Lieutenant Colonel Greg Garde and the Victorian Administrative Appeals Tribunal.
By 1987 I had paid out AGC and MCL Finance was first mortgagee of my Woodleigh Heights land. Because of the overt fraud of the Council as detailed in Chapter 8 I was in default with MCL and MCL had engaged the solicitor Mr John Norman Price of Gair and Brahe to act in relation to my default, Price was fully aware of all of the circumstances to date as my solicitor and I had attended at Price’s office on several occasions to discuss the matter in detail and I had also personally kept him fully informed by telephone.
Late in 1987 I became aware that on 21st October 1987 WHRD had been refused a planning permit to use some of their allotments for ordinary residential use and consequently were intending to appeal. I saw this as an opportunity to force the issue and decided to make a submission to the Administrative Appeals Tribunal as to the unlawful nature of the water supply agreement and the apparently fraudulent use to which it had been put and in knowledge of which the Tribunal could not uphold the appeal and order the issue of Planning Permits where unsuspecting purchasers could not be assured of a lawful water supply.
At that time the fact of and the facts of the private reticulated water supply remained concealed from me and my purpose was to have the Tribunal recognise the unlawful and fraudulent nature of the 1982 water supply and Water Supply Agreement and to order that it be transferred to the Body Corporate.
I fully informed Price of my intention. Shortly afterwards I received in the mail a writ or summons seeking that the Court give possession of my land to MCL, the envelope was addressed to the registered address of my Trustee Company, Woodleigh Heights Marketing Pty Ltd and it had done a couple of rounds of redirection before I received it. The date of postage was important because of the rules of service which allow one day in the ordinary course of the mail, the envelope was clearly postmarked Friday 11th December 1987 so notwithstanding that I did not receive it until sometime later at law it was served on me on Monday 14th December 1987 after which I had ten days to file a Notice of Appearance with the Court and this ten days took the allowed time into the Court’s Christmas recess during which period time is said to stand still so I actually had until mid January 1988 to file my Notice. I nevertheless acted urgently and attended the Court on Wednesday 23rd December to file my Notice only to be told that Judgment had been entered on Tuesday 22nd December. On the face of it this was not possible so the Clerk checked the file and provided me with an Affidavit sworn by John Norman Price on 22nd December 1987 and which said;
I John Norman Price …. MAKE OATH AND SAY – ….. THAT I did at 5.00 p.m. on Wednesday the 9th December 1987 serve the above defendant …. with a true copy of a Writ of Summons ….. “
This affidavit enabled John Norman Price to obtain Judgement in default of my appearance and before he was lawfully entitled to judgment. The Clerk gave me a copy.
On the face of it Price had sworn a false affidavit. The postmark was very clear and it was not mailed on the 9th December as sworn by him, it was in fact mailed on 11th December 1987 which is two days later than that sworn by Price. My then solicitor Peter Neville demanded explanation from Price. Price telephoned my solicitor who made handwritten file note of the conversation, the file note records that John Price says that maybe the franking machine had been turned over, that he went to 367 Collins Street and posted it himself and that he put a note to this effect on the letter on file, and he asked what are we going to do?
I did not believe this garbage so I took my camera and went to the Post office at 367 Collins Street, photographed it generally inside for record and noted a sign which said that franked mail had to be bundled, i.e. franked mail is specially handled, I asked to speak to the Post Master who identified himself as Mr. Brian Sheehan and I asked him about the possibility of franked mail having an incorrect postage or franked date, I copied his answer down verbatim, he said, “if the franked date says 11/12 that was the day it was posted, I don’t care what any document inside says, the date on the envelope is the day it was posted and that’s the end of it.”
I also spoke with a mail assistant who identified herself as Debbie Morris, she said; “We check the date and alter in red if incorrect”. I wrote her words down verbatim as well.
The very strong evidence indicates that Price swore a false affidavit. As detailed below I subsequently made this allegation and others to the Law Institute of Victoria.
