Home » Prosecutions 2022

Prosecutions 2022

PROSECUTIONS 2022

Hearings 2022

Media Coverage

January 2022

Australia accused of ‘disgraceful’ bid to keep Timor- Leste bartering negotiations secret
Christopher Knaus – The Guardian – 18 January 2022
Senator Rex Patrick says release of decades-old cabinet papers won’t further damage Timor relationship after spying and prosecution of Witness K and Bernard Collaery

Collaery secrecy ‘unfounded’, says defence
Dominic Giannini – AAP – 31 January 2022
Defence lawyers for prosecuted whistleblower Bernard Collaery have told Australia’s highest court a push to keep a court judgment secret on national security grounds is unfounded.

Open justice v secrecy: what is the case against Witness K lawyer Bernard Collaery all about?
Christopher Knaus – The Guardian – 31 January 2022
Bernard Collaery’s case has taken many twists and turns in the almost four years since he was charged.

February 2022

Cabinet documents reveal Australia pushed interests of oil and gas corporates before Timor-Leste bugging
Christopher Knaus – The Guardian – 2 February 2022
Newly released cabinet documents reveal Australia was preoccupied with the interests of major oil and gas corporations in the Timor Sea years before it bugged the Timor-Leste government during talks to carve up the crucial underwater resources.

Collaery charges must be dropped and whistleblowing laws overhauled
Michelle Bennett – Human Rights Law Centre – 8 February 2022
The Human Rights Law Centre today called on the Morrison government to drop the unjust charges against whistleblower Bernard Collaery and urgently reform Australia’s whistleblower protection laws.

Alexander Downer called Timor-Leste an ‘open book’ for Australia in 2000, tribunal hears|
Christopher Knaus – The Guardian –  9 February 2022
Former foreign affairs department officer says Downer made comment in private conversation years before bugging scandal.

Arguments over ‘court only evidence’ aired in Bernard Collaery case
Albert McKnight – The Riot Act – 11 February 2022
Legal parties in the case against whistleblower Bernard Collaery have argued over whether or not a judge should receive “court only evidence”, secret information that his defence team would not be allowed to see.

Bernard Collaery, Witness K legal bill hits $4.2m as cabinet documents remain in ‘black hole of shameful secrets’
Sarah Basford Canales – The Canberra Times – 16 February 2022

March 2022

Secret evidence to be allowed in Collaery case
Blake Foden – Canberra Times – 16 March 2022
The federal Attorney-General will be allowed to rely on secret evidence Bernard Collaery and his legal team cannot see as the whistleblower is prosecuted over the exposure of an Australian espionage operation in East Timor.

Top-secret evidence will be allowed in Bernard Collaery’s court case, ACT Supreme Court judge rules
Elizabeth Byrne  –  ABC News – 16 March 2022
Evidence so secret that Canberra lawyer Bernard Collaery himself cannot know what it is will be permitted to be used by the Attorney-General in the case against him.

Justice for whistleblower Bernard Collaery is as far away as ever
Greg Barns – Michael West Media ­– 18 March 2022
Top-secret evidence will be allowed in the prosecution of Bernard Collaery, the man who exposed Australian spying in East Timor, an ACT Supreme Court judge has ruled.

Government’s persecution of Bernard Collaery should stop
Letters to the Editor – Canberra Times – 18 March 2022
Letters by Jack Pappas, Michael Hall, Ernst Willheim

April 2022

Shooting the messengers
Kieran Pender – Australia Book Review – April 2022 No.441
How the Collaery case stains our democracy.

Australia’s intelligence community sails through another major blunder
Bernard Keane and Clinton Fernandes – Crikey – 12 April 2022
The deal between the Solomon Islands and China is a major failure by Australia’s intelligence community — and by a government that’s been dismissive of the region’s concerns.

High Court judges delay considering whether to release secret evidence in Bernard Collaery conspiracy trial
Elizabeth Byrne – ABC News – 13 April 2022 Elizabeth Byrne
The High Court has put off considering whether details of an alleged Australian spying operation in Timor-Leste should remain secret during a criminal trial.

