AWB's application to the Federal Court for an order that the document entitled ‘Cole Inquiry – Draft Statement of Contrition – Andrew Lindberg’ should not be published by the Commission of Inquiry on the grounds of legal professional privilege has been dismissed.
Judge Young analysed the grounds on which legal privilege could be claimed as well as the powers of a Royal Commission. The issue of the effect of mistaken production of the document was not argued.
The judgment did not set out the contents of the document but the summary described its origins as follows:
The major impetus for the creation of
Exhibit 665 was advice that AWB obtained from Dr Peter Sandman, a crisis
management expert and public relations consultant, to the effect that AWB should
‘over-apologise’, sooner rather than later and via a statement by
its managing director, so as to deal with the reputational damage AWB had
sustained and was likely to sustain in future in connection with the Inquiry.
Exhibit 665 was drafted by Mr Lindberg, who was then the chief executive officer
of AWB, following a telephone conference that took place on 21 December 2005.
The participants in the telephone conference were Mr Lindberg, Dr Sandman, Mr
Zwier from Arnold Bloch Leibler (the solicitors for AWB) and a number of
employees of AWB. After the telephone conference, Mr Zwier provided written
advice to AWB in an email dated 23 December 2005. Mr Lindberg based his draft
very closely on the advice he had received from Mr Zwier.
After preparing
the draft statement of contrition, Mr Lindberg gave instructions for it to be
circulated by email to the persons who had participated in the telephone
conference of 21 December 2005. The draft was circulated in anticipation of
another telephone conference scheduled for Monday 2 January 2006.
The Inquiry has not yet published the document. There has been no indication of the effect of the judgment on other claims for privilege by AWB.
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Posted by: toryburch | January 21, 2011 at 03:53 PM