To: The Advocate
Sent: 21-8-1995

Hi, here - for what it’s worth - another “Devil’s Advocate” letter/column:

At a time when the denials were bandied about with the most reckless abandon, I penned a ‘limmewreck’ for uploading to the usenet’s alt.aus.politics newsgroup. It went like this:

“Plaint for a lyrebird”
It is clear that our Lady C.L.*
has decided the truth she won’t tell
come hell or high water
- or Penny’s own pater -
for the frypan’s still cooler than fire!
* For C.L. read ‘Consummate Lyre’

The upload failed - for a technical reason that I’d be happy to explain to would-be Internet surfies - and I left it at that. Perhaps just as well, for the High Court plaintiff might have seen fit to spend more of our tax dollars trying to wring blood from a stone, i.e. me, under the scurrilous defamation laws that still so firmly anchor our nation in the Middle Ages, as far as free speech and civil liberties are concerned...

Now that there appears to emerge some comprehension in her mind of the depth of the hole the good Labor lady has so arrogantly dug for herself, we taxpayers should perhaps approach her about an out-of-court (ouch!) settlement.

Simply put: we don’t hold her, ahem, ‘faulty recollection of the events at the time’ against her - after all, this is a common affliction among politicians. Nor do we wish to enter into a debate on the ethics of what, to her, must have ‘seemed like a good idea at the time’.

But we do wish to be reimbursed for the tax dollars she has so recklessly spent in her attempt to rewrite recent political history, or at least use the judiciary to block Court’s attempt to get his own back. If one assumes a modest $500,000 in costs, that would be a 3c refund for me and 17 million others, thank you very much. But perhaps we should await the Auditor-General’s assessment...

Once the legal bill has been repaid, whatever it was, perhaps by cashiering the ministerial pay packet , may I modestly suggest that the sum so redeemed for the public purse be spent on Aboriginal health services, an area of her portfolio the minister appears to have been neglecting somewhat during the political fracas.

And while we are on the subject of ministerial responsibility: the precedent that would be set by proceeding as suggested would stake out new claims for the concept of ministerial accountability. Perhaps our legal eagles could check out that territory? I would be happy to contribute my mite. After all, it would mean the end of demockracy [subs: correct] as we know it...