Emails and other material shows that Chris Winslow, The Greens candidate for the 2016 election for the federal seat of Greenway, conspired for financial gain with the Labor Party’s Marcus Priest in an attempt to bring down Dyson Heydon.
It is extremely obvious that politics is at work at the highest levels to bring down Dyson Heydon and that Bill Shorten and The Greens leader Richard Di Natale have plenty of questions to answer.
I had dealings with Marcus Priest during the period of 2007-2009 as he is a former political advisor for the former federal Labor Party attorney-general Robert McClelland. I spoke to Priest a couple of times during that period and he is a real crook. His email address at the time marcus.priest@ag.gov.au shows up quite a few times in my book on judicial corruption. (Click here to read more)
Background
There was a media report on the 13th August that Dyson Heydon would be giving a speech at a Liberal Party fundraiser. This was quickly found to be incorrect as Dyson Heydon had cancelled the speech and it was hardly a fundraiser anyhow. (Click here to read more) The Labor Party and the Unions jumped up and down and said this showed real bias and perceived bias.
The ACTU requested documents from Dyson Heydon regarding the cancelled speech. Heydon gave them the documents. Then a couple of days later the ACTU, representing some Unions, and 2 other Unions representing themselves filed an application for Dyson Heydon to recuse himself (stand down) from the position of Royal Commissioner. (Click here to read more)
The recusal application was heard on Friday the 21st of August 2015. Commissioner Heydon reserved his judgment. On Wednesday the 26th of August it was announced that Commissioner Heydon would hand down his judgment on Friday the 28th at 10am.
Then in Thursday’s edition of The Australian (27th August) it was reported how the whole perceived bias saga started. The Labor Party and the Unions said the new information suggested that there were possibly hidden documents that Heydon had not given them and they requested further documents. They also requested that the scheduled time for judgment be vacated so they could make further submissions. Further submissions were filed on Friday and the date for judgment is now 2pm Monday the 31st of August. (Click here to read more)
The new media report in The Australian
The media report on Thursday said:
“At 5.30pm on August 12, a staff member at the NSW Bar Association took a call from Marcus Priest, lawyer, journalist and a former senior adviser to opposition legal affairs spokesman Mark Dreyfus.”
“Chris Winslow, the association’s publications manager, had dealt with Priest when he was at The Australian Financial Review and also as a staffer to Dreyfus and former attorney-general Robert McClelland.”
“Priest asked Winslow about a bar association alert, put out in April, about the Sir Garfield Barwick lecture — the one that had Dyson Heydon, who was conducting the politically sensitive royal commission into trade unions, as its keynote speaker.”
“Priest expressed surprise that Heydon had agreed to speak at the event because of its connection to the Liberal Party and asked for a copy of the invitation.”
“Winslow sent an email to Priest, with the invitation attached, at 5.50pm.”
“However, as he headed home that evening, Winslow thought about the conversation and alarm bells rang. Was a story was about to appear in the media? Perhaps the lecture, which was due to have been given last night at the Castlereagh Hotel in Sydney, would be affected?”
“As an officer of the bar association, Winslow felt he had an obligation to inform the commission about a possible ambush. He emailed Jeremy Stoljar SC, the counsel assisting the royal commission, just after 7pm: “Re the Barwick lecture: Does Dyson know this is connected to the Liberal Party?””
“He received a reply almost immediately: “I’ll raise that with him.”” (Click here to read more)
And: “Winslow confirmed the sequence of events but declined to further comment. Priest also declined to comment.”
The report mentions that Chris Winslow is a Greens candidate at the end but it should be at the beginning as it puts the whole story in perspective.
The reality is that the new media report does not add much except to expose The Greens and the Labor Party’s dirty tricks but they are too stupid to realise it. It sounds like a bunch of lies by Winslow and was probably written by someone in The Greens party then given to The Australian.
Chris Winslow – Candidate for The Greens – Will he get a big fat union donation for his good work?
The Greens have been on song with the Labor Party and Unions calling the Trade Union Royal Commission a witch hunt and saying it should be closed down. Why?
