Recidivism …

I wonder what the people of Victoria would reply if asked whether the death penalty should be reinstituted. One thing we can be sure of is that we won’t be asked …

AUSTRALIA is among a record 110 countries which have backed a resolution voted on every two years at a UN General Assembly committee calling for the abolition of the death penalty.

It would seem though, that the rehabilitation of men who murder women is less than perfect. I won’t discuss a couple of cases awaiting trial but a notable recent case illustrates the point rather well …

A Victorian Supreme Court found Leigh Robinson guilty of murdering 33-year-old Tracey Greenbury at Frankston, Melbourne, last year by shooting her in the back of the head at close range.

She had been trying to crawl into the neighbour’s house to get away from him when he shot her from just over 1.5 metres away.

Robinson then left a mobile phone message for Ms Greenbury’s ex-partner saying: “Yeah, come and get your kids. They’ve got no mother.”

The jury was not told that Robinson in 1968 was sentenced to death for murdering his then 17-year-old ex-girlfriend at Chadstone.

Had Leigh Robinson been hanged in 1968 those kids would still have a mother …

When Leigh Robinson was sentenced to natural life for the shotgun murder of his estranged girlfriend, Tracey Greenbury, in October 2009, a heraldsun.com.au poll revealed almost 78 per cent of 3000 respondents voted for capital punishment.

Forty years earlier, Robinson had stabbed to death another girlfriend, Valerie Dunn, and was sentenced to hang. This was later commuted to 30 years’ jail, of which he served just 15.

“It is often said that with rehabilitation and counselling we are able to turn cold-blooded killers into normal human beings,” Valerie’s niece reflected after Robinson’s second murder conviction.

“This week’s verdict has proved us wrong.”

I have heard it said that severe punishment has little deterrent value.

But this is certain, after execution the rate of reoffending is nil.

Smear …

Which raises the question of Ms Bishop’s actions as a lawyer representing CSR …

A few things that she didn’t do …

Julie Bishop:
– did not have an affair with a CSR board member,

– did not create a slush fund for her lover kept secret from the CSR board,

– did not create a file kept secret from her partners,

– did not prepare a slush fund with a deceptive name to make it seem it was for the benefit of CSR workers,

– did not fail to go to police when her lover used that fund to steal $400,000 meant to improve safety for CSR workers,

– did not help the lover (unwittingly) spend $100,000 of that stolen money to buy him a house,

– did not witness a power of attorney in her boyfriend’s favor that the donor claims was witnessed without him present and on a different date than the one stated.

– did not have anyone from CSR work on her renovations,

– did not have a builder she used turn up to CSR headquarters demanding payment, and

– did not get shown the door by her partners as a consequence of what she did.

Dismission …

Your dismission, should you choose to accept it …

Over the past 11 years, I have been called upon to investigate many people for workplace misconduct. The hardest people to investigate are high-achieving, high-profile women executives. Their starting position is always a haughty refusal to answer questions or participate in investigations they consider beneath them. Next they attempt to retain control by trying to impose their conditions and time frames on the investigation. They attempt to distract from their own conduct by focusing on the poor conduct of others. Some flail about, claiming the status of bullying or sexism victim.

A must read from Grace Collier, chief executive of Australian Dismissal Services, in the Fin Review … good to see a Fairfax paper covering this issue.

The Asian Century …

One can’t doubt the importance of this issue to the Gillard government. After all, it has honoured the little Asian century maker, Sachin Tendulkar. Good on him.

What’s more it has produced a great little white paper proclaiming the significance of Asia which it seems to have just discovered. It sets out some goals for us. Goals which unfortunately can’t be achieved with the governments present policy settings. In fact, whilst the private sector have been doing ever increasing business in Asia, government has been cutting its expenditure in the region for years …

Agreeable announcements are good for the government. It’s only when it does stuff that it stuffs up.

Shame it translated the white paper into Mandarin … it stuffed up.

Plains Wanderer …

The Plains Wanderer is a little ground dwelling bird which has, as its closest relatives, the Seedsnipes of South America, a clue to its Gondwanan origins. It’s very cute and sadly very endangered.

It was found to be doing quite well on some farmland in the vicinity of Terrick Terrick National Park. This was on country that had never been sown to improved pasture and had been grazed by sheep for many, many years. Quite a lot of farmland was purchased and added to the park to conserve the bird. It had been well studied by this stage and the scientific advice to Parks Victoria was to continue a grazing regime.

Parks knew better, the sheep came off.