High Court decision to hear Attorney-General’s application for special leave to appeal ACT judgment of Bernard Collaery adjourned
Toby Vue – Canberra Times­ – 13 April 2022
The federal Attorney-General’s bid for an appeal to redact more parts of a judgment that ruled for an open trial of Bernard Collaery has been adjourned after three High Court judges questioned the application with one describing the case as being “fragmentation of a criminal proceedings at its worst” on Wednesday.

Our democracy is decaying from within
John Menadue – Pearls and Irritations – 15 April 2022 (A repost from 16 September 2021)
“Democracy” has been narrowed down to a view that it is only about elections and not about well-functioning institutions. We need a summit of community leaders to help chart democratic renewal.

Timor-Leste’s presidential election pushes Asia’s youngest democracy closer to China
Michael Sainsbury – Crikey – 20 April 2022
The fragile stability that has characterised politics in Timor-Leste — Asia’s newest democracy — for the past two years is set to be shattered after Tuesday’s presidential election, and red flags will be raised in Canberra

Bernard Collaery’s war against secret trials
Binoy Kampmark – Green Left Weekly – 24 April 2022
The Australian government’s labyrinthine callousness and indifference to justice in its treatment of lawyer Bernard Collaery must be slotted in alongside that of another noted Australian currently held in the maximum-security facility of Belmarsh, London.

Shooting the messengers
Kieran Pender – Australia Book Review – April 2022 No.441
How the Collaery case stains our democracy

Mark Dreyfus on the responsibilities of Attorneys-General
It’s worth reading and viewing a speech by Mark Dreyfus to the Australian Bar Association on 30 April, outlining the the Government’s failure to protect the rule of law, and outlining alternatives. Here is the Vimeo link:
https://vimeo.com/708013521  The written speech is here.

May 2022

Morrison government’s last secrecy hurrah Attorney-General orders tribunal hearing on East Timor documents to be held
Senator Rex Patrick – Mirage News – 1 May 2022
In what could be the last secrecy hurrah in the reign of Scott Morrison, the Federal Attorney- General Michaelia Cash has issued a so-called ‘public interest’ certificate in an effort to suppress parts of a Howard Government Cabinet submission concerning East Timor and the Timor Sea boundary negotiations.

Dreyfus attacks Collaery prosecution: ‘an affront to the rule of law’
Bernard Keane – Crikey – 02.05.22
Mark Dreyfus, who will become attorney-general if Labor wins the election, has savaged the conduct of the trial of Bernard Collaery, and questioned the public interest in its continuation, describing it as  “a stark double standard that is inimical to the rule of law”.

Sic ’em Rex: forget the election, one principled politician is fighting for tiny Timor instead
Callum Foote – Michael West Media – 11 May 2022
Senator Patrick’s battle with the bureaucracy reveals Australia’s problem with transparency.

Government successfully blocks Bernard Collaery from obtaining documents on legality of spy mission
Christopher Knaus – The Guardian –  16 May 2022
Judge says legality of intelligence operation irrelevant to charge of disclosure of classified information

Federal ICAC must investigate Timor-Leste spying scandal
Hannah Thomas –Independent Australia – 17 May 2022
Law reform and investigations into cases such as the Timor-Leste spy scandal are long overdue.

The legal playing field has tilted sharply against Bernard Collaery
Bernard Keane – Crikey – 17 May 2022
The latest ruling in the trial of the former ACT attorney-general effectively liberates Australia’s intelligence agencies from judicial oversight.

Judge orders trial date be set as Bernard Collaery asks to call more evidence from former East Timor presidents
Elizabeth Byrne – ABC – 18 May 2022
Bernard Collaery wants to ask for further evidence from former East Timor presidents Xanana Gusmao and Jose Ramos Horta.

Top-secret evidence will be allowed in Bernard Collaery’s court case, ACT Supreme Court judge rules
Elizabeth Byrne – ABC – 18 May 2022 (from March), corrected 5 May 2022 – see end note.
A court ruling this week found that top-secret evidence could be used by the Attorney- General against Canberra lawyer Bernard Collaery.

