"Ships in the Night" questions regarding making an application

Graeme Mason &

Members of the Screen Australia board

Screen Australia

Level 7, 45 Jones St

Ultimo 2007                                                                                                  

1^st May 2017

Dear Graeme and SA board members

re “Ships in the Night”

I have received no response to my letter of 18^th April re “Offending Women”.

Given my inability to earn a living as a filmmaker, as a result of the ban you have placed on me, I have no choice but to accept Channel 7’s offer.

As the 5^th anniversary of the SA ban on me approaches – next week – I must use this money to commence legal proceedings to obtain the evidence I have been asking for this past five years of my having intimidated and placed at risk members of Screen Australia’s staff with my correspondence prior to May 2012; of the ‘highly offensive conduct’ that has led to the May 2014 and May 2016 bans on me.

I am writing this letter in relation to another project of mine, “Ships in the Night” - a low budget feature set almost entirely inside a taxi; with a small ensemble cast:

I cannot apply to SA for any form of development money for “Ships in the Night” as this would, you attest, place SA staff at risk.  And I cannot meet with SA staff to go through the process of accessing the Producer Offset in the way other producers can for the same reason – this would place staff at risk.

Jane Supit suggests that I and my creative collaborators could meet with her (Head of Legal) to discuss the Producer Offset. To do so would carry with it both my own and my collaborator’s implicit acceptance that I do indeed pose a risk to SA staff. This would serve to further entrench, within the film industry, the notion that I am a person who both intimidates and places at risk members of SA staff: a forced confession of guilt.

In the absence of any evidence that I pose a risk to SA staff (and none has ever been presented to me) I am entitled to follow the same procedures that my fellow filmmakers follow in their dealings with Screen Australia; to meet with relevant staff as I have with all film funding bodies in Australia this past 44 years.

There are four options open to me vis a vis producing “Ships in the Night”:

(1) James Ricketson as producer, director and screenwriter.

(2) James Ricketson as director and screenwriter – a second person producing.

(3) James Ricketson as screenwriter – a director and producer attached to the project.

(4) James Ricketson, in all key roles (including playing the lead actor) producing the film for a miniscule budget and applying to Screen Australia for post-production funds to complete the film.

Are there any circumstances in which option (1) is possible as far as Screen Australia is concerned? If you are seriously concerned about the safety of Screen Australia staff in a meeting with me in person (to discuss both development funding and the Producer Offset), perhaps the meeting could take place via skype or in a conference call?  

If I am the director and screenwriter only, option (2), would it be possible for the producer to meet with SA staff in person – with myself on skype or conference call?

Option (3). Could the producer and director of “Ships in the Night” meet with SA staff to discuss both development funding and the Producer Offset? If I am the screenwriter only, would there ever be a need for SA staff to meet with me?

If none of these three options is acceptable to Screen Australia, I can pursue option (4). This would entail self-funding (perhaps with some crowd-funding) the production. From the footage shot a ‘trailer’ could be prepared and presented to Screen Australia for consideration as a project worthy of post-production funding. There would be no need for any member of SA staff to meet with me as the ‘trailer’ would speak for itself of the feature film’s merits and sales potential?

It is your custom not to respond to any correspondence from me but I would appreciate it if you could make an exception in this case so that I know what parameters I can work within as regards Screen Australia’s possible involvement with “Ships in the Night”. If none of the four options I have mentioned is acceptable to Screen Australia it would be good to know this now; to be clear where I stand.

best wishes

James Ricketson

cc Senator Mitch Fifield, Minister for the Arts

Mr Colin Neave, Commonwealth Ombudsman

Ms Louise Vardanega, Australian Government Solicitor (acting)

The Australian Director’s Guild Board

The Information Commissioner

As the 5th anniversary of the Screen Australian ban on me approaches, a letter to Mitch Fifield, Minister for the Arts

James Ricketson

316 Whale Beach Road

Palm Beach 2108

jamesricketson@gmail.com

0499214325

Senator Mitch Fifield

Minister for Communications and the Arts

Level 2


4 National Circuit


Barton, ACT 2600                                                                                         

1^st May 2017

Dear Senator Fifield

Following on from my letters of 21^st and 27^th Feb. As with all my correspondence, you have failed to acknowledge receipt of these!

As you will be aware, it is virtually impossible for me to make films in Australia as a result of the ban placed on me by Screen Australia. This ban, in operation for five years years now, prevents me from making any form of development application to Screen Australia. It also prevents me from accessing the Producer Offset in the way that my fellow filmmakers are able to. It is Screen Australia’s contention that meeting with SA staff would place them at risk. SA refuses to provide any evidence in support of this proposition. My attempts to secure such evidence through FOI applications are knocked back by CEO Graeme Mason the grounds that it is not in the public interest that I be appraised of the evidence of my alleged offences.

Jane Supit, Head of Legal at Screen Australia, has suggested to me that one way to protect SA staff from whatever risk I pose (the nature of this ‘risk’ has never been explained to me!) would be for me and my creative collaborators to meet with her rather than the SA staff members other filmmakers meet with to discuss funding and the Producer Offset. For me and my team to meet with Ms Supit under these conditions would be to provide our tacit agreement to the proposition that I pose a risk to staff. This I am not prepared to do and nor should I be asked to. My creative collaborators and members of the film industry could quite justifiably conclude that Jane Supit’s offer was a generous one  - extended to a ‘dangerous’ filmmaker; that I was, by going along with such an arrangement, acknowledging my guilt.

