Channel 7 Today Tonight (Adelaide)

The DPP and the Auditor-General - Wednesday 6 December 2006

In order of appearance

Leigh McCluskey, Presenter
Graham Archer, Producer and interviewer
Mr Ken MacPherson, Auditor-General
Mike Smithson 7 News [file tape]
Stephen Pallaras, Director of Public Prosecutions

Program

Leigh McCluskey

But first tonight, forget the court room battles, the State’s Director of Public Prosecutions Stephen Pallaras seems to have his biggest fights in the office. The latest blue is with the State’s highly respected Auditor-General Ken MacPherson over his right to quiz the DPP on how he spends public money. And its become personal with the Auditor-General now claiming that Mr Pallaras’s decision to criticise him in Parliament without warning is a denial of natural justice. With some background, here is Graham Archer.

Mr MacPherson, Auditor-General

I think he thinks he’s God Almighty and I don’t think that any statutory officer is in a position … ever statutory officer is subject to limitations.

Mike Smithson – 7 News [file tape]

Mr Pallaras’s style has been likened to Elliot Ness the legendary crime buster made famous in the TV series The Untouchables.

Clip of "shootout" from the film

Graham Archer

He’s maybe not Elliot Ness – just a loose cannon with an indifferent sense of direction. But that’s our DPP.  

Mr Pallaras – DPP [file tape – Press Club Speech]

The DPP fears no scrutiny.

Graham Archer

South Australians are aware, it’s an office with a problem past. From punting on the job - to outrageous plea bargains which betrayed the public’s sense of justice.

Graham Archer [file tape – Mr Williams, Nemer case]

Well, do you feel like justice hasn’t been done?

Mr Williams [file tape]

Yes, I do. As far as I’m concerned, justice hasn’t been done.

Stacey Brown’s family [file tape]

We’ve just got this great big emptiness and we don’t even feel like we’ve got any sense of justice for Stacey’s death at all.

Graham Archer

But now it’s a pie fight between senior public servants. The current DPP Stephen Pallaras, and long standing financial watchdog Ken MacPherson, the Auditor-General – a man with a considerable reputation to go along with his extensive powers.

Mr MacPherson [addressing the Finance Committee of Parliament]

An Auditor-General has got powers which are to a very significant degree co-extensive with those of a Royal Commission.

Graham Archer

Of course, Mr Pallaras is a creation, or at least was intended to be, of the Premier and his Machiavellian side-kick Attorney-General Michael Atkinson. But like school boys meddling with science, the experiment began badly. Mr Pallaras, not three weeks into the job - insulted people he’d never met.

Mr Pallaras – DPP [file tape – Press Club Speech]

Over the last couple of weeks a number of politicians and commentators have engaged in what I consider to be a ploy that has been as unjust as it has been transparent.

Graham Archer

Praised people who had fallen from grace

Mr Pallaras – DPP [file tape – Press Club Speech]

I pay tribute to the contribution to the criminal justice system made by my predecessor the first South Australian Director of Public Prosecutions Paul Rofe QC.

Graham Archer

And gave the State he was about to call home, a right bucketing, before he even knew the street names.

Mr Pallaras – DPP [file tape – Press Club Speech]

I’ve never seen anything like this. Anywhere.

Graham Archer

It’s not a matter of having a glass jaw. Heaven knows there’s plenty wrong in the State’s justice system. It’s just that Mr Pallaras confused bravado with basic knowledge.

Mr MacPherson [addressing the Finance Committee of Parliament]

The DPP comes out and says this bloke’s out of his mind and blatantly wrong. No reasons, no facts, no nothing.

Graham Archer

And it was downhill from there. Of course, no one could blame him for blueing with our unfortunate Attorney-General. But it was a mixture of grand speeches and cheap point scoring which didn’t sit right.

Mr Pallaras [file tape media briefing to Archer]

Why you can’t is beyond me …

Graham Archer [file tape media briefing]

The decision was mine Mr Pallaras….

Mr Pallaras [file tape media briefing]

Any other questions …..

Graham Archer [file tape media briefing]

Just one question. Why didn’t you follow up …

Graham Archer

His heroic demands to be independent …

Mr Pallaras [file tape media briefing]

Either I’m independent or I’m not.

Graham Archer

Is at odds with his apparent willingness to defer to others on a hard call – as in using forensic pathologist Dr Allan Cala at a time when his conduct was under question in another state.

Mr Pallaras [file tape media briefing]

And for as long at that remains the position and the advice of the Forensic Science Centre to this office, advice upon which we must rely.

Graham Archer

So, what’s the latest stoush with the Auditor-General all about?

Mr MacPherson [addressing the Finance Committee of Parliament]

I just want you to know there’s a history behind this matter which is not exactly what appears on the surface at the moment.

Graham Archer

He’s referring to his criticism of the decision to prosecute Rann staffer Randall Ashbourne for abuse of office. A point which seems to have poisoned Mr MacPherson’s reputation within the DPP’s office even before Mr Pallaras swept in on his charger. However, it came to a head when the Auditor-General asked Mr Pallaras to explain why he’d engaged a PR firm at the public’s expense.

Mr MacPherson [addressing the Finance Committee of Parliament]

Now it’s not the role of a public prosecutor at public expense to get a PR consultant to come in and to contest the policy - the lawful policy decisions of the government of the day. Now, I say, I’m sorry but that’s not something you are authorised to do.

Graham Archer

Well, Mr Pallaras exploded and without warning attacked his lawful inquisitor personally in a report to Parliament.

Mr Pallaras [media briefing]

I don’t need to deal with the Auditor-General. It is he who is imposing himself, I say, incorrectly and unfairly, into my office.

Graham Archer

To which Mr MacPherson claimed the DPP had added to his sins by failing to accord him natural justice. After all, he was just doing his job as the Auditor.

Mr MacPherson [addressing the Finance Committee of Parliament]

The DPP is subject to direction. Section 9 of the DPP Act says he can be directed – directed in everything in relation to the functions of his office.

Graham Archer

This led to further insults thrown by the DPP in a supplementary report delivered to parliament this afternoon, upping the ante of abuse.

Mr Pallaras [media briefing]

So, I’m asking parliament to have a good look at where it wants the DPP to go and what sort of DPP this state is going to have.

Graham Archer

You may well ask what does the public want? Of course, the two Mike’s - Rann and Atkinson - are loving all this - when really they should be hanging their heads in shame as the architects of this debacle.

Premier Mike Rann [file tape in parliament]

I think I have made my views of the DPP very very well known.

Leigh McCluskey

Indeed he has.

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