1/16 Racism in the ACT Govt and Ernst & Young Australia thrives. On 9 May 2002, ACT employee Angel Marina wrote “…that Aborigines are compulsive liars and criminals …”, sourcing information from human resources staff Louise Fitzgerald (ACT Govt) & Tanya Taylor (EY) and the AFP.
2/16 A copy of the letter was given to Mullins, the original sent to Human Resources for investigation. Mullins emailed his line manager Tu Pham the same day asking how Marina had accessed his applications for roles at both ACT and EY, which had been attached to the letter.
3/16 Mullins wrote to his line manager Tu Pham advising of a racial and physical attack by Marina on 9 Sept 2002 seeking a disciplinary panel, although he did allow for discussion first. The matter was subsequently placed on hold at Mullins advice.
4/16 Mullins suffered racial and physical abuse by Marina frequently. On 9 May 2003 Glen Gaskill (ACT) provided a statement to Mullins outlining an incident in which Marina had used pejorative language and made threats against Mullins.
5/16 In a public interest disclosure dated 27 June 2003, the nexus of later legal proceedings, Mullins detailed racism by Marina, threats by Govt Solicitor Philip Mitchell & alleged racism by Chief Minister Jon Stanhope. Mullins was a whistleblower. The PID disappeared.
6/16 Mitchell: “… the Chief Minister and I have already had discussions about you and your naïve instance [sic] on the Government adhering to the Rule of Law; it just doesn’t happen … racial and commercial equality in the ACT are just not seriously on anyone’s agenda.”
7/16 Workplace stress due to the ongoing racism resulted in Mullins seeking psychologist support on 18 Sep 2003, continuing until 22 Dec 2003. Jillian Fleming notes that, “He felt that he had been denied natural justice … He described being harassed, intimidated and bullied …”.
8/16 An email dated 24 Sept 2003 Chief Executive quotes Mike Harris: “… the ‘Angel Marina issue had become ‘political’ and he had been directed by the Minister (Katy Gallagher) to remove me from my position …”. Gallagher was aware of Marina’s original letter and Mullins PID.
9/16 Human Resources manager Meredith Whitten emailed Pham on 15 Dec 2003: “There may be value in commencing a separate investigation into the racism issues.” This statement highlights Marina’s corporately condoned unchecked behaviour for the entirety of Mullins employment.
10/16 That condoned behaviour was reinforced when Marina submitted a now discredited PID on 19 Dec 2003 against Mullins. Court proceedings in 2017 highlighted that the material presented in Marina’s PID did not align with his letter of 9 May 2002. Marina’s PID is fraud.
11/16 On 26 Jun 2005 the Commonwealth Ombudsman noted that Mullins had submitted an earlier PID on 27 Jun 2003. “The Department advised me that you had made an oblique reference to a PID in a letter 27 June 2003 …”. Mullins made no oblique statement – he called it a PID!
12/16 #Justice4Mullins sought several documents from the ACT under FOI provisions. Of all the documents, Mullins 27 June 2003 PID, was the one which caused the greatest difficulty to procure, prompting an ACT Admin Appeals Tribunal hearing in Oct 2013.
13/16 Despite reference to the PID in the Ombudsman letter in 2005, the ACT Govt argued that it did not exist. They even tried to get the Ombudsman to recant their official correspondence to the Tribunal, which they refused to do. The 2013 Tribunal failed to clarify matters.
14/16 In 2015 @[email protected] was charged by the AFP with 16 counts of fraud on the basis of an alleged affidavit provided to the ACTAAT. In March 2017 in the ACT Sup Ct, the DPP opened with and repeatedly referred to the defendant’s Aboriginality.
@[email protected] 15/16 Jurors assessed the veracity of the alleged affidavit against other evidence. Of note is that the Mullins PID of 27 June 2003 that sparked the ACTAAT hearing had been provided by the ACT Govt to the AFP. Jurors found in favour of @[email protected] on all 16 counts.
16/16 Assumptions that these ongoing attacks are not racial in nature are deliberately blind. The culture of racism that permeates multiple ACT Govt administrations and echelons is plain, aided and abetted by EY and the AFP. Nothing less than accountability can be accepted. END.