So, Price had obtained a Supreme Court Order giving possession of my land to MCL. On this same day, Wednesday 23rd December 1987, I learned that Price was also solicitor for my and MCL’s nemesis, WHRD, and Price was acting for WHRD in respect to the Administrative Appeal. An obvious conflict of interest which he concealed from me and probably MCL when I was providing him information on the conduct of his other client, WHRD and in the circumstances I suspected an ulterior motive. I contacted John Price and he refused to either confirm or deny that he was acting for WHRD. I told price I would not communicate further with him regarding WHRD.
I complained loudly to MCL and after an initial meeting with Mr. Des Smyth of MCL my solicitor and I met with Mr. Des Smyth of MCL and John Price in late January 1988, at this meeting MCL and John Norman price were made completely aware of all of the matters then known to me regarding the fraudulent Water Supply Agreement and the fraudulent conduct of Price’s other client WHRD and also the Conduct of the Council and Water Authority. At that meeting Price confirmed that he was acting for WHRD in a matter before the Administrative Appeals Tribunal and he told Des Smyth and myself that he intended to represent the interests of MCL and my land at that appeal.
I told Des Smyth and Price that there was an irreconcilable conflict of interest, he could not both represent the interests of MCL and WHRD and the reasons were obvious and that I intended to appear at the tribunal hearing and make relevant submissions in the interests of my land.
Price was thoroughly aware that the sole reason why I could not pay his client MCL was that my land had had been rendered useless and valueless by the overtly wrong, unconscionable, fraudulent and illegal conduct of his other client WHRD and the fraudulent implementation and effect of the overtly illegal Water Supply Agreement
By letter dated 26th February 1988, I advised Price, WHRD, the Council and the Administrative Appeals Tribunal of my intention to appear and make a submission. In that letter I set out complete details as to the unlawful nature of the Water Supply Agreement and the apparently fraudulent use to which it had been put, full details of which were already very well known to Price but most importantly it pointed out the self evident fact;
“Woodleigh Heights Resort Developments P/L cannot demonstrate to the tribunal that it can or will facilitate proper access to the Common Property and is unable to demonstrate that the land does have lawful access to water or other services and Woodleigh Heights cannot demonstrate to the tribunal that it will not use its control over the common property and water supply to obtain advantage for itself.”
At the appeal hearing held on 7th March 1988, the barrister, Lieutenant Colonel Greg Garde, appeared for WHRD and was instructed by Price who was also present. Ian Lonie appeared for the Council and Water Authority. It is not credible that Garde was not fully briefed on my intentions and on the content of my letter of 26th February. Ian Lonie also must have been aware.
At the hearing I sat at the Bar Table alongside Garde and I made my submission by reading my letter.
In his written submission dated 7th March 1988, Garde represented that I was a “former owner” and therefore of no standing and under colour of the office of barrister he further represented as a fact, rather than opinion, in bold capital letters, in his signed, written submission he said;
- “THE APPLICANT HAS THE BENEFIT OF ENFORECEABLE LEGAL AGREEMENTS WITH THE WATERWORKS TRUST FOR THE PROVISION OF WATER, AND THE SEWERAGE AUTHORITY FOR THE PROVISIONS OF SEWERAGE”
And for no good or relevant reason, other than to denigrate me personally and my submission, Garde’s written submission also said;
- In 1984, Supreme Court proceedings erupted between the 3 developers (vis Glenn and Cheryl Thompson, the appellant and Woodleigh Heights Marketing Pty. Ltd., the last of these three companies is under the control of a mortgagee)
This part of the submission of Garde was of no relevance to the Tribunal and out of context save for providing verisimilitude to the implied assertion that I was nothing more than a trouble maker, however this submission is relevant to Price’s conduct because the proceeding referred to was where as a consequence of the fraudulent implementation of the Water Supply Agreement I sued for specific performance of the contracts of sale with WHRD, the fact known to Price was that the proceedings did not erupt, they occurred as a direct consequence of the fraudulent implementation of the fraudulent Water Supply Agreement and the further fact is that MCL and its lawyers were intimately involved in that proceeding and fully aware of all aspects and with the knowledge of MCL’s lawyers an employee of MCL gave evidence as to my indebtedness to MCL so that I could demonstrate my ability to perform under the contracts which his Client WHRD had defaulted upon. This is a clear example of dishonest intentional misrepresentation and obfuscation to the Court which Garde is an accomplished Master at. They knew I was coming to the Tribunal to tell the truth, Garde and Price wished to assert their lies.