Mark Dreyfus flags Bernard Collaery case as priority if appointed attorney general
Christopher Knaus – The Guardian – 24 May 2022
Labor MP says he would ‘seek an early briefing’ on prosecution of Collaery after criticising commonwealth’s handling.

Albanese Could Bring an End to Coalition’s Political Prosecutions
Paul Gregoire – Sydney Criminal Lawyers – 25 May 2022

Dreyfus to rethink trial of Bernard Collaery
Michael Pelly – Australian Financial Review – 26 May 2022

October trial date set for Bernard Collaery nearly four years after charges laid
Christopher Knaus – The Guardian – 26 May 2022
Bernard Collaery has been told he will face trial in October, four years after he was charged, despite his lawyers seeking more time to pursue an appeal that could be key to his defence.

Bernard Collaery’s trial date set for October, against his wishes, as dispute with federal government drags on
Elizabeth Byrne – ABC News  – 26 May 2022
Canberra lawyer Bernard Collaery will face trial in the ACT Supreme Court in October, four years after he was first charged with conspiring to release classified information about an alleged spying operation in East Timor.

José Ramos-Horta accuses Alexander Downer of ‘distorting’ issues around 2004 Timor-Leste bugging
Christopher Knaus – The Guardian – 28 May 2022
Exclusive: President of south-east Asian nation says Australia used cover of ‘supposedly altruistic foreign aid program’ to spy on behalf of oil companies.

Kill off the AAT: it’s stacked with Morrison’s Liberal mates and is no longer credible
Greg Barns – Michael West Media – 29 May 2022
Just before ousted Prime Minister Scott Morrison called the election, his Attorney-General Michaelia Cash stacked the Administrative Appeals Tribunal with a host of Liberal Party mates. Political appointments are out of control and the AAT needs to be killed off.

Collaery Trial Date Set: Federal Government Continues to Prosecute Whistleblowers
Paul Gregoire – Sydney Criminal Lawyers – 31 May 2022

June 2022

More than halting the unjust Collaery trial awaits Mark Dreyfus
Bernard Keane – Crikey – 1 June 2022
The new attorney-general should halt the wretched prosecution — but the tumour of corruption Collaery and Witness K exposed must be excised.

A voice for Timor and whistleblowers keeps up the good fight
Callum Foote – Michael West Media – 02 June 2022
Rex Patrick is a fighter against injustice. Defeated for re-election on May 21, he will be a loss to the Australian parliament when he leaves the Senate on June 30. He is using those few remaining days to fight for the fair treatment of the Timorese people and the man who blew the whistle on Australian spying.

Crossbenchers urge new attorney general to end prosecution of Bernard Collaery
Christopher Knaus – The Guardian – 3 June 2022
Greens and independents back calls for Mark Dreyfus to withdraw commonwealth consent to all charges in alleged Timor-Leste bugging case

Calls to end Collaery’s secret trial
Post – The Saturday Paper – 3 June 2022
Crossbenchers have called for new attorney-general Mark Dreyfus to end the prosecution of Bernard Collaery over his role in exposing Australia’s bugging of Timor-Leste.

Albanese government promises national corruption watchdog will have power to investigate pork-barrelling
Paul Karp – The Guardian – 8 June 2022
Attorney general Mark Dreyfus says ‘serious and systemic’ past corruption allegations would be part of new commission’s remit.

Attorney-General says ‘levers’ available in Collaery case
Lisa Visentin – Sydney Morning Herald –  8 June 2022
Attorney-General Mark Dreyfus says there are “levers available” to the government on the handling of the Bernard Collaery case but remained tight-lipped about any steps the Commonwealth may take in the matter, as advocates renewed calls for Canberra lawyer’s prosecution to be abandoned.

Labor government urged to drop prosecutions against whistleblowers and ramp up protections
Nassim Khadem – ABC  News– 14 June 2022
The Labor government is being urged to drop the prosecution against public-servant-turned-whistleblower Richard Boyle, among others. 

