Chapter 2 Life Begins At 82
Extra Chapters Coming Soon
Before concluding the reading of our Casualties of Telstra story, we suggest you click on the following legal research paper https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=2817646 where you will find there are others, not just the COT cases, who see loopholes in the justice given out by some of the Telecommunication Industry Ombudsman staff. Often, these ombudsmen have not even been registered lawyers or judges. Yet the Australian Establishment grants them the right to decide legal issues that, as our story shows, have, in many cases, ruined the lives of those who participated in the arbitrations.
Exposing the truth meant I faced a possible jail term
To add yet another alarming set of circumstances to this unbelievable story, I need to take the reader back to 1999, when the Victoria police Major Fraud Group seconded me as a witness in their attempt to prove Telstra had committed fraud against five of the twenty-one COT Cases during their arbitrations (see namely Ann Garms, Graham Schorer, Ralph Bova, and Ross Plowman.
It was common knowledge amongst the five COT Cases (who were being assisted by the Senate to access their previously withheld arbitration documents from Telstra) that Telstra had used two separate technical reports to support its arbitration defence of the COT Cases' claims, knowing that both were fundamentally flawed.
By 1999, using some of the late-released Telstra FOI documents regarding the five COT Cases, I could prove that Telstra had twice perverted the course of justice during my arbitration.
The current 2025 Telstra corporate secretary, Sue Laver, has refused my request to provide the Senate and administrators of the COT arbitrations with the same evidence she received in January and April 1998. This evidence proves that Telstra knowingly used one of those fundamentally flawed arbitration reports —the Cape Bridgewater BCI report —as defence documents in arbitration.
This was the Bell Canada International Inc (BCI) report that Mr Neil Jepson, Barrister of the Major Fraud Group, worked with me on during 1999 and 2000, declaring my reporting as factual.
Between 1998 and 2000, I worked alongside Mr Neil Jepson and assisted three other Victoria Police Investigators over three three-day periods. After working with two male and one female officers, I knew I had, years before, chosen the wrong career—I wished I had joined the Victoria Police Force. These three officers were dedicated to their craft.
After the Federal Government put the Major Fraud Group under political pressure to abandon the COT claims of fraud against Telstra, I met two senior Victorian police officers who apologised for what they realised was indeed an ordeal for me: my failed arbitration and the failed Victoria Police investigation. I was provided with a small A4 storage box, sealed with tape. They advised me that my four larger boxes of evidence would be couriered to my designated location. I asked if this small package could be included, as I preferred not to carry it away. The look in the police officer in charge's eyes was stern and direct, and when he said, “NO, you take this box with you now,” I didn’t argue!
This box contained some startling documents I had not seen before that would shock most people, even today. Two of those documents were two In-camera Hansard records, dated 6 and 9 July 1998, which indicated that their predecessors had allowed only five of the twenty-one legitimate COT claimants to have access to discovery documents and had also organized compensation for those five COT Cases (18 million dollars between them) in hush money. All of that was accomplished so that the Telstra Corporation could be privatised.
The Government believed that having the Senate investigate sixteen COT Case complaints would take years, as it had when the five litmus cases were assessed. So, the sixteen names on the Senate schedule, listed as still unresolved issues, were destroyed.
Now, if I am wrong, and that is not the case, then why were the remaining sixteen COT claimants all denied access to any of the privileges that the five ‘litmus test cases’ had been granted, and why did a letter from the Senate Estimates Committee Chair advises the police that the two In-camera Hansard records, dated 6 and 9 July 1998, must not be provided to anyone outside of the Major Fraud Group.
I contend that the Major Fraud Group released the two In-Camera Hansards dated July 6 and July 9, 1998, which I have enclosed in the manila envelope, to support my efforts to expose the systemic discrimination faced by the sixteen COT Cases related to Freedom of Information (FOI) claims. The Senate had formally acknowledged that these claims remained unresolved and were integral to their ongoing investigation. They assured that the outcomes of the five litmus test cases would significantly impact the remaining sixteen COT Cases. This meant that claimants would have the opportunity to appeal their government-endorsed arbitration decisions should they find the punitive damages awarded in the litmus test cases unacceptable.