Also at the hearing, representing the Council and Water Authority, was Mr Ian Lonie, who, as intimated above and detailed below, had already misadvised the Minister for Water in relation to the Water Supply Agreement. Lonie told the Tribunal that “Mr. Thompson has been everywhere with his allegations” and implied that my assertions were false or of no substance.
I will address Lonie’s full submission shortly but first of all it is clear that Garde deliberately misled the Tribunal. It is inconceivable that Price had not fully briefed Garde and had given him a copy of my intended submissions to the Tribunal. We know that Garde was aware that his client, WHRD, was a private company and not the Body Corporate of the cluster subdivision, we also know that he was aware that the subdivision was a cluster subdivision which has a Body Corporate which is responsible for all common property and has a duty to all allotment owners, we know he had read the Water Supply Agreement because he made strong, but false, representation on the legality of it, we are also confident he read s307AA of the Water Act because that is the only source of legitimacy for the Water Supply Agreement. So now we’ll see what Garde knew when he made his assertion.
The agreement states that it is between the Kyneton Shire Waterworks Trust and “Woodleigh Heights Resort Development Pty. Ltd. Of 68 Piper Street Kyneton owner or occupier of ALL THAT piece of land … .. being the whole of the land described in cluster plan of subdivision No 1134” (my emphasis)
Now straight away we know that Price and Garde knew well that the description of WHRD was simply false. First of all of course WHRD is manifestly not the Body Corporate and therefore never could be either owner or occupier of the common property. Secondly Price had just taken possession of my land, he was absolutely intimately aware that WHRD were not and never had been either owner or occupier of my land so straight away Garde was thoroughly aware that the very fundamental premise of the Water Supply Agreement was wrong at best and probably fraudulently wrong as well as fraudulent in its effect as asserted by me and known to price.
So now we’ll consider the Water Act 1958. S307AA(2) of the water act states; “An Authority may enter into an agreement with the owner of any land providing for the supply of water to such land .. ..“ (my emphasis)
So the Water Authority can enter into an agreement with “the owner”, there is no provision at all for an Agreement with “the occupier” so straight off , the Agreement defines WHRD as “owner or occupier” so even if hypothetically WHRD was the occupier of my land and the common property the Agreement is from its own words without authority of law.
The agreement goes on to say at clause 1. “the Trust shall supply to the consumer and the consumer shall take from the Trust water for domestic purposes on the said land ……”
My land is part of “the said land” which is defined in the agreement as the whole of the land described in cluster plan CS1134. This agreement therefore is expressly by its very terms an agreement between the Authority and WHRD for a water supply to my land and the common property pursuant to which WHRD control or own the water supply to my land and the common property. Forget the Water Act a or any other damn Act, nothing in this democratic country will or can render that agreement lawful as dishonestly asserted by Garde under instruction from Price.
We know that Price was thoroughly aware of the fraudulent effect of the Water Supply Agreement because that was the sole reason I was in default with MCL and the sole reason why Price was able to take possession of my land and he was completely and absolutely informed of those reasons. Price must have briefed Garde on these facts. Not only did Price and Garde know the agreement was illegal, they knew it to have been put to fraudulent purpose, namely to purport to give lawful control if not ownership of the common property reticulation system and water therein to WHRD and thereby purport to lawfully deny me access to my common property and water therein.
I say that the strong evidence is that under instruction from Price Garde knew well that he was deliberately and consciously misleading the Tribunal in relation to the legality of the Water Agreement. He did not make his assertion carelessly and recklessly , it was made for the calculated purpose of countering my truthful submission which stated that the agreement enabled WHRD to usurp control of the common property.
I say that there is no possible grounds for a belief by either Price or Garde as to Garde’s assertion, it was not a submission for adjudication by the Tribunal, Garde made his assertion as a Statement of fact and the Tribunal accepted it. Lonie stayed silent.