Coalition government spent $6m prosecuting Bernard Collaery and three other whistleblowers
Christopher Knaus – The Guardian – 23 June 2022
Exclusive: Figures provided to the Guardian reveal exorbitant legal bill for pursuing cases against Collaery, Witness K, Richard Boyle and David McBride

Timor Spy Saga: Rex Patrick pushes Labor to unveil Australia’s dirty secret, end persecution of Bernard Collaery
Callum Foote – Michael West Media – 30 June 2022
In one of his last moves as a senator, Rex Patrick has advanced his battle against the National Archives to release important documents relating to John Howard and Alexander Downer’s undermining of Timor-Leste in the early 2000s.

July 2022

Whistleblowing and the high cost of speaking up
Kieran Pender – Law Society Journal Online – 1 July 2022
Three men are presently before Australian courts charged with revealing information about the inner-workings of government agencies or the conduct of our armed forces. Such prosecutions say plenty about the lack of protections afforded to whistleblowers – yet what is the price for our democracy? Why a change of government must signal a new approach for Australia’s treatment of whistleblowers.

On July 7, 2022 the Attorney-General, the Hon. Mark Dreyfus QC MP, discontinued the prosecution of Mr Bernard Collaery under section 71 of the Judiciary Act 1903.

JOINT MEDIA RELEASE by the ATTORNEY-GENERAL and the FOREIGN MINISTER
Attorney-General’s Department – 7 July 2022

Press conference on Bernard Collaery – Transcript
The Hon Mark Dreyfus QC MP  – 7 July 2022

Gilbert + Tobin Welcomes End to Collaery Proceedings
07 July 2022

Australia’s Timor-Leste intervention has a dark history — one perpetrators want to hide
Bernard Keane – Crikey – 7 July 2022
Australia’s intervention in East Timor saw serious misconduct by soldiers and bureaucrats. Some paid a terrible price for the cover-ups and harassment that followed.

Bernard Collaery’s leaking charges over East Timor operation dropped on Mark Dreyfus’ orders
Lisa Visentin – Sydney Morning Herald – July 7, 2022

Prosecution of whistleblower lawyer Bernard Collaery dropped after decision by attorney general
Paul Karp – The Guardian – 7 July 2022
Mark Dreyfus ordered the commonwealth DPP to discontinue case over alleged unlawful disclosure of classified information.

Justice for Bernard Collaery must be the beginning of decisive action on whistleblowers
Kieran Pender – The Guardian – 8 July 2022
It was hard to watch the bureaucratic machine perpetrating injustice – Mark Dreyfus must now intervene in the other two cases.

ACT Supreme Court formally ends prosecution of Canberra lawyer Bernard Collaery
Elizabeth Byrne – ABC News –8 July 2022
The prosecution of Canberra lawyer Bernard Collaery has now officially ended, with his legal team considering seeking costs for the case that has spanned four years.

With the persecution of Collaery ended, it’s time to hold the perpetrators to account
Bernard Keane – Crikey – 08 July 2022
Bernard Collaery’s legal ordeal has been ended by Mark Dreyfus, but those responsible for our actions in Timor-Leste must be pursued.

‘Witness K and Bernard Collaery are heroes’: how Australia made two men pay for its dirty secrets
Christopher Knaus – The Guardian – 9 July 2022
Decision by new government to abandon prosecution prompts widespread relief from lawyers and supporters in Australia and Timor-Leste

La’o Hamutuk Press Release  12 July 2022
La’o Hamutuk Congratulates Australia for Ending the Prosecution of Bernard Collaery and Urges them to Continue to Respect Timor-Leste’s Sovereignty

Bernard Collaery’s divine intervener
Amy Fallon – The Saturday Paper –16 July 2022
When the decision to end his prosecution was announced, one of the first people that whistleblower Bernard Collaery called was a 76-year-old, plain-clothed, straight-talking nun living in a south-western Sydney convent.

