaying tactics were nothing more than malfeasance for the purpose of defrauding welfare recipients of legitimate welfare entitlements.
I would remind you that it is a matter of public record that in 1998, the Job Network was facing bankruptcy just four months after it was launched. As previously stated in other correspondence, the root cause of this was the fraudulent misuse of breaching legislation by some of my (then) Job Network (FLEX 3) recruitment consultant peers in Job Network agencies across the country. Instead of the police being brought in to investigate this fraud, Centrelink management simply imposed a quasi-secret breaching moratorium. This was extremely effective in stopping the fraud but welfare recipients who had been the ‘collateral damage’ in this fraud scheme were never compensated for the dreadful harm caused by this activity, i.e. they were effectively ripped off by both the Job Network and by Centrelink. The implications of the McKinley case are especially relevant here for any fatalities that occurred in South Australia as a result of this fraudulent activity and the subsequent cover-up by Centrelink management are almost certainly unreported Felony Murders. The risk of being charged with causing death by reckless endangerment, which in SA could mean being charged with Felony Murder, is a very compelling reason why Centrelink still does not “collect” and report post breaching terminal outcomes statistics.
Whether through hubris, political arrogance or just plain old fashioned stupidity, Tanya Slibersek failed to appreciate that Hank Jongen hit his “Use-by” date on May 16th 2011. As you freely admitted in your letter to me, Centrelink was the source of the video footage used in the Today Tonight broadcasts that are at the centre of my complaints to the ACMA broadcasting investigation section. Over the last decade or so Hank Jongen has successfully positioned himself as a media personality by making himself oh so readily available when cameras and microphones are around or when the media wants to engage in socio-economic vilification, i.e. welfare bashing.
This raises the question as to just how much of the video material provided to the media by Mr Jongen over the last decade or so has been about building up the status, dignity and self esteem of welfare recipients and how much has portrayed welfare recipients as dole bludging, “gravy train” riding rorters of the system? It is not just the video footage and television interviews with Mr Jongen that you must consider. The ABC provided archives of both radio and TV broadcasts and so a very detailed and complex picture of Mr Jongen’s love affair with the media can be built up. Your problem, and Brendan O’Connor’s problem, is that that picture of Mr Jongen love affair with the media will reveal that he was more likely to engage in socio-economic vilification than in focussing upon his primary task of building up the social esteem and image of welfare recipients so that employers will be willing to employ these people rather than (literally) import workers from overseas.
New brooms sweep clean and since Brendan O’Connor is a new broom, the opportunity exists for him to make a clean sweep and get rid of the Centrelink ‘old guard’ who are so solidly linked to the post breaching fatalities cover-up. Perhaps he could take a leaf out of the Prime Minister Hand Book for solving politically ticklish issues and ‘promote’ these old lags out of harms way. Ms Gillard has promoted Tanya Slibersek to another portfolio but that is not as good a tactic as when John Howard ‘promoted’ his Defense Minister, Peter Reith, to the Consul-General’s job in London. When asked to explain why Amanda Vanstone had not reportede breaching fatalities he ‘promoted’ Amanda Vanstone to the Ambassador’s job in Rome. Perhaps Hank Jongen could be ‘promoted’ to similar job in Somalia or Iran?
I strongly recommend that you have a look at what welfare recipients have to say about the quality of their interaction with Centrelink. Check out the comments lodged on my YouTube videos and follow the links to other videos that have been posted. Download and install a program like ‘Atube-catcher’ http://atube-catcher.dsnetwb.com/video/content/banco-datos-Download-latest-update.html and you can then build up your own library of these videos which could be handy if you are subpoenaed and asked about the opinions being publicly expressed by welfare recipients on YouTube.