Dr Mark Antos has been studying the Plains Wanderer in the Park over recent years and has documented their catastrophic decline. They require low herb and grass with about 50% bare ground to do well. Two years of high rainfall and no grazing has turned the environment into something entirely unsuitable. Their plight made the Weekly Times recently which tells us …

… no Plains Wanderers had been seen as part of bi-monthly surveys since March 2011.

Meanwhile, it is my understanding that another researcher, working on private land, has continued to find the little buggers on land that is being grazed. In other words they’re better off outside the park than they are on land purchased with public money for their conservation.

Today, though, some good news. In the survey conducted this weekend one Wanderer was caught and banded. One hopes it signals the beginning of a recovery.

Nicci Rox …

THE nation’s chief law maker Nicola Roxon is totally satisfied the prime minister did not act improperly over the setting up of a union slush fund.

Julia Gillard has consistently denied she did anything wrong or personally benefited from setting up the Australian Workers Union Workplace Reform Association for her then partner Bruce Wilson while working as a lawyer in the 1990s.

Ms Gillard has conceded the association was a slush fund that Wilson and other union officials used to fund their re-election campaign.

She told West Australian authorities the purpose of the association was for training and workplace safety.

Federal Attorney-General Nicola Roxon says allegations against Ms Gillard are unwarranted.

“I’m totally satisfied that Julia had not done anything improper or anything unlawful and in fact no actual allegation of impropriety is being made against her,” Ms Roxon told ABC radio.

I wonder how much comfort that gives our Julia given the company it puts her in …

Ms Roxon was asked whether Mr Thomson should be suspended from the ALP until the matter is resolved.

“It’s an option in theory, and maybe as things develop,” she said.

“But we haven’t had actually any content. There’s been all this swirling allegation [but] no one actually is aware of what is being alleged in detail.”

And she was vigorously defending Mr Slipper after having every opportunity to read the emails that ensured he had no prospect of a defense …

On Tuesday night, it emerged during a Senate estimates hearing that the Attorney-General was briefed on June 9 about the hundreds of dubious or distasteful text messages sent by Slipper to his staffer James Ashby.

Four days later, on June 13, Roxon instructed the Solicitor-General to seek to have Ashby’s case struck out. She also gave instructions to seek a waiver for the government to be allowed to use the texts to have Ashby sacked.

Also on June 13, in a further attempt to shut down the case, the government offered to pay damages to Ashby to settle his sexual harassment claim.

Two days later, despite her knowledge of the scale and nature of the texts sent by Slipper, the Attorney-General held a press conference and said this: ”The Commonwealth strongly believes that this process has been one which is really for an ulterior purpose … the Commonwealth has obtained a vast amount of material … It will be clearly shown … that there were in fact clear intentions to harm Mr Slipper and to bring his reputation into disrepute and to assist his political opponents and that was the purpose for the bringing of this claim.”

The political mischief in this case has never been in doubt. What was misleading about the Attorney-General’s statement was that the ”vast amount of material” was not merely vexatious. It buttressed a sexual harassment claim. It was also political dynamite.

Roxon also said something that was untrue: ”We aren’t bringing a strike-out application; Mr Slipper is.”

The shadow attorney-general, Senator George Brandis, told me yesterday: ”These texts, on any view, contain dozens of instances of predatory sexual conduct. So the Attorney-General’s claim that this was merely a vexatious case was extraordinary. Any person who read the texts would know instantly that Ashby had a case.

So, Ms Roxon, do you really believe it was entirely kosher to set up a slush fund? Do you believe Ms Gillard was present when Mr Blewitt signed the power of attorney that she witnessed? Did Mr Hem drop five grand in her bank account? Was her house renovated with proceeds of the slush fund? Do you think she may have withheld details of a swindle from her client the AWU? Do the missing documents cause you no concern?

Or is it the case that Julia is exactly as innocent as the other people you have recently defended?

ICAC …

Yesterday morning, Mr Watson, Counsel Assisting, and Mr Rosario Triulcio on the stand. The line of enquiry concerns why an old friend of Mr Obeid might buy a farm …

MR WATSON:  Well, all right.  Well, I’ll drop that.  You don’t know
anything about farming?

RT. No.

Mr W. You didn’t know what went on on Donola before?

RT. Oh, no.

Mr W. And you didn’t know whether it was economically viable as a farm?

RT. No.

Mr W. Wouldn’t have known whether they ran goats or rats or cows there would you?

RT. I’m assuming they didn’t run rats.

Mr W. All right.
THE COMMISSIONER:  Not four-legged ones.