Gamester Pty Limited & Anor v Rural Press Limited & Ors; Re His Honour Mr Justice Lockhart; Ex parte Gamestar Pty Limited &

[1992] HCATrans 95

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IN THE HIGH COURT OF AUSTRALIA	•
Office of the Registry

Sydney

B e t w e e n -

GAMESTER PTY LIMITED and

BARBARA ANN CAMERON

Applicants

and

RURAL PRESS LIMITED,

JOHN LINDSAY PARKER and

TIMOTHY ROY STARKEY

Respondents

Office of the Registry

Sydney

B e t w e e n -

GAMESTER PTY LIMITED and

BARBARA ANN CAMERON

Applicants

and

RURAL PRESS LIMITED,

JOHN LINDSAY PARKER and

TIMOTHY ROY STARKEY

Respondents

Office of the Registry

Gamester(7) 1 20/3/92

Sydney In the matter of -

An application for a Writ of

Mandamus against HIS HONOUR

MR JUSTICE LOCKHART

Respondent

GAMESTER PTY LIMITED and

BARBARA ANN CAMERON

Applicant and Prosecutor

Applications for waiver
of fees

BRENNAN J

(In Chambers)

TRANSCRIPT OF PROCEEDINGS

AT CANBERRA ON FRIDAY, 20 MARCH 1992, AT 9.18 AM

Copyright in the High Court of Australia

HIS HONOUR:  Yes, Ms Cameron?

MS B.A. CAMERON: Firstly, I am just wondering if, perhaps,

you could tell me how much time I have, so that if

I am restricted I could concentrate on the main

points?

HIS HONOUR:	I will not be sitting past five past 10.
MS CAMERON:	I see, so I need to be quick.
BRENNAN J:	You take whatever time you need, Ms Cameron.

MS CAMERON:  Yes. If I have only got half an hour I will

just concentrate on the main points.

As I understand it all I am to put to you are the reasons for the waiving of the fee and nothing

else this morning, is that right?

BRENNAN J: That is your application, Ms Cameron, I am

sitting here to hear whatever applications you

make. I have before me three sets of documents,

two of them relate to a waiver of fees, I think,

and the third relates to some proceedings in

relation to Justice Lockhart.

MS CAMERON:  Yes. The problem with these applications is

that they have really become an awful mess, and I

say created on purpose by Sly & Weigall just to

make the situation totally unmanageable. Perhaps

if I could try and explain what the documents are.

BRENNAN J: First of all I think, perhaps, you should tell

me what are the documents which I should be looking

Gamester(?) 2 20/3/92

at that you have filed in these applications,

because in applications like this the Court has to

decide matters on the papers that appears before

it. So, you tell me formally now which documents

you are relying on.

MS CAMERON:  The documents that are before you to waive the fee, because that is the first step -

HIS HONOUR: Let identify those, first.

MS CAMERON:  I was going to explain how we might be able to

do away with some of them.

HIS HONOUR:  It is a matter for you. I will only be looking

at whatever documents and whatever material you say

that you want me to look at.	So you tell me that
and I will then look at them.

MS CAMERON:  Right. The documents were prepared the day I

came out of hospital and they are very scant. I

did not have any of the material with me when I did

them.	So what I would tell you is probably more
important than what is in the documents.	I

prepared the documents in this way: there is an

application to waive the fee under the matter of

the appeal, No 646, and then an identical

application under the matter, No 839, and an

application to waive the fee under an application

to enforce a stay under the Legal Aid Commission

Act.

HIS HONOUR:  Well now, just a moment until I have a look at

that.

MS CAMERON:  Those are the three matters.

HIS HONOUR: There is an application for special leave to

appeal. I am not looking at that, am I?

MS CAMERON:	As I understand it - and I ask you to be accommodating of the fact that I am not a lawyer,
and that is the document that I was given from the
Court office this morning - I am only to argue that
the fee be waived this morning and if there is only
half an hour I would think that is probably all that we will be able to do.
HIS HONOUR:	It is an application for the filing fee for the

appeal in NG 646 of 1991 be waived?

