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[This edited version of the article has been prepared by Dr Robert N Moles]

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Justinian 3 April 2006 – Evan Whitton “The Stuffed Man”

The public’s verdict on OK Cole is unlikely to be kind … Peter Livesey should be let back in the fold … Rorting the market for gongs … Bert Wainer doco. OK Cole QC says it is “not appropriate” to ask Little Jackie for permission to report on politicians’ role, if any, in richly bribing a mass murderer. Jackie refuses to give him that power. Like many, I believe OK’s posture is a nonsense and Jackie’s inexcusable.

When the Fitzgerald corruption inquiry turned up evidence that politicians were up to their armpits in it, the Hon Gerald Fitzgerald QC asked Bill Gunn (1920-2001) for changed terms of reference. Gunn did not hesitate. A lawyer more eminent than OK, or even Jackie, remarked: “There are no terms of reference. Nor should there be.” I fear the public’s verdict on this corruption inquiry will not be kind to OK or Jackie.

Don’tcha just love it when the herps get on their high horsie? Sydney barristers who wore horsie hair on their heads saw no incongruity in damning their colleague Peter Livesey (seen here) for wearing his hair long. And in the Court of Criminal Appeal, Justice Raymond George Reynolds said of Livesey in 1982: “This young man has no concept of the ‘noblesse of the robe’, the collegiate pride of a learned profession.”

Profession? It can be argued that the common law has been a business since lawyers and judges formed a cartel to maximise their profits 800 years ago.

Learned? You could probably count on the hand of Mafia boss Tommy (Three-Finger Brown) Lucchese the number of lawyers, academic and working, who can tell you when the adversary system began.

Nobility? Adversarial ethics give trial lawyers a “sacred duty” to do whatever it takes to get the best result for the client, e.g. “destroying” child victims of sex crimes, blackmail (Henry Brougham), and conspiracy to murder (James Giffard).

By comparison, Mr Livesey’s view of his sacred duty – letting a client use his own money to get bail – seems quite mild, but he was warned off the course proper for it in 1982, and since then has lived in relative poverty. He would now like to get his ticket back. Only terminal hypocrisy could prevent its prompt return.

And don’tcha just love it when the reptiles drop into the Marty Feldman crouch to salute visiting mini-celebs? The splash in Rupert’s Big A on Tuesday, March 28 was:
“Tony Blair gives lesson on leadership”

The reference, in case you sensibly slept through the event, was to a little lecture read to the colonial Parliament by a sanctimonious herp, Anthony Charles Lynton (The Stuffed Man*) Blair, 52, PM of the nanny country since 1997. Like George Bush, the hollow man relies on meaningless high order abstractions to gull the gullible. He said in the war on “terrorism”, the battle of “values” is about promoting “democracy”, “the rule of law”, “justice”, blah, blah.

Leadership? Some questions the reps, not to mention K. Christian (Lardgutz) Beazley, 57, unaccountably did not ask: “Um, Prime Minister, on the rule of law, is that the one you broke when you invaded Iraq ? And if you crave justice, what are your chances of ending up, like Slobbo, in The Hague?” Or, come to that, the Old Bailey?

Under the Honours (Prevention of Abuses) Act of 1925, the Met’s Messrs Plod are investigating possible criminal offences by elements of the ruling parties. I append some data for no better reason than that money is interesting to everybody, even lawyers.

The Act came into being because a pair of organised criminals, Liberal PM (1916-22) D. Lloyd (The Welsh Wizard) George (pic) and his bagman, A. Maundy (Thursday) Gregory, sold gongs to all comers at whatever price the traffic would bear.

John Lidstone said in his 1998 Churchill Society Lecture on cash for honours that multiplying by 100 gives rough recent values. I add our approximate current values.

Orders of the British Empire (thoughtfully invented by the Wizard in 1917) went for about £100 ($25,000). By 1922, Lloyd George had dished out 25,000 OBEs. Others:
Knighthood: £10,000-£15,000 ($2.5 million-$3.75 million).
Baronetcy: from £25,000 ($6.25 million).
Barony: £30,000-£50,000 ($7.5 million-$12.5 million).
Viscountcy: £80,00-£120,000 ($20 million-$30 million).

Lloyd George decently gave the Libs some of the proceeds, but kept an estimated £1.5 million ($375 million) for himself. Maundy got a flat £30,000 a year ($7.5 million; $37.5 million over five years).

For the look of it, Maundy got six months and a fine of £50 ($12,500) in 1933, but Lloyd George was not charged.

Maundy remains the only person charged under the 1925 Act; Lloyd George even got an earldom. So, if modern Labour and Tory politicians, e.g. La Thatcher, did sell gongs, they will probably be OK, and can look forward to their own peerages.

Colonial politicians of criminal bent got a share of the gong action, but only up to the knightage, otherwise the House of Lords would have to sit in Wembley Stadium.

Bob Askin, NSW Premier 1965-75, sometimes acted as his own bagman. “Sir” Peter Abeles (Kt 1972) got his knighthood by losing generously to Askin in a poker game, and admitted as much to your correspondent in 1973.

On the other hand, Sir Warwick Fairfax (Kt 1967) – seen here – who rightly but unsuccessfully ordered my dismissal in 1975 for my abject failure to hew to his line that Pig-Iron Bob’s invasion of Vietnam was a really good idea, stood me a lunch at Primo’s in 1983 for, as far as I could see, the sole purpose of assuring me that when he accepted the accolade he had no idea Askin was corrupt.

“Sir” Johannes Bjelke-Petersen spent two years from 1984 seeking a peerage but did not get one, perhaps because even the Brits draw the line somewhere, or because that notorious skinflint baulked at the prices.

Some may recall the account (Justinian November 2, 2005) of my frolics with Dr Bert Wainer (1928-86) as he sought to show the sodden and sinister Sir Arthur Rylah something the Monk and Jackie might profitably take on board: bad laws make bad cops.

SBS will show John Moore’s documentary, Abortion, Corruption and Cops – The Bertram Wainer Story on Thursday, April 6 at 8.30 pm.
* We are the hollow men
We are the stuffed men
Leaning together
Headpiece filled with [Jack] straw
T.S. Eliot The Hollow Men (1925).

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