There was absolutely no benefit or reason for MCL to take possession of my land, it was vacant unoccupied land, there were no rents to receive and there was no need to take possession to exercise a mortgagees power of sale. The only benefit accrued to Price’s other client, WHRD, because the consequence of MCL taking possession was that Garde was able to represent that I had no standing at the Tribunal hearing. There was of course benefit to Price’s pocket at the expense of mine or MCL’s. On the face of it Garde’s submission was in direct reply and purposeful contradiction of what he surely knew my proposed submission to be, it was set out in my letter to Price. Assuming Garde had been retained to advise and appear in late 1987 the probability is that Garde advised Price to take possession of my land so that he could make submissions as he did.
The written submission presented and signed by Ian Lonie on behalf of the Council and Water Authority, in presently pertinent part, said; (with interposed comment by me) (Lonie’s submission is further discussed further below)
“The cluster subdivision has been developed by Woodleigh Heights as a timeshare resort in the late 1979’s and early 1980’s”
“Woodleigh Heights” is a reference to WHRD which was not even incorporated until March 1981 and did not begin development of the timeshare resort till well after that. .
The subdivision was initially developed and marketed as a Rural Residential cluster subdivision.
“The Council has adopted a policy or guidelines regulating the size of subdivisional allotments in different areas under its control. That policy as applied to the subject land provides for a minimum allotment size of 3 acres (with reticulated water) and 6 acres (without reticulated water)”
The lot density at Woodleigh Heights was one allotment per 3 acres so under the policy it could not be subdivided without a “reticulated water supply” and in this case it was a private one.
“… there was an application for the cluster subdivision of the land into 45 allotments (of 2 acres each) having an overall lot density of 1 allotment per 3 acres. One of the conditions of that development required water to be provided by a large on-site dam and internal reticulation.”
Lonie accurately describes the private “reticulated water supply” and that it was a condition of the Planning Permit.
“By an agreement on the 1st January 1982 the then shire of Kyneton Waterworks Trust entered into an agreement with Woodleigh Heights under which ….. the Waterworks Trust …. subject to the Water Act 1958 …… supply to Woodleigh Heights and that the Company would take ….. water for domestic purposes.”
The Water Authority entered into a Water Supply Agreement with a private company and which agreement was carefully and illegally intended to purport to give lawful control of the essential service, water, within the cluster subdivision to that private company and the Agreement was unlawful for many Reasons including that it required the approval of the Governor in Council and that approval was neither sought not given. In addition it provided for supply of water to land not owned by WHRD and therefore was not permitted under the Water Act and other reasons including its fraudulent intent and effect.
“The intention of the Waterworks Trust ….. at the time the agreements were entered into was that the agreements were to deal only with Woodleigh Heights for the purpose of assisting a decentralised industry, namely, the tourist resort.”
This accurately sets out the unlawful intent of each of the parties to the Agreement; it was dishonestly intended to purport to give lawful control and ownership of the water supply and reticulation system within CS1134 to WHRD to the exclusion of all present and possible future land owners within the cluster subdivision other than WHRD. For this specific and illegal purpose the agreement was between WHRD and the Water Authority and not the Body Corporate and WHRD.
“It is to be noted that under the agreements the Company was responsible for the construction of internal reticulation, so the mains only connect to the land and the internal reticulation is not controlled or operated by the Board.”
Thereby dishonestly facilitating the dishonest representations that WHRD owned and operate the reticulation system which was in fact entirely contained within the common property and was in fact the property of and responsibility of the Body Corporate.
Lonie omitted to submit to the Tribunal, the facts known to him, that the Water Supply Agreement fraudulently purported to give lawful control of the common property reticulation system to WHRD and it fraudulently purported to give lawful control of the water supply to allotments owned by other people to WHRD including the allotments which were the subject of the hearing and which were intended to be sold to other people and if the appeal succeeded could be sold to other people.
Not surprisingly, given the level of orchestrated corroboration and collaboration for the purpose of denigrating me and defeating my submissions the Tribunal disregarded the truth told to it by me and ordered the Council to issue the permits with water supply and sewerage as a condition but the reality was that due to the overt and calculated deception of Price, Garde, Lonie, WHRD, the Council and the Water Authority there remained no lawful means of providing those services.
