A Blog to outline the saga of an Australian woman who took on the governments of her state (South Australia) and the Commonwealth - and won! But in the process she's in danger of losing everything she owns.
DID YOU REALIZE THAT SOMEONE IN AUSTRALIA CAN WIN A COURT CASE AGAINST THE GOVERNMENT, I.E. BE DECLARED INNOCENT, BUT STILL HAVE TO PAY THE GOVERNMENT'S COSTS?
Some good news about her bankruptcy battle has brightened Dawn Rowan's day. Picture: MARK FRECKER
Hope on the horizon for St Andrews counsellor
Will Jackson
21May08 Some good news about her bankruptcy battle has brightened Dawn Rowan's day.
Some good news about her bankruptcy battle has brightened Dawn Rowan's day.
ST ANDREWS counsellor Dawn Rowan has been given a glimmer of hope in her fight to stop the Federal Government seizing her home.
Jagajaga federal Labor MP Jenny Macklin has revealed she is seeking to have Ms Rowan's bankruptcy debt to the Commonwealth waived.
The Government has been pursuing Ms Rowan for $397,000 in legal fees incurred in a long-running defamation battle.
It won a bankruptcy order last September, allowing it to seize her home and assets.
Ms Macklin, the Families, Housing, Community Services and Indigenous Affairs Minister, has been reviewing the case after lobbying from Ms Rowan's supporters.
In a letter to Ms Rowan last week, Ms Macklin said while she had no power to halt the debt recovery, Minister for Finance and Deregulation Lindsay Tanner could waive such debts." "
"Accordingly, I am writing to (Mr Tanner) asking him to consider the waiver of your debt," Ms Macklin wrote.
Ms Rowan, whose only remaining assets are her house and car, told the DV Leader it was an enormous relief to "finally" be treated with kindness.
"I've never had anyone treat me as anything but a criminal for the past 22 years," she said.
Ms Rowan, 62, was named in a damning 1987 government report into a South Australian crisis shelter she helped run.
Shelters in the Storm contained anonymous claims of physical, sexual and verbal harassment of Christies Beach clients, as well as intimidation, inappropriate counselling practices, professional negligence and misappropriation of funds.
The allegations were proved false and Ms Rowan successfully sued two television stations and the federal and South Australian governments in 2002.
All but the State Government appealed successfully, but the Federal Government was the only party to pursue her for costs.
Ms Rowan said she believed Mr Tanner would agree to Ms Macklin's request, but there was still potential for the television stations to pursue her for legal costs.
Dawn received a fax from Hon. Jenny Macklin's office today which says, in part:
'Even though I have no power to halt the debt recovery, you will be aware that the Minister for Finance and Deregulation [Hon. Lindsay Tanner] has the power to waive debts in circumstances such as yours.
'Accordingly, I am writing to the Minister for Finance and Deregulation asking him to consider the waiver of your debt.
'Please let me, or my Electorate Office, know if I can further assist you in this difficult time.
'Yours sincerely,
Jenny Macklin'.
****
I hope to talk with Jenny Macklin's Canberra office tomorrow (Thursday, May 15) to check about what else we can disclose.
But this is very good news. Hon. Lindsay Tanner has the final call (and he's a bit preoccupied at the moment with the Federal Budget).
There are still quite a few questions to be faced/answered. You'll hear from me again in a few days.
Jan and I are meeting with Dawn again tomorrow. To those of you who pray, let us give thanks for this milestone event, and pray for an uncomplicated positive decision by Mr. Tanner!
Thanks again to all of you for lobbying for justice for Dawn.
===>>> Why not email Jenny Macklin and thank her? (JMacklin.MP@aph.gov.au )
The Diamond Valley Leader - the local newspaper in Dawn's region of Melbourne - has published four articles about Dawn. The earliest (or http://tinyurl.com/5h3b4w)
Some of you might have read (on the frontpage of the Melbourne Herald Sun May 6 2008) that high profile lawyer-businessman-TV funnyman Steve Vizard has has this week handed back his ORDER OF AUSTRALIA award.
He said 'This is partially out of respect for the ORDER, to protect it,' and 'because it is the right thing to do.'
Steve Vizard collected his ORDER OF AUSTRALIA medal for services to the community, in 1997.
Vizard also said his decision to hand back the ORDER OF AUSTRALIA was brought on by his civil conviction concerning his financial dealings described by the judge as 'dishonest and a gross breach of trust'.
The Herald Sun article also says 'Previously an award could be revoked for a criminal conviction. Last September that was extended to include Civil penalties.'
Comment: Although this change to the Australian Awards rules is not retrospective, Steve Vizard, having received his award in 1997, in the light of these changes (ie. to include a ban on persons with CIVIL CONVICTIONS) has decided to 'do the right thing'.
Judith Roberts has a CIVIL CONVICTION in the Rowan Vs. Cornwall and Others case for 'gross defamation' in the judgment of June 2002. Justice Debelle was scathing in his condemnation of her behaviour as Chair of the 'Independent' Review into the management of Women's Shelters in South Australia, conducted in 1987.
Just before the Full Bench Appeal in this case was about to start, Judith Roberts, at the time guilty of MALICIOUS Defamation, was curiously awarded an AO for 'services to the community'. How does the award process evaluate the decency and credibility of its recipients?