G+T’s reflections on representing Bernard Collaery
Jerome Doraisamy – Lawyers Weekly – 20 July 2022
Following the dropping of charges against former ACT attorney-general Bernard Collaery, Lawyers Weekly spoke with BigLaw firm Gilbert + Tobin about its representation of Mr Collaery and why such work is so important.

Collaery Prosecution Dropped, But Politicians Remain Unaccountable for Bugging Timor Cabinet
Paul Gregoire – Sydney Criminal Lawyers – 21 July 2022

Vindictive and bad faith prosecutions?
David Lovejoy – The Echo – 22 July 2022
As Bernard Collaery’s friends and supporters celebrate the dropping of the prosecution against him, it is still relevant to ask, why were Witness K and his lawyer Collaery put on trial in the first place?

There were numerous other print articles reporting on the discontinuance. Here is a list of some of them:

ACT Supreme Court formally ends prosecution of Canberra lawyer Bernard Collaery – ABC

Attorney-General Mark Dreyfus orders Commonwealth to drop charges against lawyer … – ABC

Whistleblower Relief: Dropping the Collaery Case   Dissiident Voice

José Ramos-Horta pleased ‘fairness prevailed’ in Bernard Collaery case – The Guardian

The secretive Bernard Collaery saga closed as Australia eyes China’s regional rise – ABC

Labor’s Mark Dreyfus undoes unjust prosecution of Bernard Collaery   Independent Australia

Whistleblower Relief: Dropping the Collaery Case – International Policy Digest    International Policy Digest

Bernard Collaery’s actions may not have been in vain if whistleblowers are to be protected  The Canberra Times

Dumped Collaery case shows secrecy law reform overdue – The Mandarin

Gareth Evans says conviction of Witness K should be reversed after Bernard Collaery decision The Guardian

The unconscionable prosecution of Bernard Collaery was an assault on the values Australia

Collaery trial’s secret business should be the first job for a federal ICAC, not buried in department

Australian government drops charges for lawyer who exposed spying on East Timor, but …

Bernard Collaery: The spy case that ignited an Australian secrecy row – BBC News

Editorial – Protect our whistleblowers – The Echo

Editorial Mutually assured corruption – The Saturday Paper

David Pocock urges Labor to stop ‘unjustified state secrecy’ over Timor-Leste papersSarah Basford Canales – The Canberra Times – 27 July 2022 Freshly elected ACT senator David Pocock has called on the federal government to put an end to “excessive” state secrecy relating to sealed cabinet papers from two decades earlier.

Albanese government continues push to keep parts of Bernard Collaery case secret
Christopher Knaus – The Guardian – 27 July 2022
Human Rights Law Centre says new attorney general should abandon the appeal and let judgment ‘finally see the light’

Rex Patrick on Timor spying: Albanese government’s first secret trial after only 67 days
Rex Patrick – Michael West Media – 28 July 2022
Rex Patrick is fighting for the release of documents which expose Australia’s spying on Timor-Leste to cheat the little country out of oil and gas reserves. He is in court in Melbourne this minute but it’s a game of “We can neither confirm or deny”. The former senator and unbowed transparency warrior kicks off his first column for Michael West Media today.  

No place for secret trials in Australia, reform needed to improve national security law
Evan Schuurman, – Human Rights Law Centre – 29 July 2022
The Human Rights Law Centre has welcomed a finding from the Independent National Security Legislation Monitor, a national security watchdog, that the level of secrecy in the trial of an intelligence officer known as Witness J should not have occurred and can never be repeated. 

Labor announces national security law review after inquiry criticises secrecy of Witness J case
Christopher Knaus – The Guardian – 28 July 2022
Report describes ‘unprecedented’ secrecy that ‘should not have happened and should never happen again’

THE CENTRE FOR PUBLIC INTEGRITY – 29 July 2022

On July 7, newly minted Attorney General Mark Dreyfus ordered the Commonwealth to drop the prosecution of former ACT AG Bernard Collaery. As our board member, Stephen Charles AO QC, wrote: “Australia’s bugging of Timor-Leste’s Cabinet rooms and subsequent hounding of Bernard Collaery and a former intelligence officer was a display of mendacity, duplicity, fraud, criminal trespass and contempt of international law.”  You can watch Stephen discuss this with Bernard in our 2021 webinar.