The Gillard Government is politically committed to bringing in a balanced budget by 2013 and Centrelink’s senior management are paid ‘Performance Bonuses’ for achieving targets. Thanks to the 7 Network, it is public knowledge that one of Centrelink’s current ‘Performance Indicator Targets’ is the recovery of $3 Billion in alleged overpayments. I would also remind you that the 7 Network letters make it quite clear that the 7 Network knew about the 6 week rule BEFORE claiming that welfare recipients ‘owed’ Centrelink $3 Billion. This correspondence from the network makes it easier to underscore the point that the network was aiding and abetting Centrelink to continue to run the 6 week scam which, if feedback from congregation members after I preached a social justice sermon in October 2011 is any accurate guide, suggests that this scam was up and running during the Howard era. Allowing Hank Jongen, the man responsible for concealing both the 6 week rule and post breaching fatalities, to appear on national television mouthing the “We will get you” mantra was just plain stupid; a recipe for disaster. Tanya Slibersek should have only allowed a professional media spokesperson who did not about these sensitive issues to have contact with the media, not Centrelink’s general manager who simply knows too much to be risked in front of a TV camera.
Hank Jongen is now the key to having some extremely sensitive issues put before a court and you really do need to know the extent of the damage that his answers can do, not merely to the Gillard Government, but to federal parliament itself.
- Have you made any effort to determine just how much of that $3 Billion allegedly ‘owed’ is covered by the 6 week rule?
- Ever more importantly, have you also contacted your peer in Centrelink, Neil Skill, and asked just how many post breaching fatalities have occurred that neither the DSS nor Centrelink have ever reported since the very first fatality occurred? If you checked out the CDROM that I provided, the “Centrelink collects” file will make it quite clear that Neil Skill literally has the answer to that question at his fingertips; a point that I shall be emphasizing in court.
It is not just “Happy Hank’ who is in the hot seat over these deaths. You are as much in the firing line as every other public servant and politicians who made a career ‘enhancing’ decision to hide these murders.
The ‘Nicole Kidman’ complaint. (The name is an alias to protect the privacy of the person concerned.)
“Life is what is at stake here Father. We’re talking about real people dying. Potentially a lot of people. But the number isn’t even important, is it? If there’s even one life at risk, that life must be weighed against your rules concerning the privacy of any records. And that life must prevail”.
Michael Harvey: The Third Rail, page 182 Bloomsbury Publishing London 2010.
The above quotation may be fiction, but it highlights the very real problem that even under the new, ‘improved’ rules, vulnerable lives were, and unfortunately still are, constantly being placed at risk by the shockingly contemptuous manner in which federal politicians, Centrelink management and some CSO’s treat welfare recipients.
The writer of the complaint in the appendix was nearly driven to commit suicide before rallying and deciding to fight back. In my email files are responses from other welfare recipients who were also driven to the wall. Sadly, one file is from a person who now mourns the loss of a parent who was driven by Centrelink to commit suicide.
The Social Networking Phenomenon.
The NBN is a unifying resource that is helping to bring together the victims of Centrelink’s misdeeds. As the optic fibre NBN is rolled out, pressure on the existing ADSL networks is decreasing which improves performance and helps to lower pricing. I now pay 20% less for 250% more bandwidth which works 100 times faster than my former crappy dial-up connection. This is now a common situation for many welfare recipients; so common that welfare recipients can report income via the internet to Centrelink. In addition, far more welfare recipients are computer literate and know how to use Facebook and Twitter to maximum effect. The short to medium trend is thus that more welfare recipients will be networking and sharing information.
This rapid advance in communications means that probably sooner rather than later, welfare recipients and former welfare recipients will be a force powerful enough to ensure that those responsible for abusing their vulnerability will be held fully accountable for their actions. Until now, I have opted to make available lists of documents that are covered by the two Senate ‘don’t copy – don’t distribute’ orders.
The Senate Suppression Orders are now being ignored.
You are a senior official in the Attorney-General’s Department and you make take this letter as formal notification that I am now ignoring those instructions because I believe that they are unlawful, i.e. they represent the misuse of lawful authority for the express purpose of concealing fraud and unlawful deaths.