MS CAMERON:	Yes.
HIS HONOUR:	Is that one of the matters?
MS CAMERON:	Yes.

Gamester(7) 3 20/3/92

HIS HONOUR:  The Court file at present, that I have,

contains a summons dated 16 March 1992; an

affidavit sworn by you on 16 March 1992;	a second
affidavit sworn by you on the same date;	and a
third affidavit sworn by you on the same date.	In
addition to that, there is a document which is
headed, Application for Special Leave to Appeal.
It has not a number assigned to it at the moment

but it is dated and signed by you on 16 March 1992.

Now, that is one lot of documents I have. Is that

all the documents I should be looking at?

MS CAMERON:  No, there should be an identical set asking for

application for leave to appeal - to waive the

filing fee and an application for leave to appeal

under 839 of 1991. That is the Federal Court

number. I understand the Federal Court has

combined those two appeals and I do not know

whether or not we will be -

HIS HONOUR:  Just a moment. We have this one now for filing

fee in appeal NG 646. That is the one we have just

been looking at?

MS CAMERON:  Yes.

HIS HONOUR: Right.

MS CAMERON:  It may be a good thing to combine the two from

the point of view of minimizing the morass of

material.

HIS HONOUR:  Just a moment while I see what other documents

there are here. Yes, there is a summons for a

filing fee in appeal No NG 839 to be waived, is

that right?

MS CAMERON:	Yes.
HIS HONOUR:	And with that there seems to be what seems to

be the same affidavits as in the other matter, is

that right?

MS CAMERON: Yes, they are identical.

HIS HONOUR:	Together with another document which is a draft application for special to appeal?
MS CAMERON:	Yes.

HIS HONOUR: All right. I have those two. Are there any

other documents I should be looking at?

MS CAMERON: 

Yes, well now the third one is an application

to waive the fee in - this is a matter that has
been before Justice Gaudron and Justice Toohey and
it is in regard to seeking an order nisi for a writ

Gamester(?) 

20/3/92

of mandamus to enforce the Federal Court to stay the matter under the provisions of the Legal Aid

Commission Act, which says that they must stay it

while an appeal is pending against it and a refusal

to give legal aid.

Now, I am not sure if procedurally, I do not

know, if I can continue on. Justice Gaudron waived

the fee in Sydney the other day and commenced it.

Now I think probably I am wrong in reapplying with

that. I think there can just be a continuation of
that, but I am not sure. She found that an order

had not been made by Justice Lockhart and that I

should go back to the Federal Court and ask for an

order, which I did, and he has now made an order,

so I would think we can probably continue with that

in the same - all of the documents are in the file

that was before Justice Gaudron.

HIS HONOUR: Well, I have another file here, which is the

one I am looking at at the moment, which is an

application that the filing fee for the order nisi

be waived by the Court.

MS CAMERON:  Yes, well see Justice Gaudron waived it last

time I was before her. Now I feel that this is

probably the same matter, because first of all, I

asked her if she would order that Justice Lockhart

stay the matter and she found that he had not made

an order as to whether or not he would or would not

stay it, and she told me to go back to the court

and insist on a yes or a no, I will or I will not,

stay it, and he said no, he would not stay it. Now

I would think that probably we can continue under

the matter that was before Justice Gaudron, but I

do not know.

HIS HONOUR:  Well I do not know either, Ms Cameron. What I

am saying is that the application that is before me

at the moment, in the form of a summons, is for a

filing fee for the order nisi to be waived by the

Court and, together with that, there are some

affidavits which I again assume are the same

affidavits as in the other matters.

MS CAMERON:  No, they may be different. I will just -

HIS HONOUR:	They may be different, all right.
MS CAMERON:	But perhaps could we sort out whether or not I

need this application; can it continue under what

Justice Gaudron did last time?

