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From: judy Mum and I went down to see dad yesterday in the Port Phillip Prison at Laverton. He is not doing too good. He has not been given his medication which is for a heart condition and for his diabetes. He looks absolutely terrrible and I have asked his solicitor to contact the prison to get a doctor to see dad. Dad requested to see a doctor but he was told no. Dad also wishes to try for a further bail application on his next court appearance on the 28th November, 2000. Keith Hoban, dad's solicitor, has sent a letter to the Victorian Government Finance department, which have instigated the sale of the property and also to the Real estate selling agents to put them both on notice in regards to the pending High Court Appeal for possession of the property. I shall let you know if dad was able to get his medication and to see a doctor. |
OVOP responded to this e-mail from Judy by sending, that same day, e-mails to all members of the Victorian Parliament, and faxed copies to the federal Human Rights Commissioner, and to The Hon Daryl Williams, Attorney General of Australia, as follows:
U R G E N T A T T E N T I O N P L E A S E Subject: Denial of Medication and Medical Attention to Brian Fyffe, Human Rights Activist held in custody ONE VOICE - ONE PEOPLE Human Rights Defenders brings the Brian Fyffe case to your urgent attention: Brian Fyffe had been jailed in Victoria and kept in custody for 10 months without a trial because he had alarm clocks on his farm for irrigation purposes. While he was held in custody, the State of Victoria purchased his farm for a fraction of its value and under circumstances that appear to be in breach of statutory law. Prior to that he had won in court against the Victorian State Insurance but payment of his damages was deliberately made too late for him to be able to solve his financial problems. At the end he was forced to lease back his own farm. Now, the State of Victoria intends to sell his farm and has put Mr Fyffe again in jail alleging possession of firearms including a machine gun. His bail application has been dismissed as he was described as dangerous man. In the bail hearing the police admitted that they had not found a machine gun. Previously Brian Fyffe was kept in jail for 10 month charged with 18 offences which were dropped in the end. The alarming inconsistencies and the circumstances of the present and previous imprisonment and the ongoing character assassination of Brian Fyffe by the authorities clearly indicate that the government of Victoria seeks to shut him up to prevent him from fighting for his rights. Attached please find a message from his daughter Judy which is self explanatory. Brian Fyffe's life is being threatened. He has been denied medical attention! Are you prepared to take responsibility for his life? Further it has been reported to us that there are at least 350 people held in remand centres in the state of Victoria without a trial. Apparently there are women held in a basement of a remand centre who have not seen daylight for at least 40 days! Are you aware of such appaling abuses of human rights in Victoria? What are you going to do about it? ONE VOICE - ONE PEOPLE Human Rights Defenders demand that Brian Fyffe's human rights are respected and protected and that he receives immediate medical attention! We further demand that you take immediate action to protect the human rights of the people who are held in custody without a trial. Awaiting your immediate reply. Yours faithfully Brigitte Straulino President ONE VOICE - ONE PEOPLE Human Rights Defenders |
The response cannot be said to show any real interest in human rights exists in high places in Australia. But it did cause a comment in the form an e-mail to Judy, sent on the morning of Wednesday November 15, from a Mr Andrew Eagle a Complaints Information Officer at the Federal Human Rights and Equal Opportunity Commission (HREOC) who wrote in part :
... In addition, there is the requirement under the Human Rights and Equal Opportunity Commission Act 1986, that deals with allegations of a breach of human rights, that the subject matter of a complaint involve an act or practice of the Commonwealth. ... If Mr Fyffe was charged under state law, then allegations against the state police and the conditions of detention are for a detainee being held by the state of Victoria, would not constitute an act or practice of the Commonwealth, and therefore, the Commission would be unable to inquire into these matters. ... If Mr Fyffe was charged under federal law, and Mr Fyffe is being held on behalf of the
Commonwealth, then Ms Straulino would need to provide full details of the allegations regarding
Mr Fyffe's treatment, bearing in mind that human rights are specifically defined and that the
Commission cannot inquire into the procedures and/or decisions of a court. |
Note the very general nature of the reply and the statutory powerless nature of HREOC to do anything at all for Mr Fyffe, even if he were to die * before trial when in custody as a result of what the court has ordered. This does provide clear proof that Australian courts, be they State or Federal, can abuse a citizen's human rights with total impunity.
Unlike the situation in the USA Australian judges and magistrates (both State and Federal) are not elected by the people and so if corrupted they can represent a massive unremovable human rights threat to all Australians as no democratic control exists over their actions. In reality real power in Australian is based not on the will of voters but rather emerges from informal linkages between judiciary, certain MP's, senior bureaucrats, and certain police. This produces situations in which ultimate power becomes available via informal alinement of views in a manner that is not subject to or recognised by any democratic process. The independence of the judiciary and courts is a very convienient fiction used by those who are able to exercise real power via such informal linkages. It is mainly by such informal process and structure that an extended and legalised genocide of the indigenous peoples of Australia has taken place, and by which they continue to be killed by 'the system' to this very day and yet John Howard and others in power can claim that no such action has actually ever officially taken place and that thus there is no basis for Australia to say sorry.
* This is not simply an abstract proposition for it is not fair to say that Australia does not have a death penalty - it just does not have an official death penalty on the statute books. It does however allow its 'due legal and custody processes' to kill a lot of people and has a prison service that is so poorly run that bashings, rape and forced drug injection are said to exist as covert de facto elements in an Australian court's punishments. Some limited parts of this behaviour have reached the international media. When the matter of the high level of black deaths in custody came to international attention the actual statistics thus revealed showed that the total number of deaths in custody (both of black and white detainees) exceeded that taking place under the former brutal white South African government. An Australian Federal Royal Commission reported but soon after the media reported that number of black deaths in custody had actually increased since the Royal Commission !
Indeed extra judicial killing and a disregard for what should constitute due process at law in a true democracy may be viewed as acceptable by many in NSW. A NSW case of sexual assault of a child resulted in a member of the NSW police force going to the home of the person charged with the offence and shooting him dead. A jury found the policeman not guilty. Views expressed in the popular media here included that public money had been saved by such a rapid end to the suspect's life. Perhaps the problem is that the Australian public; did not get any education in civics and theory of government; came in part as refugees from troubled areas of the world where summary execution without trial was common; and from actual contact with the way the courts here operate have little faith in the ability of the legal system to provide justice?