Australia’s reputation….sullied

The prosecution of Collaery was performed under the auspices of national security. “This is the most appalling and terrible thing that Australia has ever done… to another nation,” said Mr Watson, a director of Australia’s Centre for Public Integrity. “And it is the most venal of all sins because we did it for money,” he told the BBC.
(“Bernard Collaery: The spy case that ignited an Australian secrecy row”  see

https://www.bbc.com/news/world-australia-61836078 )

August 2022

“The Time Has Come for Full Disclosure”: Former Senator Rex Patrick on the Timor-Leste Files
Paul Gregoire – Sydney Criminal Lawyers – 3 August 2022

Virginia Trioli and Mark Dreyfus
ABC Radio Melbourne –12 August 2022
SUBJECTS: Deaths in custody; Optional Protocol for the Convention Against Torture and Inhumane Treatment; Meeting of Attorneys-General; Draft National Principles for Coercive Control; National Anti-Corruption Commission; Victorian IBAC; Visit by NZ Justice Minister; Voluntary Assisted Dying Telehealth; Uniform defamation laws; Bernard Collaery; Whistleblower protections; Moss Review; Julian Assange; Kiribati constitutional crisis.

East Timor warns Australia over Sunrise gas project
John Kehoe – The Australian Financial Review – 16 August 2022
East Timor’s Minister for Petroleum has issued an ultimatum to partner Woodside Energy and the Albanese government, warning offshore gas located between the two countries must be piped to East Timor and that other Asian countries are circling to develop the potential $US50 billion ($71 billion) energy resource.

Timor-Leste warns it will work with China if Australia insists on pumping Timor Sea gas to Darwin
Christopher Knaus –The Guardian – 19 August 2022
Exclusive: President José Ramos-Horta says his country’s leadership ‘has to make decisions … if necessary a trip to China’

Woodside CEO optimistic of Timor gas breakthrough
Angela Macdonald-Smith – Australian Financial Review – 30 August 2022
Woodside Energy CEO Meg O’Neill is optimistic the visit by Foreign Minister Penny Wong to Timor-Leste this week will drive a breakthrough in negotiations on terms for the development of the Sunrise gas field in the Timor Sea.

Will Timor-Leste become China’s latest aircraft carrier?
Rex Patrick –  Michael West Media –  31 August 2022
In the wake of Scott Morrison and Marise Payne’s disastrous foreign affairs stewardship, Penny Wong jets to Timor-Leste today in what may be another rescue mission to save a Pacific neighbour from China’s expansion in the region. Rex Patrick has long warned the young nation might spurn Australia in favour of Chinese investment.

September 2022

Australian FM warns East Timorese against Chinese debt
Rod McGuirk – Associated Press – 1 September 2022
Australia’s foreign minister on a visit to East Timor is warning the nation against going into “unsustainable debt” to the Chinese on a major gas project

Wong rebukes Ramos-Horta for gas project media pressure
Matthew Knott – Sydney Morning Herald  – 1 September 2022

‘Don’t lecture us!’ East Timor president defends China, offshore gas drilling
Matthew Knott  – Sydney Morning Herald – 7 September 2022
East Timorese President Jose Ramos-Horta has defended China’s role as a growing strategic and economic power in the Asia-Pacific, arguing it has “hardly ever” invaded other countries and was unlikely to do so in the future.

Australia must respect Timor’s sovereignty
Editorial – Sydney Morning Herald – 8 September 2022

Spies Like Us: how Timor’s oil and gas delivered justice to Bernard Collaery
Rex Patrick – Michael West Media – 8 September 2022
The prosecution of Bernard Collaery was dropped after pressure from Timor-Leste and fears of China’s expansion. It’s not great news for other whistleblowers such as David McBride, Richard Boyle or Julian Assange. Rex Patrick reports. 

