James Ricketson
58 Braidwood Road
Goulburn 2580
jamesricketson@gmail.com
0488543555
3rd October 2023
The Hon. Christopher Minns, MP
Premier of NSW
GPO Box 5341
Sydney NSW 2001
Dear Premier
I wish to lodge a complaint about the modus operandi used by icare and the Personal Industry Commission (PIC) in resolving disputes between employers and employees.
For four years now, these two bodies have placed an employee - CM - and an employer - Ms. AL - under enormous emotional pressure as they move at a glacial pace to arrive at a determination on a case which, it seems to me, on the basis of the available evidence, should never have been initiated by icare.
The attached correspondence will serve as an introduction to the problems encountered by Ms.L in this matter.
Familiar as I am with pretty much all the documents involved in this matter, it is beyond me why icare did not resolve it in a couple of months back in 2019, one way or another, but instead stretched it out over four years - allowing Ms. L's potential bill to mount at a rate of $1,200 a week - plus, of course, the $4000 required to provide the employee who worked for her business for 28 days only with a 'comfort dog.'
Regardless of the outcome in this instance, surely it should not take four years for a combination of icare and the PIC to arrive at a determination of such significance to both employer and employee?
How many other businesses have been destroyed by such interminable delays? How many other employees of such businesses have had to suffer years of anxiety waiting of a decision? Is this the best your government can provide by way of services to both employers and employees?
In his 15th August 2023 letter, Glen Capel of PIC writes:
'The Personal Injury Commission is an independent statutory tribunal ... It is not a tax payer funded tribunal as suggested by you.'
My response to this, in a letter to Judge Gerard Phillips, President, Personal Injuries Commission, dated 15th August 2023, was to direct him to the PIC website on which is to be found:
"The Commission is an independent statutory tribunal within the New South Wales justice system, committed to providing a transparent and independent dispute resolution service."
'If the Commission is not funded by New South Wales tax-payers,' I asked Judge Phillips, 'could you please tell me from whence its funding comes?'
Judge Phillips did not answer my question.
Does the PIC's 'independent statutory' status render it a law unto itself? Unaccountable? Unfettered by NSW government review of the services it provides?
My questions for you, Premier, are as follow:
Are icare and the PIC run as efficiently as they should be?
Or, to be more blunt?
Are icare and the PIC fit for purpose?
In the case of icare, the fact that the insurer is hundreds of millions of dollars in debt suggests that the answer may be 'no'.
Is icare set up in such a way as to make it easy for scamsters to game the insurer if they can find a psychiatrist who has no need to actually meet them, but is prepared to declare that they have been traumatised by an employee and are now incapable of working?
I trust that someone within your government does have oversight of the way in which icare and the PIC are run and can look into this matter.
yours sincerely
James Ricketson
James Ricketson
58 Braidwood Road
Goulburn 2580
jamesricketson@gmail.com
0488543555
The Hon. Christopher Minns, MP
Premier of NSW
GPO Box 5341
Sydney NSW 2001 8th. November 2023
Dear Premier
Further to my letter to you of 3rd October regarding icare and the Personal Injury Commission (PIC).
Your office passed my letter of complaint about the PIC on to the PIC to respond to.
On 25th October I received a letter from Marianne Christmann, Principal Registrar at the PIC, the last paragraph of which reads:
"I confirm that the Commission has addressed your concerns as far as it can given you are not a party to the dispute and that the Commission will not engage further with you in relation to this matter. This means that the complaint is closed and that we will file your correspondence. Yours faithfully ...
Ms. Christmann addressed none of the issues I raised in my letter to you, did not answer any of my journalist questions and made it clear that she had no intention of responding to questions from me in the future.
Having been working in the media for 50 years, I am accustomed to this kind of 'the-complaint-is-closed'spin from minor bureaucrats. Their job in the technocratic world we live in now is to protect senior bureaucrats, Premiers included, from their public servant duty to be transparent and accountable in their dealings with the public and the media; to make problems magically disappear whilst creating the illusion that they have been dealt with.
The state of play vis vis Ms. L v icare is as follows, in brief:
- Mr. M worked for Sweet Art for a total, cumulatively, of 28 days between July and September 2019.
- When she offered Mr. M a job, Ms. L did not realise that her bookkeeper had forgotten to renew her company's workers compensation policy, which she had paid into every year, for 40 years.
- icare claims that Mr.M was so badly 'inured' by Ms. L on 26th July, 11 days after he commenced working for her, that he will be unable to ever work again.
- No evidence of bullying is presented by Ms. Haddock in the 'Statement of Reasons' document in which she justifies the awarding to icare of $168,000 compensation.