Jane Supit has made reference in a letter to my “highly offensive conduct”; providing this as a reason for the continuance of the ban on me. This is a lie. It is defamatory. It is in line with comments made on and off the written record by various members of Screen Australia management and the Board this past five years. In order to justify its ban, in the absence of any evidence, Screen Australia must vilify me; must present me as a danger to staff; must refuse to communicate with me, to answer questions and to characterize my asking of questions, my asking for evidence in support of the allegations made against me, as “harassment.” This tactic has worked. I am now alienated from the Australian Director’s Guild, a craft body of which I was a founder. The ADG will not even mention the ban on me in its newsletter, let alone request of SA evidence in support of the ban.

If indeed my letters have ever made it to your desk you have chosen to ignore them. You have not even had the courtesy to acknowledge their receipt. I am now left with no alternative but to commence legal action to secure, from Screen Australia, evidence of the intimidation and placing at risk I am allegedly guilty of; of ‘highly offensive conduct’ that Ms Supit refers to. This will be an expensive and time-consuming process – both for myself and for Screen Australia. It need not have transpired if you, or any previous Minister for the Arts this past 5 years, had simply picked up the phone and said to Graeme Mason (and previously Ruth Harley), “Please provide Mr Ricketson with the evidence he has requested of the offenses that have led to his being banned.” As I have made clear on countless occasions, I would  accept the ban on me willingly if there were any truth to the allegations made against me.

The damage done to my career this past 5 years cannot be undone. Leaving aside the fact that I have not been able to complete “Chanti’s World” as a result and must sell my “Offending Women” footage for a pittance, I calculate that the ban has cost me at least $300,000 - $60,000 for each year that I have not been able to work as an Australian filmmaker.

The damage done to my reputation, however, can be undone when it becomes clear, through the courts,  that the reasons given for the original 2012 ban were fallacious; that the reasons given for the two subsequent bans are equally fallacious. That the acquisition of the evidence of my alleged offenses should require legal action is absurd.

Quite apart from the damage done to my career and reputation there is another factor that comes into play now as far as I am concerned –  freedom of speech. Once the facts are known (namely that I have not intimidated or placed anyone at risk) it will become clear that the original ban on me was Ruth Harley and Fiona Cameron’s ham-fisted attempt to silence a critic; to punish me for exercising my right of free speech. This has nothing at all to do with my being a filmmaker but goes to the heart of a much more important problem we confront in Australia – namely that bit by bit, incrementally, ours has become a society in which severe punishments can await anyone who has the temerity to speak their mind freely; who ask questions that senior bureaucrats do not wish to answer.

best wishes

James Ricketson

Yet another appeal to the Screen Australia board to cease making it impossible to access the Producer Offset and, hence, to make films in Australia

Graeme Mason &

Members of the Screen Australia board

Screen Australia

Level 7, 45 Jones St

Ultimo 2007                                                                                                  

18^th April 2017

Dear Graeme and SA board members

re OFFENDING WOMEN (Anu Singh)

Following on from my letter of 6^th April.

True to  Screen Australia’s lack of commitment to the precepts of transparency, accountability and old fashioned good manners, I have received no acknowledgement 

of its receipt.

Channel 7 has offered $8,500 to buy footage from me to include in the broadcaster’s own documentary about Anu Singh. Or, to put it another way, $8,500 to buy what amounts to 13 years of my work (on and off) following Anu.

Whilst SA’s ban on me remains, I can neither apply for development monies or the Producer Offset for OFFENDING WOMEN and hence cannot complete this documentary.

You have a board meeting coming up on 28^th April. I request that you place Screen Australia’s ban on me on the board’s agenda and call for a vote on whether or not to lift it. The wording of the proposal to be voted on could be very simple and take up no more than 5 minutes of the board’s time. Words to the effect of:

“That Screen Australia either (a) provide to Mr Ricketson evidence that he intimidated and placed members of Screen Australia staff at risk, that he is guilty of ‘highly offensive conduct’, or (b) lift the ban and enable him to not only complete OFFENDING WOMEN but to access the Producer Offset with his other film projects.”

The alternative for me is to accept Channel 7’s paltry offer and write off the 13 years of work I have done on this project. The $8,500 of offer would go some way to paying the legal fees required to commence court proceedings - the only purpose of which would be to force Screen Australia to provide me with the evidence I have been asking for this past 5 years.

The decision to ban me back in May 2012 was not made at a board meeting. It was made as a result of Ruth Harley calling the present board members and asking them, on the phone, if they approved of the idea of banning me. She had been given a green light by the Australian Government Solicitor to change Screen Australia’s Terms of Trade to make such a ban legal.

A decision to lift the ban could be made in a similar fashion – a phone call to each of the board members with some variation of the proposal I have mentioned above. The ban could be lifted in 24 hours.

Alternatively, if you believe that a decision to lift or continue with the ban can only be made at a board meeting, you could do so on 28^th April.

I will hold off letting Channel 7 know if I am going to accept or reject the offer made to me until 29^th, by which tie I trust I will have an answer, one way or another from Screen Australia.

best wishes

James Ricketson

cc Senator Mitch Fifield, Minister for the Arts

Mr Colin Neave, Commonwealth Ombudsman

Ms Louise Vardanega, Australian Government Solicitor (acting)

The Screen Australia Board

The Australian Director’s Guild Board

The Information Commissioner