HIS HONOUR:  Well Ms Cameron, I think I should say that I do

not know; it is your application.	I have looked at
those papers and - - -

Gamester(7) 5 20/3/92

MS CAMERON: Well, I do not know either.

HIS HONOUR: Well, I am afraid if neither of us knows, then

I should not be waiving any fees, because fees should only be waived when matters are brought to

the court in a fashion which allows the Court to
decide. If the Court cannot decide, because it
does not know what the matters are, then the Court

should not be troubled with them.

MS CAMERON:  What I am trying to do is, you see, Sly &

Weigall have tried to mushroom the paperwork and

the matters and the issues, I think to try and say
that I am here vexatiously and proliferating

matters all over the place, which is simply not

true. They are the ones who have caused this great

morass of paperwork and offsprings of files and

splitting the whole thing. I am trying to bring it

back to a central point and this is one of the

problems of the fact that I am not qualified. I

mean, my intuition is that we ought to be able to

continue this legal aid issue under the application

before Justice Gaudron, but I am being honest with

you, I do not know.	I do not know whether to treat
it as a new application or not.	I thought perhaps

you would be able to help me with that.

HIS HONOUR:  I do not think I can help you, Ms Cameron; I do

not know enough about what it is.

MS CAMERON:  Why do I not start with the others and if we

put that aside it may become apparent as we go on

perhaps.

HIS HONOUR:  Well you make your application in whatever form

you wish. I should tell you, however, that I will

endeavour to decide your application according to

the material that is placed before me. I am not in

a position to assume some helpful role to one

litigant, as against another.

MS CAMERON: All right, yes, I appreciate that. The point

that I would like to emphasize is that you have

very little before you, because I had to get these

documents on as a matter of urgency and I did it

the day I came out of hospital, and I did not have

access to any of the material. But the bulk of the

material, that I would seek to rely on from

financial means, is in Justice Gaudron's file and,

for example, the notices of appeal that I have

filed there have been filed before we have received

the judgment, before I had seen the transcript and

before we had had legal advice.	I had no knowledge
because I was not in the Court.	They were filed

just to preserve our rights within the time frame.

Gamester(?) 6 20/3/92

HIS HONOUR:  Ms Cameron, I do not know what judgments you

are speaking about.

MS CAMERON:	Could I please sit down?
HIS HONOUR:	Yes, of course.
MS CAMERON:	Thank you. Could I say what I was going to say

to you, because I am concerned that if I have only got half an hour we are going to use it up sort of wandering - - -

HIS HONOUR:  Ms Cameron, I will not sit past five past 10,

but if you are not finished then and you have some
reason for taking a longer time, I will sit later

in the day when the Full Court is finished sitting.

MS CAMERON:	I see, all right.
HIS HONOUR:	But sit down, please.
MS CAMERON:	I do not want to, unnecessarily, give you a

long day.

HIS HONOUR:  You are not to worry about that, but you are to

tell me what is the matter that you are seeking the

waiver of fees about?

MS CAMERON: Perhaps if I could try and do that.

HIS HONOUR:	Yes.
MS CAMERON:	And I think, because you have not had this case before, I should perhaps take a couple of minutes
and outline, put them into context. It is a trade
practices matter. It was about the takeover of my
publishing business.  The Federal
Attorney-General's Department granted legal aid
because they felt it should be heard in the public
interest.  We say their aid was wrongfully taken
back on the basis of the same opinion upon which
the aid was given.  The matter has been before the
Court about eight years, there have been over 200
directions hearing, and we have never had one
affidavit of evidence heard, one of the 53
witnesses - not one affidavit has ever been heard.
There has never been any hearing and in 1990 we
settled the matter, each year almost we settled the matter.
HIS HONOUR:	Where is the settlement?