By this time each of my original 10 allotments had been subdivided into three smaller allotments. About two years later MCL had been acquired by ESANDA and on 19th February 1990, Price sold all my land to Deckwood Pty Ltd for $7,500 per block. Deckwood Pty Ltd was a company controlled by the children of the CEO of the timeshare company operating the Woodleigh Heights Resort, Mr Kenneth Raymond Buchanan. . Price, ESANDA’s and WHRD’s solicitor, did not advertise the land for sale. He did not have an auction and he made no attempt whatsoever to maximise the sale price. Price merely sold it by private treaty to associates of his client WHRD. The $7,500 per block was about one quarter the value of the land compared to if it had a water supply available to it. Immediately the land became owned by Deckwood, water was made available to it and about six weeks after that, Deckwood was making a tidy profit by selling the allotments to a related company, Petite Pty Ltd, for $12,500 per block. On the same day that Petite Pty Ltd purchased the allotments, it applied to the Registrar of Titles to have each allotment divided into 102 share interests for timeshares. Petite Pty Ltd then leased each allotment on a 99 year lease to Club Kirribilli Limited, in whose hands each such share interest was worth several thousand dollars each as timeshares at what is now, Kyneton Bushland Resort. Each of Deckwood Pty Ltd, Petite Pty ltd and Club Kirribilli were Buchanan companies, as was WHRD when the Water Supply Agreement was entered into.
I was completely unaware of this sale until the Shire Secretary, David Parkinson, of all people! telephoned me and told me that the Council had received a Notice of Aquisition and my land had been sold to Deckwood for $135,000. Naturally enough I was a little annoyed at this turn of events and doubly annoyed because the crooked rates related to the Woodleigh Heights land would have been paid to the Council out of the sale proceeds.
I then made some rather loud complaints to Esanda, who by that time had taken over MCL. My complaint essentially detailed the facts set out above but particularly detailed the conduct of Price and Garde. In an effort to justify itself Esanda then provided me with a Letter of Valuation which it had obtained. This letter dated 12th October 1988 (some months after the tribunal hearing and decision) from property valuer G.D. Sutherland Pty. Ltd said;
“It is our opinion noting the complications of services … …. a realisable value of individual allotments under forced sale conditions is in the range of $5,000 to $6,000 per lot.”
“You will appreciate that that the problems associated with the provision of services is extensive and at this stage possibly unsolvable. This will obviously have an effect on value”
As at the date of the Sutherland letter the Decision of the Tribunal had been made and it ordered that residential permits for WHRD’s 34 lots be issued. While this provided a precedent for the issue of such permits in relation to my land the problem that there was no access to lawful provided services for my land remained.
This problem was also true in relation to the allotments of WHRD in respect of which permits had issued and the probability was that as a consequence of the Tribunal orders unsuspecting purchasers had unwittingly purchased land which was fundamentally deficient in that there was no lawful provision of services to their land.
These situations existed completely as a consequence of the fact that Price, Garde and Lonie had overtly misled the Tribunal and concealed and denied the fact known to them that the Water Supply Agreement was unlawful and the fact that they overtly cooperated with one another to denigrate me and make wrong my truthful submission.
So, rather than soothe my soul the G. D. Sutherland letter caused me to complain even louder to Esanda and I had a number of meetings with its top executives and eventually Esanda agreed to once again retain G.D. Sutherland for the purpose of doing a revaluation as at 12th October 1988 and to more fully explain the reasons for the earlier valuation and the source of the information they relied on.
G. D. Sutherland then provided a complete Valuation Report dated 17th March 1992, in pertinent parts this report states; (with some comment by me interposed)
“Water/Sewerage – The Kyneton Water Board advises that water and sewer are available at the entrance of the estate in Melville Drive. Internal reticulation is the responsibility of the land owner, and a substantial network has been installed by Woodleigh Heights Marketing Pty. Ltd. And its associated companies ……”
Woodleigh Heights marketing Pty Ltd was my trustee company and the registered owner of the lots Sutherland was valuing. G.D. Sutherland confused my trustee with WHRD. Further comment below.