My letter of 7th November to Ms. Haddock speaks for itself.
In my article I am keeping the identities of Mr. M and Ms. L secret, and will not be including any details that might identify them.
I have only one question for you, Premier:
"Is there any mechanism in place within your government whereby decisions made by the PIC can be independently reviewed?"
yours sincerely
James Ricketson
cc. icare, PIC
James Ricketson
58 Braidwood Road
Goulburn 2580
jamesricketson@gmail.com
0488543555
The Hon. Christopher Minns, MP
Premier of NSW
GPO Box 5341
Sydney NSW 2001 24th. November 2023
Dear Premier
re WXXXX Special Events Pty Ltd v Workers Compensation Nominal Insurer (icare)
Further to my letters to you of 3rd October and 8th November regarding icare and the Personal Injury Commission (PIC).
Quoting again from the PIC's Ms. Christmann's 25th October letter :
"I confirm that the Commission has addressed your concerns as far as it can given you are not a party to the dispute and that the Commission will not engage further with you in relation to this matter. This means that the complaint is closed and that we will file your correspondence. Yours faithfully ...
As I have made clear before, I am not a party to this dispute. I am a journalist who will, once this matter is finally resolved, finish my article about what has transpired during the past four years of icare's legal pursuit of Ms. L.
Yes, I am a friend of 40 years of Ms. L, as I have made clear to icare and the PIC. On 8th August I commenced my letter to, Judge Gerard Phillips with:
Dear Judge Phillips
I have been a friend of Ms. Anthea L for 40 years. I am a filmmaker and journalist. Last year I commenced filming a documentary about Ms. L's life.
Paul Macken is a friend of Ms. Haddock, but this does not disqualify him from representing Ms. L, so why should my friendship with her disqualify me from implementing my journalistic skills to write about a case that is, I believe, in the public's interest to know about?
It was in my capacity as a filmmaker, producing a documentary about Ms. L's life and art, that I first wrote to Mr. Harding, CEO of icare, on 19th. June:
Dear Mr. Harding
I am a freelance filmmaker and journalist.
I am producing and directing a film about the life of Ms Anthea L - from her early days in Hollywood as a 'cake artist' up until the present day.
I have been totally transparent with both icare and the PIC this past five months in the roles I play - as friend, filmmaker and journalist. There is no conflict of interest here.
In my capacity as a journalist I am interested in verifiable facts, in asking questions, in making sure that what I write is factually correct - hence the questions I have put to Mr. Harding, Judge Phillips, Ms Haddock, Dr. Clarke and yourself.
It would be unprofessional, of me not to ask these questions. It seems, however, that they will go unanswered.
Please do ask Ms. Christmann's to place this letter on file, along with my previous letters. It will provide evidence that you, as Premier, along with the Hon. Anoulack Chanthivong MP, Minister for Better Regulation and Fair Trading, and other NSW government ministries, have been alerted to the fact that Ms. Haddock lied when she claimed in her 'Statement of Reasons' that text messages between Ms.L and Mr. M are undated.
If anyone in any of the relevant ministries of your government looked at these text messages, they would realise immediately why the dates on which they were sent is as important as their content. In the mind of any truly independent observer these dated messages would give rise to very serious doubts regarding the truth of Mr. M' bullying allegations.
All those members of the government departments across whose desks my letters have passed - bureaucrats committed, in theory, to the precepts of transparency, accountability and truth-telling - now know that:
(1) Ms L paid Mr. M in full; indeed, overpaid him.
(2) There is no evidence of bullying on Ms. L's part in Ms. Haddock's 'Statement of Reasons'.
(3) The 'evidence' of 'bullying' Ms. Haddock relies upon is a report written by Dr. Thomas Oldtree Clarke, based on one teleconference call; a call in which Dr. Clark accepted the truth of all that Mr. Michael's told him - despite his client having a 30+ year record of mental illness, including drug-induced paranoia.
Writing as a friend of Ms.L's:
The emotional and professionals costs paid by her, during this past four years of icare's legal pursuit of her, have been huge, and distressing to observe.
Regardless of the facts, for icare and the PIC to allow this matter to drag on for four years, has inflicted emotional damage on both Ms. L and Mr. M and raises question about the competence of two bodies whose job it is, in part, to protect employees (if not employers) from such damage.
It seems to me that it is icare that is guilty of the legal bullying of Ms. L in this matter, with the tacit approval of the PIC, and indifference on the part of those in your government whose job it is to hold icare and the PIC accountable.
yours sincerely
James Ricketson
cc Judge Gerard Phillips, President, Personal Injuries Commission
Mr. Richard Harding, CEO icare
