Spare a Thought for the Whistleblowers Labor Continues to Persecute This Christmas

As much of the nation celebrates Christmas on Wednesday, 25th of December, there will be two whistleblowers continuing to have their liberty seriously eroded, as they’ve had seriously dubious charges laid against their names and the crimes that they stood or stand accused of warrant serious gaol time.

Prime minister Anthony Albanese took office with a broad aspiration flowing from the Australian public in 2022, when it put him there, and that was that he should provide better governance than his predecessor the megalomanic Scott Morrison.

Yet, this is not been the case two years on, as the Albanese government has proceeded to sign the nation up to a $368 billion submarine deal during cost-of-living and housing crises, while it presented Israel with a blank cheque in terms of Gaza that its busily trying to renege on now, and its domestic politicking around maintaining social cohesion in respect of the genocide has sowed deep divisions.

Labor too promised to protect whistleblowers prior to taking out the May 2022 election, however this has only translated to one of three prominent political prosecutions being dropped.

That was the case against ACT barrister Bernard Collaery, who, unlike ATO whistleblower Richard Boyle and ADF discloser David McBride, wasn’t a public service officer even though he was publicly raising government corruption.

Indeed, Collaery was rather the lawyer of ex-ASIS officer Witness K, who exposed the Howard government having bugged Timor-Leste’s cabinet offices in 2004, to get the upper hand in fossil fuel negotiations with the Southeast Asian nation that was then the youngest country on the planet and one of its poorest too. And Witness K pleaded guilty and received a suspended sentence in 2021.

So, it appears that quite like the Morrison administration, Albanese is progressing two highly unpopular whistleblowing prosecutions with an election drawing ever closer. Yet, unlike the Coalition, Labor’s execution of this hitlist is taking place in the background, whereas, when the Liberals were in charge, the prosecutions were front and centre.

David McBride  

Over Christmas, former ADF lawyer David McBride will be locked up in the ACT’s Alexander Maconochie Centre, where he’s serving a 5 year and 8 month term, with no chance of parole for 2 years and 3 months, over his having blown the whistle on Australian operations in Afghanistan early last decade, which resulted in the ABC’s exposure of multiple war crimes in 2017’s The Afghan Files.

After serving two tours of duty as an ADF legal officer in Afghanistan over 2011 and 2013, McBride confronted his seniors with his concerns in respect of a plan for the military to change its rules of engagement, an area McBride is an expert in, along with a proposal to prosecute several officers, even though the criminal law standard of reasonable suspicion hadn’t been met in regard their cases.

The classified files that McBride handed to the ABC resulted in the broadcaster exposing Australian war crimes. And this happened at around the same time that the government commissioned the Brereton inquiry to investigate war crimes in Afghanistan, and in late 2020, its report recommended the AFP investigate 19 ADF personnel in respect of 23 incidents that involved 39 alleged murders.

A serious anomaly involved in the McBride case is that he’s the only person associated with the alleged Australian war crimes perpetrated in Afghanistan who is now serving prison time, and yet, he didn’t partake in any of the wrongdoing. And the lawyer is expecting to appeal the outcome of his trial next March.

Richard Boyle

Unlike McBride, former Australian Taxation Office employee Richard Boyle won’t be spending Christmas/New Years in prison. Instead, he’ll be sweating it over the holiday period in respect of the 24 criminal offences, which carry a combined maximum of 46 years inside, which he’s expected to face in a South Australian court in November.

Boyle was the first person to argue his defence under the widely derided Public Interest Disclosure Act 2013 (Cth), which was drafted by current federal attorney general Mark Dreyfus. And the SA Supreme Court confirmed on appeal in June that Boyle had not broken the law in blowing the whistle to the ABC, but he had in terms of the preparatory acts he made to build his case.

So, the man whose disclosure saw an end to an ATO garnishee practice being applied unlawfully and his whistleblowing in respect of that since having been found to be totally above board and in the public interest, is now facing close to half a century inside over acts such as photographing client files on a screen and uploading the shots onto an email address, which was never accessed.

Meanwhile, Dreyfus has stalled on his promised overhaul of the Public Interest Disclosure Act, to the point that it might not be introduced during the current term of parliament, even though the 2023 consultation paper regarding potential PID reforms actually contemplates providing criminal immunity to whistleblowers for conducting preparatory acts, just like the crimes Boyle is now facing.

Yet, one aspect of Boyle’s case does hold hope and that is last week the South Australian man’s lawyers announced that they’re in negotiations with the Commonwealth government in respect of a plea deal, that could potentially see Richard plead guilty, without having to serve any hard time.

So, spare a thought for these two whistleblowers who spoke out in the public interest this Christmas, as the draconian treatment the Australian authorities are subjecting them to is currently being overshadowed by the broader authoritarian creep of the federal government, which is taking place regardless of which major is in charge.