“This system remains under the control of the operating company and has not vested in the Water Board. Any individual land owner would subsequently be required to negotiate with this company in order to obtain these services via the reticulation system currently installed. A contribution to the cost of this scheme would therefore undoubtedly be necessary but cannot be accurately determined as no ‘standard levy’ applies and would result from direct negotiation”
“Please note that the above conclusions have been reached from discussion with the Kyneton Water Board, and we have relied on their advice in making our assessment”
“Our investigations indicate that each allotment is capable of being developed for residential purposes with an A.A.T. decision in March 1988 allowing the erection of a dwelling on other lots within the estate establishing a valid precedent. In order to obtain this approval however, it would be necessary to connect any dwelling to a reticulated water supply and sewerage disposal system, and although these systems are available within the estate they are not under the control of the local Water Board. Any purchaser would therefore be required to negotiate with the private developer for connection rights to these systems, with inherent uncertainty over both permission being granted and the cost involved.”
“The price obtainable for the subject allotments is obviously influenced by this uncertainty, and must be discounted for the likely cost involved in connection to services.”
G. D. Sutherland confirmed their 1988 Valuation. The comments by G.D. were comments of the situation as it stood in 1992 and at all times since the Tribunal was misled by all of the aforementioned individuals.
The situation very clearly described by G. D. Sutherland is exactly as I had submitted to the Tribunal the situation would be and so the valuation by G. D. Sutherland reflected the consequences of the misrepresentations to the Tribunal by Price, Garde and Lonie.
Following further agitation from myself, in 1995 Esanda retained two further valuers and on this occasion although retained by Esanda the valuers were jointly instructed by Esanda and I and the assumption to be taken by the valuers was that required service were available and to be valued as at 1989 when Price sold my land.
The first of these valuations by O’Briens Valuers and Property Consultants had an inspection date of May 17th 1995, the second by A.T. Cocks is dated 5th June 1995. Of great significance is that this O’Briens report states;
“At about the dated of our assessment the existing time-share development was supplied by water and sewerage facilities. These services were provided to the development by the then relevant authority being the Kyneton Water Board pursuant to agreements between Woodleigh Heights Resort Developments Pty. Ltd. And the Water Board. Briefly the Kyneton Water Board operates and maintains the water main along Edgecombe Rd to Melville Drive while the internal reticulation system was the responsibility of the developer.”
In other words the unlawful Water Supply Agreement was still in place and all because of the corrupt misrepresentations of Price, Garde, Lonie and crew. Of further significance is that neither valuer could locate a relevant sale of any of the allotments within the Cluster Subdivision except for a bulk sale of some 22 allotments from WHRD to two related companies in October 1989 at $18,000 each but it was noted that these allotments were not serviced by water. It is within my personal knowledge that these purchasers were Director related to WHRD so a reasonable assumption is that these Directors did not sacrifice the welfare of their personal companies by paying a high price, the greater probability is that they paid what they considered to be reasonable market or a low price and probably discounted for bulk purchase and the cost of obtaining services. .
In any event the valuation provided by O’Briens before discounts was $366,500 and by A. T. Cocks $431,500, both far in excess of the $135,000 obtained by price when he sold to Deckwood.
I merely hypothesise that the dearth of sales may be due to the problems identified by myself and G. D. Sutherland. WHRD hoisted on their own petard so to speak.
I am a mere layperson but one doesn’t need legal training to recognise fraud, perjury, lies, and things which are an affront to conscience and must be an affront to the law. The things in consideration here are not fine esoteric things they are fundamentally and overtly outrageous and repugnant to a reasonable mind. Each one of the individuals who made submissions to the tribunal must have been aware that they were overtly misleading the tribunal and they were doing so for various ulterior and dishonest motives. It is simply not credible that Price, Garde and Lonie were not aware of the fact of and foreseeable consequence of their overt misrepresentations. I say that each one of them individually and collectively, deliberately and carefully contrived and cooperated to deceive the tribunal and they did and as a consequence of their deception the situation described by G. D. Sutherland was the predictable result and was accurately described and predicted by me in my letter of 26th February 1988 as submitted to the Tribunal but corruptly countered by Garde under instruction from Price.