Given Steve Vizard's act of decency and respect for the Australian Awards system, I call upon Judith Roberts to also do the decent thing and hand back her AO, since she remains guilty of the civil charge of Defamation.
Or will she hang on with the shallow technical defense that these changes are not retrospective?
****
Here's the latest article in Dawn's local paper, the Diamond Valley Leader...
A statement released a few days ago by Dawn's lawyer, in response to a Leader journalist's question. (More details will be posted here if anything unfolds):
'It may be that Minister Macklin has misunderstood what Dawn requested of the Government. Dawn has not asked for the Secretary of the Department to not pursue her for the legal costs that she owes - that would have been pointless as the Department has already pursued her to the limits of the law. Dawn was, after all, recently made bankrupt at the request of the Commonwealth Government.
Rather, what Dawn asks is that the Minister intervenes and uses the powers that the government has under S.34 of the Financial Management and Accountability Act to now waive that debt. Dawn's supporters have been advised by the Govt that the Finance Minister would only act on a recommendation from the relevant Minister, i.e. Jenny Macklin.
This is a source of enormous frustration for Dawn, because both the former and current governments have not even acknowledged that they do in fact have the power in their hands to assist her.'
This blog tells an amazing story. If you're an Australian, you might naively believe that you live in a country committed in its legal and political institutions to fairness and justice.
As you read on, you will have good reason to doubt all that.
(See Dawn's Documents Blog - http://dawnrowandocuments.blogspot.com/ - for more...) ************************************ JULIAN BURNSIDE QC: 'I have carefully considered your situation... You have exhausted all possibilities of legal recourse... It is now important that your story be known by the public rather than buried... Be more assertive in pushing this issue in the media. Exposure of the Commonwealth's shabby behaviour might cause a change of heart.' ***************************************
Please contact your local Federal member or senator urgently on behalf of Dawn: the more emails and letters sent to people in authority the more likely they will take notice! (See next paragraph for a couple of letters: you can use the raw material to construct your own. Note (January 2008) that they're dated in terms of the election: it's now important to contact the new Labor ministers. But they can still provide the raw material you can use).
Shalom!
Rowland ~~~ Samples of letters on behalf of Dawn Rowan:
Dear [local Federal member]
As a member of your constituency, I am writing to seek your assistance on a matter of justice currently before the Minister for Families, Community Services and Indigenous Affairs, and the Federal Attorney General. In August 1987, a lady called Dawn Rowan worked at Christies Beach Womens' Shelter, Adelaide. It was shut down by the SA Government following unsubstantiated allegations, all of which were subsequently found to be grossly defamatory. Dawn Rowan has since worked to restore her unfairly tarnished reputation and gain compensation.
This she won in the SA Supreme Court, yet now faces bankruptcy and homelessness on legal technicalities. These were exposed on Channel 7s "This Day Tonight" in May 2007 -- see the video onfront page of her advocate at http://jmm.aaa.net.au. Since her home can only be saved by a decision from your Ministers above, may I ask you to please: 1) Assess the justice of her situation for yourself and advise me of your findings,
2) Raise the matter with your Ministers and
3) Advise me of the outcome.
May I take this opportunity to thank you for representing our constituency so well, and wish you well for the election expected later this year.
Yours sincerely,
~~~
2. A letter I wrote to the Diamond Valley Leader newspaper - also to several parliamentarians. (The Leader has published three pages of stories and photos re Dawn's situation. It's the local paper for the area where Dawn lives).
The Editor [ ]
Thank you for your excellent coverage last week of the Dawn Rowan saga. I do not know a worse miscarriage of justice in our nation than this one.
In Ethics 101 I learned that 'not everything that's legal is moral.' In our Westminster system it's apparently 'legal', under parliamentary privilege, to tell a bevy of lies defaming an innocent person, but it's manifestly immoral.
It's OK apparently for five government agencies to 'lose' a cohort of documents relating to this case, but until that government institutes an enquiry, no one is held accountable.
In the appeal process it's apparently legal for a judge not to disclose bias, as Dawn Rowan alleges, when there are a number of close associations on various committees with the leading guilty party.
This saga also suggests that to pursue for costs an innocent person (Dawn Rowan) when at every level of the case the guilty party was declared to be the Government of S.A. is also immoral.
And if Ministers Ruddock and Brough who are hounding Dawn Rowan to bankruptcy had any decency they would also realize that they're being very unwise. People are not going to vote in this election-year for parliamentarians who so manifestly lack compassion.
At a forthcoming bankruptcy hearing we will learn whether an innocent person will be out of her St. Andrews' home and on the street. There's now a very large groundswell of interest and concern about this case. Put Dawn Rowan into a Google search for some evidence of this: she occupies the first 17 of over a million entries!
Please do what you can to ameliorate the dire situation in which Dawn Rowan finds herself in.
I am sure that you are aware that Dawn has saved many lives, come to the aid of women and children fleeing domestic violence and been the compassionate adviser of women whose lives have been blighted by violence and threats. She was warning people about the prevalence of child sex abuse long before that subject became speakable. Like many women in the van, she has been punished for her outspokenness. This is a terrible thing for young women of our age to understand, but it seems to be the truth still. She is one of my heroes. In the 80s her work was an international influence for good and her work seminal in the progress towards understanding families under stress.
She has continued her work despite the misery her life became after the appeal against her successful defamation case.
This woman does not deserve to be pursued into bankruptcy.
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