I believe that I do not have to prove in court that Tony Abbott may be a closet sociopath or that breaching was a Crime against Humanity? Am I right in believing that once the court, and the community, is confronted with the scale of the death toll caused by breaching activity, then those issues become matters for commissions of inquiry and police investigations. I only have to challenge the ACMA’s refusal to investigate Tanya Slibersek and as part of that process put Hank Jongen in the witness box to discuss Centrelink ‘non-disclosure issues’ such as the concealing of the 6 week rule and breaching fatalities.
Am I clever? No! Just extremely short on cash and the reality is that every day in court is hugely expensive as you are fully aware. Hence the national interest/public interest issues put to the court will have to be very clear and very concise.
“You’re not paranoid if…”
The carbon tax is a $30 Billion incentive for Tony Abbott’s supporters to leave no stone unturned in keeping Hank Jongen out of court. Implicit in that statement is an apparent disregard for the potentially life threatening risks posed by my actions. Whistleblowers have been killed for a lot less than having $30 Billion on the line. Realistically, if the carbon tax proves to be a cash cow, every cash strapped government in the world will introduce a similar tax. For global corporations and their major investors this will be a mega disaster. Hence it is not just Corporate Australia that has a vested interest in protecting Tony Abbott and if that means committing murder, I am sure that there is no shortage of people who would regard that as ‘a routine business activity’.
As my previous comments make quite clear, the Gillard Government is accused of deliberately trying to defraud welfare recipients of $3 Billion and that is hardly an election winning accusation. I have no doubt that some of the Gillard Government’s supporters are every bit as ruthless as their corporate counterparts and may see violence as a solution to Ms Gillard’s problem.
Unlike the fictional characters played by Bruce Willis, I am no hero as anyone who was at the public consultation meeting held by the Media Convergence Review Panel at the Adelaide Hilton Hotel on August 5th, 2011 can confirm. The first member of the public to speak at that meeting was, as everyone who was present could plainly see, absolutely terrified. So terrified, that just speaking required a major effort.
What those watching me speak were unaware of was the years of intimidation, the “watch your back” threat, overt phone hacking, and silent phone calls, etc. I believe that the meeting was recorded; if so then listening to that recording will confirm that I am no hero, just someone pressing on despite the potentially lethal risks which, thanks to Tony Abbott’s “Industrial manslaughter” comment and the subsequent senate inquiry into the Roofgate disaster, mean that Tony Abbott will have seriously damaged electoral credibility once it is revealed in court that he concealed every single breaching quota fatality.
However, for those relying on Tony Abbott to get rid of the carbon tax, the thought that he could face criminal investigations into these fatalities must be the stuff of nightmares. In addition to being stuck with the carbon tax, there is also the open ended issue of the compensation bill for these fatalities plus the even bigger nightmare that breaching legislation was unconstitutional. Just how big a bill could that be? Given that voters will not tolerate income tax hikes or a levy to pay the breaching compensation bill, Corporate Australia and the 5% of taxpayers who benefited most from the Howard Government’s massive high income earner tax cuts are most likely to hit the hardest when it comes to funding these taxes.
AM I A TARGET OR A NUTCASE?
At the moment I am effectively just another voice in the wilderness, ignored by all but a few thousand welfare recipients who have read my blogs or watched my YouTube videos. Once I pay a lawyer to lodge the statement of claim, political expediency, corporate and personal greed will all probably kick in. Does that mean that someone will finally make good on the ‘watch your back’ threats? Put yourself in my position. Would you ignore the fact that $30 Billion is more than enough ‘incentive’ to ensure that no one, especially an over-the-hill, passionate welfare activist, poses a serious potential legal threat to Tony Abbott’s chance of becoming Prime Minister after the next election?
I PRESS ON.