“Be honest for once”: cost of secret trials rises as Government covers-up Timor spying fiasco
Rex Patrick – Michael West Media – 17 September 2022
The Timor-Leste secret spy trials are not over, with costs already $5m and rising, Rex Patrick writes the Government will be back in court spending more public money trying to censor one of the former Chief Justice’s decisions to keep secret the finding of the Court that the spying operation took place.

East Timor faces ‘fiscal cliff’ without gas project, IMF warns
John Kehoe – Australian Financial Review – 25 September 2022
East Timor faces a “fiscal cliff” next decade if the Greater Sunrise gas field north of Australia is not developed in the next few years, the International Monetary Fund says.

October 2022

Bernard Collaery likens his prosecution by Australia to a ‘Moscow show trial’
Christopher Knaus The Guardian – 5 October 2022
Witness K’s lawyer gives first speech since case against him was dropped, argues for reform of the National Security Information Act

Collaery demands Royal Commission on Timor Leste spy scandal
John Jiggens –  Pearls and Irritation – 15 October 2022
“Just think of it. After years and years of assisting the Timorese resistance … to have Witness K. come to my office and tell me something so marked with treachery, words still fail me. … So immoral. So unethical. … so counter to all of our national interests!” 

Lessons from the Bernard Collaery case
Gareth Evans – The Saturday Paper – 15 October 2022

David McBride should be protected, not prosecuted
Amir Haidari – Independent Australia – 26 October 2022
Whistleblowers such as David McBride provide a service to the Australian public and don’t deserve to be punished.

November 2022

Dreyfus faces international pressure over whistleblowers
Tom McIlroy – Australian Financial Review –  3 November 2022
International transparency groups are pushing Attorney-General Mark Dreyfus to drop two high-profile whistleblower prosecutions, and have called for better protections for people speaking up against wrongdoing.

Bernard Collaery case: Australian government’s legal bill spirals despite dropped prosecution
Christopher Knaus – The Guardian – 9 November 2022
Legal bill grows by $248,000 in three months amid ongoing pursuit of secrecy

Integrity commission subject to a secrecy clause that could hide national security corruption
Bernard Keane – Crikey –14 November 2022
The National Anti-Corruption Commission bill contains a flaw that would allow an attorney-general to cover up investigations into national security or international relations.

Outgoing spy chief Paul Symon on Bernard Collaery, ASIS’s rigorous recruitment process, and why narcissists need not apply
John  Lyons – ABC News – 14 November 2022  
WANTED: The best and the brightest from Australia’s universities to work for one of Australia’s most interesting — and secretive — organisations.

Rough justice
Letter – Crikey – 15 November 2022

Glen Davis writes: Bernard Collaery has too long been obliged to think as a defendant (“Morrison’s a hypocrite on secrecy, but attacks on him undermine transparency”). The spying by the Howard government on the government of Timor-Leste was illegal, was contrary to Australia’s diplomatic interests, and trashed the foreign aid legacy earned over two generations of hard work. The treaty that followed was made in criminal breach of the ACT laws of fraud. Why are the perpetrators not prosecuted?

Is it true that the evidence for which prosecutors sought secrecy in Collaery’s trial is the same evidence that would convict Howard, Downer and Brandis of conspiracy in the ACT to commit fraud? Was the Collaery prosecution no more than a Brandis device to gain court-ordered secrecy over the evidence needed to convict the Howard ministers? Yes, the prosecutions of Witness K and Collaery were vexatious. The secrecy sought for evidence is worse than immoral and puts at risk more than public trust in the courts.

Coalition launches new — and false — attack on Bernard Collaery
Bernard Keane – Crikey – 24 November 2022
The Coalition is obsessed with Bernard Collaery and is now using Parliament to make false allegations against him. Pdf here.

December 2022
Timor gaps
Hamish McDonald – Inside Story – 8 December 2022
Labor’s decision to drop the prosecution of Bernard Collaery leaves key questions unresolved