I point out that this is not rocket science, WHRD was a private company, Woodleigh Heights is a cluster subdivision with a Body Corporate which by law is responsible for all common property including services and all facilities within the common property areas. Each of these “learned” lawyers was fully aware of these things and also fully aware that the Water Supply Agreement fraudulently purported to give that lawful control and responsibility to WHRD. My submission correctly asserted that WHRD had usurped that control and the Council and Water Authority gave currency to that seizure and fraudulently represented that water was not available to other landholders within the cluster subdivision.
Only an absolute nincompoop would not know such a thing to be offensive to law and morality. These Lawyers are not nincompoops, they are clever but simply outright dishonest. It matters not to what extent Garde had been briefed by Price, adequate of the facts were squarely before the tribunal and known to Garde. WHRD is a private company, Woodleigh Heights Estate, registered Cluster Plan No CS1134 is a cluster subdivision. Nothing more is needed. WHRD cannot control the services. Garde and Lonie were thoroughly aware of all of the implications of the submissions made but these things passed over the heads of the Tribunal Members and the direct attack on my submissions caused the Tribunal to disregard the true and predictable and subsequently proven implications which were stated outright by me.
On the face of it Price and Lonie at least, if not Garde made their respective submissions to fraudulently conceal and deny the fact of the fraud which had been perpetrated against me for years by their respective clients and they did so most successfully and Price and Lonie did so for the corrupt purpose of dishonestly obtaining a decision of the Tribunal in favour of their corrupt client WHRD. Price and Lonie had been involved for a long period of time., Lonie in particular was intimately involved for years, their submissions were calculated to conceal and deny the obvious fact that the Water Supply Agreement was unlawful and would inevitably lead to the circumstance described by me in my submission and subsequently described by G. D. Sutherland.
The then Lieutenant Colonel Greg Garde, barrister, made his submission under colour of office of barrister and Lonie that of a solicitor, officers of the Court, I was merely a layperson deliberately, cooperatively and purposely portrayed by Garde and Lonie as being unreasonably disgruntled and even that was a calculated misrepresentation to the Tribunal.
From the material in this part I conclude that Lonie, Price and “The Honourable” Justice Greg Garde AO RFD QC, President of VCAT as he now is conspired with one another to mislead the self same organisation which Garde is now president of, the AAT or VCAT as it now is. This does not instil confidence in the just administration of the VCAT or any Court where Garde may preside. More on “The Honourable” Justice Garde AO RFD QC later.
There are several outstanding truths associated with and coming from the Tribunal Hearing;
The entire purpose of Garde, under instruction from Price, represented that the Water Supply Agreement was lawful and enforceable was so that Garde could submit/demonstrate to the Tribunal that his client WHRD should be able to sell its land as useable residential land complete with a lawful water supply, i.e. that the Water provided pursuant to that Water Supply Agreement was lawfully available to land not owned by WHRD. If price believed that to be true why then did he sell my land at a price which reflected no water supply? I say that the answer to that is simple, Price knew full well that the Water Supply Agreement was unlawful and he was not prepared to advertise it with water. In addition, as we now know G. D. Sutherland valuation letter of 12 October 1988 gave a value without services, why then did Price not forcefully say that the valuation was wrong? Again I say Price knew full well that Garde’s submissions were false. In addition Price himself had just set a precedent in the Tribunal, why did he not try to maximise the value of my land by applying to the Council for a residential use permit for my land? Once again the answer is that price knew Garde’s submissions were false and he was not prepared to advertise my land as having lawful access to water.
Lonie had a duty to do the best for his clients on the facts. Lonie was demonstrably absolutely aware that his client on the day, the Water Authority, had represented that water was not available to my land because there was no agreement between myself and the Water Authority or between the Body Corporate and the Water Authority. The Water Supply Agreement was manifestly unlawful for a number of reasons submitted by me, not the least of which was that it purported to give lawful control of the water and reticulation system which was common property owned by the Body Corporate to WHRD, in addition the mere notion of a private entity having control of an essential service to someone else’s property let alone an entire cluster subdivision is an affront to all sense of morality let alone the law. Lonie had a duty to put the truth and win on the day for his client and that truth known to Ian Lonie was that the Water Supply Agreement was unlawful and WHRD could not lawfully provide water to any prospective purchasers of its allotments. Had he done so he would have won the day for his clients but he did not and he could not without demonstrating that his earlier advice to the Minister for Water and to my solicitor was at best misleading if not outright deceptive and his clients had indulged in fraud for years. He was between a rock and a hard place and both were dishonest.