MS CAMERON: It is in Justice Gaudron's file. There was a

written offer, a written acceptance, we advised

them that we accepted it in writing, there was an

opinion from Mr Dale Kemp of Dibbs Crowther

Gamester(7) 20/3/92

& Osborne in which he says the settlement is

enforceable. The history of the matter - - -

HIS HONOUR:  Now, just before you go on, you say that there

are some documents which evidence this settlement

in a court file?

MS CAMERON:  Yes. They should be before you if you have

Justice Gaudron's file.

BRENNAN J: Well I do not. What is the number or can you

identify this file that you are speaking about?

MS CAMERON: Well, this order nisi matter which is before

you - this is the third time it has come before the

Court. First of all it came before the Court

before Mr Justice Toohey, here in this courtroom,

and he found that Justice Lockhart had not made a

decision one way or the other and he told me to go

back to the Federal Court and get a decision. We

did that and again Justice Gaudron found that he

had not made a decision one way or another and that

was under the same file number, and she told me to

go back and make sure he said yes or no, which I

did, and he said no and now my feeling is that we

should still be within that same file number and we

should not have this.

BRENNAN J:  I would be advantaged if I could see what you

are speaking about in terms of a settlement, but if

I cannot, I cannot.

MS CAMERON: Well, I will see if I can find my copy. I am

hampered by the fact that I have been in hospital
and I have come out and somebody has just given me

this pile this morning and I do not know what is in

it and I do not - it is just impossible for me to

keep track of the - there is the opinion from

Mr Kemp and - now, this is the affidavit that is

in - it is sworn 19 February 1992 - and this would

be in the file which was before Justice Gaudron and

I think I handed up the - - -

BRENNAN J: Well you go on and tell me about the matter

then, in your own words, Ms Cameron.

MS CAMERON: Well, there was a written offer - I have got

some of the documents here - there was a written

acceptance and exact terms of the offer; there was

a letter from Sly & Weigall in which they said

"Whilst you and Gamester have now acknowledged our

client's offer of acceptance" they said that we

needed to sign an agreement which reflected the

settlement. Sly & Weigall are trying to say that

there is a Masters v Cameron-type three situation

where there was no agreement until the contract was

signed, but that is not the case. It is a

Gamester(7) 20/3/92

Masters v Cameron-type one or two - I am not sure

which category - where there were no further terms

of an agreement to be negotiated.

They said and they held me to being bound by

the acceptance of the written offer by our written letter of acceptance and the agreement was only to

confirm the matter.	In every way the settlement is
binding.	Any lawyer who has looked at it has said
it is binding.	They cannot escape it.

Each year, and sometimes two or three times

within the year, over the nine-year history of this

case, the matter has been settled and each time we

have come to the point of consummating the

settlement, Mr Parker has just backed out of it.

He has done this to other publishers he has taken over in the same way in which he took our

publishing business over. He has a history of

destroying totally any person who stands up to him.

We sought to - - -

HIS HONOUR:  I do not need to hear any comment about your

views on the character of your opponent. What I

need to know is what happened about_the litigation.

MS CAMERON:	Yes. Well, we sought to file affidavits of other publishers of similar fact evidence in this
matter.
HIS HONOUR:	Perhaps you did. What litigation followed the

settlement?

MS CAMERON:  I took the written offer, the written

acceptance and the contract along to the court on

12 December 1990, and Mr Justice Sheppard said that

he would - and asked him to enforce it - and he

said that it was a bit irregular because I should

really be in the supreme court, but he said because

of the provisions of the cross-vesting legislation

he would permit enforcement within the original

file number and in the Federal Court, and he set
down a hearing date to enforce it.	He said at the

time, when he said he would hear an enforcement, he

would stand over all other notices of motion until

after the settlement matter had been decided.	He
also said that he would not hear them because

Mr Don McKay of Sly & Weigall was a close, personal

friend of his and the main thrust of the other
application was to seek an order of the court that
Sly & Weigall pay all the costs for wilfully
delaying the case. There is a wealth of very
strong evidence, both as to the authority that they

could be ordered to pay and to the fact that they

had wilfully delayed the case.

