BHP has accused coal miner Simon Turner of making “wild accusations” but refuses to say what they are. Michael West, also named in the court case, reports.

Simon Turner, a coal miner who has locked horns with mining giant BHP in the courts over wage theft, cannot afford a lawyer. 

In fact, he sleeps on his garage floor and has to get the train down from Newcastle to Sydney to tackle BHP, and the five other large corporate defendants, and their phalanx of lawyers. 

It was some ten against one – one man without legal counsel – at the hearing before Justice Needham in the Federal Court last Thursday.

Proceedings have already been muzzled, after BHP won confidentiality orders to suppress Turner’s evidence to the Court.

It is truly a David v Goliath battle in the courtroom, even more imbalanced by the fact that in order to get access to evidence in his own case – namely the transcripts of last week’s hearing – Turner has to find a lazy 

$1,952.53 to pay for public evidence made in an open court. 

He can scrape up the 53 cents, but the $1,952 is harder to find. For public information. About his own case. In an open court.

Likewise, the cost is prohibitive for others who might be interested to find out what is going on with Turner’s allegations that BHP has been engaged, with other parties, in a $2B+ wage theft.

Same cost for us, and the public too. Anyone wanting public information. Even though Michael West Media and the author of this story have been raised in court by BHP’s lawyers Minter Ellison. 

Minters has claimed on behalf of its client that Turner has made “wild allegations”. We are fascinated to find out about these “wild allegations”. But journalists have to pay for court transcripts too, even if they are mentioned in the proceedings. We are also permitted to visit the Court Registry to read transcripts but not to photograph them.

So it was that we approached Minter Ellison to ask, as they made this claim of “wild allegations” – and brought us (MWM) up in Court presumably in connection with these “wild allegations” – if they would mind sharing their claims with us, as well as their affidavits tendered in evidence, and their transcripts in respect of these “wild allegations”

Their client BHP is trying to have the matter knocked out of court, and the Judge’s decision on their strike-out application has been reserved. So it would not be appropriate, as we could not physically make it to Court, to report properly on the case or upon these allegations of “wild accusations” without reference to a transcript.

That would be “hearsay”, therefore unreliable.

Alas, our petitions to Minter Ellison seem to have fallen on deaf ears. The firm is not sharing its accusations of “wild allegations” with us so that we can inform the public of this purported outrage, this wildness.

This was disappointing; disappointing that a tier one law firm, whose Federal government billings alone stand at roughly $20m a year, would not reveal what they were telling a judge about people in an open court.

We did however remind them of their lofty ethical principles, and their commitment to the highest standards of integrity and transparency, as espoused here

We wrote to them: “I note that Minters holds dear the principles of transparency, ethics, accountability and the “highest standards of integrity”, and so anticipate, in the interests of these principles, that you may be so kind as to furnish us with these documents.

“I am also told that Trent [Trent Forno: the Minters partner handling the Turner v BHP case] has recently filed at least two affidavits with the Court in relation to these matters. In the interests therefore of accurate reporting of your case, would you mind also forwarding these and other documents which are pertinent to proceedings.”

So, we are flying a little blind here, and will have to wait to report appropriately on the proceedings until we can dig up the money for the transcripts or get somebody into the court registry to take notes on the many pages of transcripts, not photographs (that would be too easy).

At least a foreign venture capital company is making money from Australia’s system of justice though. Is this silver lining? VIQ Solutions Australia, a subsidiary of Canadian tech group VIQ Solutions Inc, will be getting our $1,952.53 in fees for accessing this public information from another hemisphere. 

It is probably worthy of note that VIQ has been criticised by the legal profession for providing inaccurate transcription services, which is a problem because how does one rely on court transcriptions, say for making an appeal, if they cannot rely on the accuracy of the transcription?

In any case, we remain bewildered by the claims of Minters and Trent about wild accusations. Could it all be a mistake? BHP and its corporate coterie are not without blemish when it comes to making mistakes.

For years, BHP and Chandler Macleod have claimed that a mob called Ready Work Force was Simon Turner’s employer. Apparently they have now flipped on that claim and contend that it doesn’t matter who the employer was, what is important is that there is a deed between Ready and Turner and that that deed shows that Turner has been correctly paid.

We can’t say this for certain – that they have flipped – because that would be deemed as “hearsay” by the Court and perhaps “wild allegations” by BHP and its lawyers. 

But what we can say is that there was a court ruling by Justice Altobelli in 2017 which found that Chandler MacLeod was Turner’s employer. Also, that Turner’s PAYG records, ATO records, the mine contract and the miners’ payslips, employer contribution records and the Coal LSL (long service leave) documents all show Chandler MacLeod as the counterparty; that Turner was paid by Chandler MacLeod.

No sign of Ready.

It’s also wild that BHP and co are now arguing, according to hearsay, that it doesn’t matter if this mysterious Ready was in the Deed or not, or if Ready was Simon Turner’s employer or not. What really matters is the enforceability of the Deed!

So, let’s have a false Deed upheld by the Court?

In the meantime, we eagerly await the statutory information and the transcripts which are required to tell this story (without the deployment of hearsay) and dispel any suspicion that Australia’s corporate icon BHP and its blue-chip law firm Minter Ellison – which adhere to the highest standards of ethics, transparency, integrity and accountability – might be engaged, in any way, with the distasteful practise of pettifogging.

One would certainly not make such a wild accusation.

Simon’s legal crowdfund

https://michaelwest.com.au/is-bhp-making-wild-accusations-about-wild-accusations/

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