Chapter Nine - The ninth remedy pursued
Transcripts from the Administrative Appeals Tribunal (AAT) dated 8 October 2008 (No V2008/1836) reveal significant testimony provided by Graham Schorer, the spokesperson for COT cases. In an official capacity under oath, Mr. Schorer conveyed to two government attorneys and a senior member of the AAT panel that he and I were actively seeking access to a series of freedom of information documents that Telstra had withheld during the critical arbitration discovery process. Our primary objective was to compile a comprehensive and factual narrative that would illuminate and potentially open doors for other similar cases—fewer than sixteen—that could prompt the Senate to advocate for a thorough government investigation into the validity of our claims.
What Mr. Schorer failed to disclose to the attorneys or to the presiding judge, Mr. GD Friedman, was a crucial detail that had bearing on our case: unbeknownst to me, the government had concealed AUSTEL Adverse Findings from both itself and the arbitrator in March 1994. Alarmingly, these findings were provided to Telstra a mere six weeks before I signed my arbitration agreement. This transfer of information was strategically timed to assist Telstra in mounting a defense against my claims regarding the persistent problems I was experiencing with telephone and fax services, continuing even on the day the information was bestowed upon them.
The government appeared to operate under the belief that it was imperative to prevent me from substantiating my claims. It was not until November 2007—twelve years after the government initially supplied these AUSTEL Adverse Findings to Telstra—that I received access to this critical document. By this point, the utility of the findings had diminished significantly, as they were now five years past the six-year statute of limitations for filing an appeal against my award.
A thorough examination of this report may lead an impartial observer to conclude that the government has patently breached its obligations towards me as a citizen of Australia. This breach appears to stem from a discriminatory practice favoring Telstra, a corporation that was wholly owned by the Australian government—representing the collective interests of the Australian people—during that significant period in March 1994.
Government Corruption
Transcripts from my Administrative Appeals Tribunal AAT hearings (respondents the Australian Communications Media Authority - ACMA) on 3 October 2008 (No V2008/1836) show the judge (senior members hearing my AAT - Freedom of Information (FOI) case did not find me vexatious or my claims frivolous. However, other government agencies have branded me vexatious and my claims frivolous because they have a vested interest in concealing the truth surrounding my claims that the international arbitration process in Australia was legally abused to protect the Telstra Corporation at all costs → Senate Evidence
When it became evident that the new owners of my business along with me at my residence (next door) that we were both still losing faxes in December 2007, I sort documents from both Telstra and ACMA under FOI. This was to be my last attempt to resolve these long outstanding lost document issues which DCITA promised Senator Barnaby Joyce in 2005 (see above) they would investigate as part of my DCITA assessment process. This failure by the DCITA (which after all was the government) to investigate why eleven years after my arbitration and my now sold business was still experiencing the same ongoing telephone and faxing problems that first brought me to arbitration in 1994 I contacted a Brian Hodge, a suggested telecommunications expert so as I could provide his findings to the government. A cost of $15,000.00 plus.
After viewing the Cape Bridgewater Holiday Camp BCI/Ericsson NEAT testing results and the Cape Bridgewater Holiday Camp Arbitration related Service Verification Test results and the CCAS data dated 29 September 1994 (see Arbitrator File No/110), Brian Hodge (B Tech, MBA, B.C. Telecommunications), on 27 July 2007, prepared a report. On page 22, he states:
“It is my opinion that the reports submitted to Austel on this testing program was flawed, erroneous, fictitious, fraudulent & fabricated, as it is clear that no such testing has taken place as Telstra’s own call charge system DOES NOT record any such activities. Therefore the results are flawed or did not occur.” (See Main Evidence File No 3)
Mr Hodges concluded Telstra fabricated their reports about the many ongoing telephone problems still affecting the holiday camp customer access network CAN as late as November 2006. Many of these problems were caused by moisture affecting both the copper-wire and optical fibre joints in the CAN. These problems were so bad that, in late 2006, Telstra actually had to disconnect the Cape Bridgewater Holiday Camp from the fibre network and return it back to the already-corroded copper-wire network (see Open Letter File No/23).
In my 157-page Statement of Facts and Contentions dated 26 July 2008, which I provided to Mr Friedman and ACMA, I clearly defined how, for reasons unknown, AUSTEL, and later ACMA, did not conduct themselves in a properly transparent manner. This behaviour included allowing Telstra to support their arbitration defence by using deficient Ericsson NEAT Cape Bridgewater test results that AUSTEL (now ACMA ) knew were grossly deficient – long before they used them. It is also clear from the same Statement of Facts and Contentions that I highlighted Telstra’s use of the sanitised April 1994 AUSTEL Report instead of the later, and more adverse, AUSTEL findings (against Telstra). that eventually resulted from AUSTEL’s full investigation into my matters, and that I explained how this severely disadvantaged my March/April 2006 submission to the Department of Communications, Information Technology, and the Arts. The financial cost of preparing that 2006 submission came to more than $20,000, which was entirely a waste of money, as I did not receive a copy of AUSTEL’s Adverse Findings until November 2007.
If I had received those findings before the DCITA government assessment process, I would have been able to prove to the DCITA assessors my claims were valid..
Transcripts from my Administrative Appeals Tribunal (AAT) hearing (where the Australian Government ACMA was the respondent) on 3 October 2008 (No V2008/1836) show I maintained my Freedom of Information applications to ACMA should be provided free of charge in the public interest, because of the extent of the problems within the Telstra installed Ericsson AXE telephone equipment right across Australia. Telstra and ACMA were still withholding from me this Ericsson data in 2008, Mr G D Friedman considered this AAT hearings and, on 3 October 2008, stated to me in an open court in full view of two government ACMA lawyers.
