Richard Boyle was an employee of the ATO who became a whistle blower against this corrupt corporation and has since been fighting an 8 year long battle against their insidious efforts to have him prosecuted.
On 11 November 2024, just 2 days ago, Richard Boyle, with his wife in support, came to the District Court to appear at a hearing to determine the future direction of the ATO’s case against him. He later spoke to a crowd of well-wishers.
Richard Boyle was an employed in debt recovery with the ATO when in 2017 he approached upper management to report that tax payers were having their wages illegally garnished, without any notice, to pay back tax commitments that were assessed by the ATO alone and without any consultation with the tax payer. It was only when management ignored him that he went to the media. This was every bit as bad as the long-standing Robodebt scandal. Between the abuse reported by Richard and Robodebt the ATO stole $billions from tax payers, ruined businesses, ruined lives and drove people to suicide.
The courts have declared he did the right thing but that hasn’t stopped the government from prosecuting him for what are largely technicalities of copying private tax documents and tax file numbers. But without basic evidence like this how can anyone prove there has been a violation. I’m sure the people who had their documents copied would be more than happy if it meant they avoided, what were for some, live changing debts.
The Attorney General, Mark Dreyfuss, has it within his power to stop this persecution but remains silent. He was responsible for drafting the Public Interest Disclosure Act 2013, and he has stated for the record he is very proud of it, yet he doesn’t think it needs to protect the only whistle blower who has appealed to its provisions.
The ‘Green Left’ published an article on 3 September 2024 about Mark Dreyfuss and his whistle blower legislation, ‘Mark Dreyfus talks about protection but allows whistleblowers to be prosecuted’
On 11 November 2024, just 2 days ago, Richard Boyle, with his wife in support, came to the District Court to appear at a hearing to determine when his case would go to trial. One person who attended this public hearing commented that the Judge showed obvious frustration with the prosecution that the matter had taken so long to come to trial.
The prosecution wanted a hearing to be held sometime in November 2025, after the obligatory Pre-Trial Conference. This is 1 year away! On the other hand Richard wanted the hearing by March 2025. This hearing was very short after which Richard and his wife joined a crowd of some 70 supporters on the lawns of Victoria Square in front of the courts.
The ABC’s report gave a short account of what transpired.
He did not speak of his case but spoke in general terms about the massive failings of the ATO and how a criminal cabal works within it. Nevertheless he emphatically states that by far the majority of ATO employees are good people but must work within the system.
He spoke of ATO administrators, in a different case they were prosecuting, going to the home of one person, after hours, to warn him they had imprisoned one person and we could do the same to him.
Another business owner was Jae Jang, who came from South Korea to create a beverage company that ran fowl of the ATO in a dispute over how to classify various wines, fortified wines and other alcoholic products that attract different tax rates. The ATO hounded him until he was forced to move his business to New Zealand. When, at a later time he returned to Australia he was immediately arrested at the airport. His sister mortgaged her home to help finance his legal costs so the ATO came after her. They eventually took her house. Tragically she took her life when she jumped from a 22 storey building, in view of her mother.
From his speech in Victoria Square, Richard will travel to Sydney to speak on this issue again and then off to Tasmania. He says Tasmania is a very dark place. The massive long term abuse that has happened since the 1960’s at the Ashley Youth Detention Centre is grim testimony of that. Despite, many $million’s paid in settlements to abuse victims and another 90 victims coming forward the Tasmanian government constantly delays closing the facility.
The Commission of enquiry delivered a report of some 3,000 pages and in a single line it states, that victims were often taken off-site to be abused. Richard says that sounds like a paedophile ring.
The ABC gave a report on the Ashley Youth Detention Centre
Richard asked a simple question of his audience; do we want mass governmental child abuse to continue? No; well then we all need to get involved.
Richard says he is tired and unwell due to the stress over such a long time but knows the fight must go on however he is calling out for supporters.
Anyone wishing to contact Richard can do so via X
https://x.com/Richard_D_Boyle
His post in regard to this most recent court hearing can be found here;
https://x.com/Richard_D_Boyle/status/1852824141558374841
By Mark Nielsen 13 November 2024