Over the last few years The Greens have received massive donations from the Unions and take instructions from the Unions in relation to their policy and public statements regarding the Royal Commission. Chris Winslow would be well aware of this.
One example is Federal MP Adam Bandt who has been a regular recipient of Union donations.
“At the 2010 election the Victorian ETU donated $125,000 to Mr Bandt and $200,000 to Greens Senator Richard Di Natale’s campaign.” And at the 2013 election the ETU donated $300,000 to Mr Bandt. (Click here to read more)
And then there is the lazy $1,000,000 The Greens received from the National Tertiary Education Union before the 2013 federal election. (Click here to read more)
The Greens aren’t choosy and also received a $50,000 donation from the CFMEU for the 2013 election. (Click here to read more)
They’re just some examples of Union donations to The Greens. The point is when the Unions say “jump” The Greens say “How high” and without a doubt Mr Winslow has said “how high” the last few weeks.
Chris Winslow’s refusal to answer any further questions to The Australian shows says plenty.
How does Chris Winslow benefit financially?
Chris Winslow
Chris Winslow is a candidate for The Greens in the seat of Greenway at the next federal election and stands to benefit financially if he is elected. His chances of being elected would increase if the Royal Commission fails. If he is involved in helping bring down the Royal Commission he might also be rewarded by the Unions with large donations. Some questions that Mr Winslow should answer are:
- Other than Marcus Priest, who did he speak to before he sent the email to Jeremy Stoljar? Did he take advice or instructions from anyone in The Greens Party?
- Why didn’t he just phone Jeremy Stoljar? Was the purpose of the email to have a paper trail to possibly be used later?
- Has he been offered any donations from any Unions? If so when and by who. Does he intend approaching any Unions in the future for donations?
- Was he offered anything by Marcus Priest.
Marcus Priest
Marcus Priest needs to explain why he rang Chris Winslow and whether he was working for someone when he did as it was no accident. One thing’s for sure and that is either Marcus Priest or Chris Winslow leaked the story to the SMH on the 12th or 13th of August with the sole intention of undermining the Royal Commission.
Marcus Priest
Marcus Priest would be a hero in the Labor Party at the moment and he will be paid back at a later date with a cushy job somewhere as he has already had a couple. This would have been a huge motivating factor for Priest as he would have been thinking “I help destroy Heydon and I’ll get paid for it later”. Shows what a classy person Priest is.
As soon as the story broke on the 13th of August Mr Priest retweeted the below message on Twitter which gives a good indication what he was planning when he spoke to Chris Winslow.
Further Tweets and other aspects have been covered on Michael Smith’s site. (Click here and here to read more).
Bill Shorten, the Labor Party, Richard Di Natale and The Greens
Bill Shorten and Richard Di Natale have a lot of questions to answer regarding what they knew and when? What communication did they or other party members had with Marcus Priest and Chris Winslow? Did they or anyone in their partys help leak the stories to the media?
For me it is impossible to believe that Bill Shorten or Richard Di Natale only became aware of Chris Winslow’s and Marcus Priest’s involvement on Thursday (25/8/15). Are we to believe that Chris Winslow and Marcus Priest never said anything to anyone in their own parties about their conversation since the 12th of August? Then how did the SMH and The Australian get their stories and who from?
What has happened since the 12th has been carefully choreographed by the Labor Party and The Greens in an attempt to cause maximum damage to the Royal Commission.
It is interesting that there is clear perceived bias by both the people who lit the fuse on Heydon for perceived bias but both of them have done their best to conceale their own personal interest and also their financial interest.
The perceived bias application is frivolous and vexatious. For the Unions and Labor Party to waste time asking Dyson Heydon to quite for a speech he never gave is a disgrace. But they are desperate to conceal their corruption.
If every media story ran with the fact that Chris Winslow is a Greens candidate and that Marcus Priest is nothing more than a Labor Party troll then the story would quickly die. For some reason most of the media are deliberately concealing it which will ultimately just embarrass themselves.
Dyson Heydon should unload on the crooks like there is no tomorrow in his judgment on Monday which is what I expect him to do. Then he should subpoena Chris Winslow and Marcus Priest and put them in the witness stand and see what they have to say then.
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