As a consequence of the deliberately and carefully false and misleading submissions of Garde and Lonie to the Tribunal under instruction from John Norman Price, WHRD, the Council and the Water Authority the Tribunal unwittingly made orders whereby the Council was ordered to issue residential permits facilitating the sale of those allotments to third parties in the complete absence of a lawful water supply to those allotments.
Back to John Norman Price’s Affidavit. By fax of 8th January 1991 I filed a complaint against Price with the Law Institute of Victoria, the principal allegations were (a) that Price had sworn a false affidavit and obtained a Judgment based on that false Affidavit and (b) that Price had an obvious conflict of interest in that he could not and did not represent the interests of MCL when he acted for WHRD. In support of my allegations I provided the evidence as to the false affidavit and a copy of an extensive letter dated 11th July 1988 which I had provided to MCL and which detailed Price’s conduct at the Administrative Appeals Tribunal.
In reply the clever little Law Institute noted that there was no conflict of interest because there was no solicitor/client relationship between Price and myself, well of course there wasn’t and that was not my allegation, the LIV sidestepped the issue by misstating the issue. My assertion was a conflict of interest between MCL and WHRD and I was demonstrated correct. In relation to the false affidavit the Law Institute said that there was my version of events and Price’s version of events, well the fact is there was not two versions, there was the hard documentary evidence versus Price’s version so again the LIV sidestepped the issue by misstatement. The reply from the LIV included a copy of a letter from David Brahe of Gair and Brahe which stated that Price had a file note saying the writ was posted on 9/12/87 at 5.00pm and that the writ was posted late in the day and Price can only conclude that the receptionist having readjusted the date (of the franking machine) readjusted again but incorrectly. Price’s explanation to my solicitor was that he had personally franked the envelope and personally delivered it to the post office, did he not check to see that the franking machine had in fact embossed the envelope and well, notice the date which is critical to the issue of the lawful date of service. I personally don’t buy it, solicitors can and do retrospectively whip up file notes to accord with anything knowing full well that the corrupt brotherhood will support them.
In relation to the conflict of interest David Brahe said that both MCL and WHRD confirmed that Price could act for WHRD however David Brahe omits to say as to whether or not MCL were aware that Price intended to represent that the fraudulent Water Supply Agreement was lawful and enforceable and the illegality of that agreement was one of the precise issues asserted by me when I met with MCL and Price and when price asserted he was going to act in the interest of MCL and the Land at the tribunal hearing. David Brahe sidestepped the issue that Price had manifestly not acted in the interest of either MCL or the land and he had in fact acted to the specific detriment of MCL and the land by falsely representing me as a trouble maker and the Water Supply Agreement as lawful and enforceable.
Since that time Lieutenant Colonel Garde as he then was has become Major General Garde AO RFD QC, the highest ranking officer in the Australian Defence force reserves and he has been appointed a Justice of the Supreme Court of Victoria and also President of the Victorian Civil and Administrative Tribunal, the self same body which he misled in 1988 in respect to the Water Supply Agreement and as detailed above. At his swearing in ceremony as President of the VCAT on 26th June 2012 Garde said;
“I Gregory Howard Garde swear by almighty God that as the President of the Victorian Civil and Administrative Tribunal I shall at all times and in all things do equal justice to all persons and discharge the duties of my office according to law and to the best of my knowledge and ability without fear favour or affection”.
The oath was administered by the Chief Justice of the Supreme Court of Victoria.
A short while before making this Oath, as amply detailed above, Garde had also overtly misled the Supreme Court twice and then the Court of Appeal and knowingly and deliberately conspired with other lawyers of the same ilk to deceive the court for the purpose of obtaining wrongful judgments and securing manifest injustice; he also made oaths to the Supreme Court when becoming a solicitor and barrister.
In 1988 he squarely misled the very body in respect of which he now says “I shall at all times and in all things do equal justice to all persons”
An oath here, an oath there, everywhere an oath, — lip service for the gravy train.