letter to Simon Crean

Like so many ostriches, Ruth Harley, Fiona Cameron, Glen Boreham and members of the Screen Australia Board, along with Simon Crean and the office of the Prime Minister presume that if they bury their heads in the sand, pretend that no problems exists here, hey presto, there is no problem! After all, who cares what a few hundred readers of Ricketson's blog think! We'll just ride this one out until Ricketson runs out of steam. He's played all his cards by now, surely! If even the Prime Minister refuses to acknowledge receipt of his letters, what do we have to worry about? Nothing, right!?

The Hon Simon Crean

c/o Caroline Fulton

Acting Assistant Secretary

Creative Industries and Sector Development

Department of the Prime Minister and Cabinet

Office for the Arts

GPO Box 6500

ACT 2600                                                                                                26^th June 2012

Dear Minister 

I am as tired of writing letters to you as it must be tiresome for whoever’s job it is to ignore my letters to receive yet another one from me! “Damn, it’s that bloody Ricketson again! When will he give up!” I can only speculate as to what level within your Ministry a decision has been made not to even acknowledge receipt of my letters.

All it would take to bring my letter writing to an end (a relief for all concerned!) would be one phone call from some senior member of the Ministry for the Arts to Ruth Harley to ask her to provide the evidence in support of my banning that she refers to but will not reveal.  Ms Harley will either produce the correspondence and prove me a liar for claiming it does not exist or not produce it and prove herself one. Perhaps the reason why the question has not been put to Ms Harley during the past six weeks is that, your ministry having ignored my original complaint for 18 months, for it to acknowledge now that it had merit would raise the question: “Why did your ministry not intervene 18 months ago when it could have been sorted out quickly and relatively painlessly?”  The same applies to the Ombudsman, who also seems fearful of asking Ruth Harley for evidence to back up her ban lest there be no evidence!

My enclosed letter to Rachel Perkins, a member of the Screen Australia Board speaks for itself of my determination to get Ruth Harley to either release the correspondence (or extracts thereof) that she has referred to as Screen Australia’s reason for banning me or to lift the ban and apologize to me for placing it in the first place. Yes, both you and the Ombudsman can continue to bury your bureaucratic heads in the sand. After all, all I have to continue my fight to clear my name with now is a blog in cyberspace and if you ignore me for long enough I’ll just give up eventually, right?

Maybe.

best wishes

James Ricketson

cc Commonwealth Ombudsman