It may be challenging to comprehend, but in August 2001 and again in December 2004, the Australian Government issued written threats (refer to Senate Evidence File No 12) warning me of potential contempt charges if I ever dared to disclose the contents of these in-camera Hansard records. These pivotal documents had the power to sway the outcomes of our cases had the COT claimants chosen to challenge the arbitration process. This situation raises a profound question: Where is the justice in such a scenario?
Telstra - Contempt of the Senate
In October 1997, when Telstra provided the Cape Bridgewater/Bell Canada International Inc (BCI) report in response to questions raised by the Senate on notice, Telstra already knew it was false. However, no one has ever held Telstra accountable for its actions, even though its actions were in contempt of the Senate.
On 12 January 1998 (three months after this false Cape Bridgewater BCI testing information had been provided to the Senate), during the same Senate estimates committee investigations into COT FOI issues, Graham Schorer (COT spokesperson provided Sue Laver (Telstra’s 2020 Corporate Secretary with some documents. On page 12 of his letter, Graham states:
“Enclosed are the 168 listings extracted from Telstra’s Directory of Network Products and Network Operations, plus CoT’s written explanation, which alleges to prove that parts of the November 1993 Bell Canada International Report is fabricated or falsified.”
On pages 23-8 of this letter, and using the Cape Bridgewater statistics material, Graham provided clear evidence to Sue Laver and the chair of the Senate legislation committee that the information Telstra provided to questions raised by the Senate on notice in October 1997 was false (see Scrooge – exhibit 62-Part One – Sue Laver BCI evidence and Scrooge – exhibit 48-Part Two – Sue Laver BCI Evidence). Knowingly providing false information to the Senate is in contempt of the Senate. No one within Telstra has been brought to account for supplying false Cape Bridgewater BCI results to the Senate. Had Telstra not supplied this false information to the Senate, the Senate would have addressed all the BCI matters I now raise on absentjustice.com concerning my ongoing telephone problems in 1997
This evidence which I formulated into my own prepared Telstra’s Falsified BCI Report which is also discussed on our my-story/introduction/Introduction page was one of the documents along with the Tampering With Evidence – TF200 that Neil Jepson thought could assist me in winning my arbitration appeal. It is also evident from the statements made (see Major Fraud Group Transcript (1) by Sue Owens Barrister, who assisted Mr Neil Jepson in the Major Fraud Group investigations, that my evidence had been compiled most professionally.
I reiterate it is essential to raise the Victorian Major Fraud Group’s police involvement in the COT cases’ matters (as well as several parties associated with the Major Fraud Group), as it is linked to our An injustice to the remaining 16 Australian citizens page. I was not one of the four COT cases’ litmus group, who, through Sue Owens (barrister) lodged complaints against Telstra with the Major Fraud Group in 1999. I was seconded as a witness some months later. The litmus COT cases provided my evidence of Telstra committing fraud against me, during my arbitration to the Senate estimates committee during their FOI investigations.
After I provided the contents of (see Telstra’s Falsified BCI Report to Neil Jepson, the Major Fraud Group asked me to assist them in compiling this evidence for their investigations. I did this over two separate visits to Melbourne, spending two full days at the Major Fraud Group’s St. Kilda Road offices. This is important to the litmus test cases issue because the Major Fraud Group was stunned at the evidence and how I proved Telstra perverted the course of justice twice by submitting false evidence to Dr Hughes, the arbitrator appointed to my case.
In late 1998, the Major Fraud Group asked me to supply this discarded evidence at the request of their barrister, Neil Jepson.
In 2024, Sue Laver will be Telstra's current corporate secretary and a member of the Telstra board. It is well documented in Evidence-Telecommunications Industry Ombudsman - Chapter 2 Devious and Savage that during my Telecommunications Industry Ombudsman (TIO) administered arbitration process, the TIO allowed Telstra Corporate Secretary Jim Holmes to attend monthly TIO board meetings. Minutes of those meetings (see File 48-B -AS-CAV Exhibit 48-A to 91) show that Jim Holmes attended all the monthly meetings (but one) from December 1993 to June 1994, during the period of my Fast Track Settlement Proposal, which in January 1994 became my Fast Track Arbitration Procedure, signed on 21 April 1994.