“Let me just say, I don’t consider you, personally, to be frivolous or vexatious – far from it.
“I suppose all that remains for me to say, Mr Smith, is that you obviously are very tenacious and persistent in pursuing the – not this matter before me, but the whole – the whole question of what you see as a grave injustice, and I can only applaud people who have persistence and the determination to see things through when they believe it’s important enough.”
And, in 2008, Darren Lewis (the new owners of my business) wrote to the Federal Magistrates Court stating:
“I was advised by Ms McCormick that the Federal Magistrates Court had only received on 5th December 2008 an affidavit prepared by Alan Smith dated 2 December 2008. PLEASE NOTE: I originally enclosed with Alan Smith’s affidavit in the (envelope) overnight mail the following documents:
- Two 29 page transparent s/comb bound report titled SVT & BCI – Federal Magistrates Court File No (P) MLG1229/2008 prepared by Alan Smith in support of my claims that I had inherited the ongoing telephone problems and faults when I purchased the Cape Bridgewater Holiday Camp
- Two s/comb transparent bound documents titled Exhibits 1 to 34
- Two s/comb transparent bound documents titled Exhibits 35 to 71 (the attached 71 Exhibits was enclosed in support of Alan Smith’s 29 page report);
- Three CD Disks which incorporated all of the submitted material.
“On learning from Ms McCormick that the information discussed above in points 1 to 4 had not been received by the Federal Magistrates Court I again had a stress attack seizure, a problem I have been suffering with for quite some time due to the predicament I now find myself in and the disbelief that once again my mail has been intercepted. I have attached herewith dated 3rd December 2008, a copy of the Australia Post overnight mail receipt docket numbers SV0750627 and SV0750626 confirming the total cost to send the above aforementioned information was $21.80. I am sure Australia Post would confirm that a large amount of documents would have been enclosed in these two envelopes when they left Portland.” (See My Story Evidence File 12-A to 12-B)
Australia Post will not charge any postage fee for an overnight parcel unless they stamp and retain it. Since neither of these parcels arrived at their proper destination with all of the information originally enclosed, those documents must, therefore, have been ‘lost’ between the Portland Post Office and the Magistrates Court.
As I have reported throughout this webpage numerous Telstra COT related arbitration documents (like those lost on route to the Federal Magistrates Court in December 2008) were also lost during 1994/95 on route to the arbitrator hearing my case.
As Darren’s letter shows, I helped him prepare these reports two in his bankruptcy appeal against the Australian Taxation Office (for back taxes) using my own evidence that the Telstra Corporation, knowingly submitted two false and fundamentally flawed Cape Bridgewater Ericsson testings results to the arbitrator during my arbitration, to deliberately mislead the arbitrator into believing that there were no more ongoing phone problems affecting my business, when the Ericsson faulty equipment used in that testing had not proved those findings at all.
But more importantly for Darren and Jenny Lewis (my evidence needed that day to assist Darren and Jenny Lewis) of not being declared bankrupt went missing as did the same evidence during my 1994/95 arbitration Sixteen Years Previous (see Chapter 1 - The collusion continues which DMR (Canada) and Lane (Australia) state in their 30 April 1995 joint report “A comprehensive log of Mr Smith’s complaints does not appear to exist.” when it did exist.
MOST IMPOTANT - see Chapter 1 - The collusion continues
I need to take the reader forward fourteen years to the following letter dated 30 July 2009. According to this letter dated 30 July 2009, from Graham Schorer (COT spokesperson) and ex-client of the arbitrator Dr Hughes (see Chapter 3 - Conflict of Interest) wrote to Paul Crowley CEO Institute of Arbitrators Mediators Australia (IAMA), attaching a statutory declaration (see ”Burying The Evidence File 13-H and a copy of a previous letter dated 4 August 1998 from Mr Schorer to me, detailing a phone conversation Mr Schorer had with the arbitrator early in 1994 regarding lost Telstra COT related faxes. During that conversation, the arbitrator explained, in some detail that:
“Hunt & Hunt Australian Head Office of was located in Sydney and is a member of an international association of law firms. Due to overseas time zone differences, at close of business, Melbourne’s incoming facsimiles are night switched to automatically divert to Hunt & Hunt Sydney office where someone is always on duty. There are occasions on the opening of the Melbourne office, the person responsible for cancelling the night switching of incoming faxes from the Melbourne office to the Sydney Office, has failed to cancel the automatic diversion of incoming facsimiles.”Burying The Evidence File 13-H.
The fact that Dr Hughes did not official diclose these faxing problems between his Sydney and Melbourne office prior to is hinging on criminal negligence. Dr Hughes also did not acknowledge what happened to the comprehensive log of my phone complaints.
I reiterate, a comprehensive log of my phone complaints did exist.
It is important to note before AUSTEL commenced their investigation into my phone/fax complaints, I provided them with a comprehensive log of my phone complaints which I later supplied an updated copy to Dr Hughes (the arbitrator) to my claim on 15 June 1994 as my interim to my arbitration submission (see File - 7 to 9-A - AS-CAV Exhibit 1 to 47 and File 108 - AS-CAV Exhibit 92 to 127). The nominated documents in those two files AS-CAV Exhibit 1 to 47 and AS-CAV Exhibit 92 to 127 show a comprehensive log of my phone complaints did exist.
Who in government had enough power to stop two investigations into Telstra's unlawful conduct stemming more than two decades?
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