In his letters, the apostle St Paul detailed a long list of times that his life was in deadly peril; his resolve in the face of these perils was summed up in three words, “I press on”. As a Christian, when it comes to the potentially lethal risks involved in speaking up for welfare recipients and demanding justice, I have but one option, like St Paul, I press on.
I genuinely believe that common sense should prevail and that I should act with caution. As a consequence, you are likely to have little advance warning of the lodgement of the statement of claim and, for safety reasons, I may not be available for ‘negotiations’; not that I would negotiate at that critical stage.
My primary goal is not stopping Tony Abbott from becoming the next Prime Minister. Goal #1 is welfare justice and that means stopping the current scams and ensuring restitution/compensation for the victims of previous scams, e.g. the Howard Government’s repulsive Performance Indicator Targets. Accountability is actually a tier 2 goal, but that may have to come first and if you don’t do what you can to help to end Centrelink’s murderously fraudulent scams then you should consider your own current exposure to South Australia’s felony murder laws.
As you are fully aware, “I was only following orders” or “I was only doing my job” does not constitute a valid reason for helping the federal parliament and Centrelink to conceal fraud and mass murder.
Please, keep in mind that when it comes to the SA felony murder statute, there are no fence sitters.
This letter has been posted on the Internet and you will be judged by your actions in dealing with the issues raised. You can chose to do nothing about the two case studies provided, in which case you will be identified as being part of the welfare fraud problem. Alternately, you can act with integrity, or act to cover you own backside, and make strenuous efforts to have the victims in the two case studies receive the justice that they are entitled too. How you choose to respond is your decision.
Choose wisely.
Ronald's space 
it is obvious that centrelink has physiologists and psychiatric experts to deal with people with mental illness and medical problems such as on DSP pensions so they would know what makes people tick,they would also know how to pull the strings with breaching policies so that they would know a certain percentage of people will suicide if put under sufficient stress so i think it is either incompetence or deliberately saving money at the cost of lives or collateral damage ,either way something has to be done to stop the deaths,how can governments cry crocodile tears about the suicide rate if they ignore one of the major causes?
Check ALL of Centrelink’s annual reports – it is all about money. Believe it or not, in Centrelink annual reports, welfare recipients are NOT CLIENTS.! The Department of Employment is but 6.8 million welfare recipients are not. If you are not a client, what are you?
Go figure that one. I know that can’t!
Ron Medlicott (yadnarie12)
recently I have had dealings with centrelink and I became convinced that there are money saving policies at the expense of the taxpaying public. At first they claimed I had failed to put in an appiontment slip which was not true and I had proof. They then rescheduled for another date and made me sit through a 3rd rate video presentation on finding a job. During the presentation many present were obviously stoned, had no foot wear on, were walkining in and out for a smoke and so on. They then made me sit through an interview during which they made me feel as if I was trying to get something that I did not deserve. I became frustrated and raised my voice to emphasize my frustration. They promptly called security to escort me off the premises. They suggested I make an appeal to Centrelink. By this point I gave up and missed out on benefits owed to me and promptly found a job myself. I am convinced their tactics are policies to discourage people from getting what they are entitled to. I am aware there is fraud; But why make all suffer for the sins of a few? I think you are right we are just collateral damage for policies that are designed to save money for a surplus we don’t even want or need at this time!
Hi, thank you for your comments.
I am about to post a new blog that deals with Centrelink withholding information and thus being liable to the same criminal charges that Centrelink usually lays on welfare recipients.
Re: Tony Abbott’s “Green Army.” Another up-coming posting – did you that “Civil Conscription” is prohibited by the Australian Constitution? Check out paragraph 51, (xxiii)(a) of the constitution. It clearly bans civil conscription from being linked to welfare payments. If you want to liven up a boring Centrelink session, POLITELY (with a smile) ask questions about the waiver of debt law and why the Green Army is unconstitutional.
Ron Medlicott (yadnarie12)
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