Gamester(7) 9 20/3/92

So, those outstanding notices of motion were

stood over and on the fourth day of hearing the

application to enforce the settlement,

unfortunately I had to leave the court for medical reasons. I have got two chronic medical problems.

One, is that I have a stomach ulcer which has

become chronic, and it bleeds at the slightest

provocation, and, in particular, it bleeds because

I am also medicated for thrombosis and the two

medications are incompatible. I have now developed

high blood pressure and I have a queried aneurism behind the right eye. I cannot have an angiogram because I am allergic to the dye.

HIS HONOUR:	You left the court on the third or fourth day.
MS CAMERON:	Yes, I had to leave because of medical reasons.
HIS HONOUR:	Yes.
MS CAMERON:	Mr Justice Sheppard, who has shown compassion

in regard to my health throughout this case said he

would stop if I left, and I left. After I left,

Mr Martin asked him if he would dismiss the matter

for want of prosecution.

HIS HONOUR:	Who is Mr Martin?
MS CAMERON:	The counsel for Rural Press.

Mr Justice Sheppard said he would have trouble

doing that because he did not have a notice of motion which to dismiss because the matter had

commenced without a notice of motion. He had power

under the rules to waive the need for a notice of

motion in the circumstances of expedition being

required because of my health.

So then Mr Martin suggested to him that he

amend one of our other notices of motion to read in

such a way that it would provide a platform on

which he could dismiss the matter, and he

amended - - -

HIS HONOUR:	You mean dismiss the matter of the settlement?
MS CAMERON:	Yes.  We had filed a notice of motion asking

that an unconscionable clause in the contract which

had been included be varied or removed, and

Mr Martin asked him to change that clause to say

that we required the settlement in the contract

enforced, or words to that effect.	I do not have
it in front of me.	I cannot be precise.

Mr Justice Sheppard said, and he used the words, "I

will myself amend the notice of motion", and he

amended it to read that, and then in the same

sentence dismissed it.

Gamester(?) 10 20/3/92

HIS HONOUR:	Well now, was an order taken out which reported his judgment?
MS CAMERON:	No, he did not provide a written judgment, and

all we had was a letter from the court in which the

court said that he had dismissed his amendment, and

we had - the report of listing said he had

dismissed his amendment.

HIS HONOUR: Well, there is no court order?

MS CAMERON:  I have never seen it. I do not know whether

Sly & Weigall have taken it out or not. But we

received a letter from the court which stated that
he had dismissed his amendment, and we had a copy

of the report of listing. I think I should have

those documents here with me somewhere.

On the first day of the hearing of the

settlement - because I am so desperate for help
with this case, and because I am not qualified, I

did what I did to you this morning, I asked

Mr Justice Sheppard for help in the court. I have

been told often that I am not to, but I am
desperate so I do. He said, "Look, I cannot help

you", and he used the words, "If I descended into

the arena and helped you I would be overturned by

an appeal court."

After I left the court on 1 October 1991, I

spoke with Mr Richardson at Sly & Weigall, and he

said the whole matter has been dismissed.	He said
it is finished; it is over; everything was
dismissed.

HIS HONOUR:  Now, whatever he may have told you is one

thing. Did you take the proceedings that had been

before Mr Justice Sheppard on appeal?

MS CAMERON:  Yes.

HIS HONOUR:	To whom?
MS CAMERON:	To the Full Court.
HIS HONOUR:	When?
MS CAMERON:	On 28 February.
HIS HONOUR:	What has the Full Court said about it?

MS CAMERON: That is what I am coming up to now, but if I

could just collect my thoughts. If I could just go

back to 1 October 1991 when I had to leave for

medical reasons, and Mr Justice Sheppard dismissed

his amendment. Now, there was no judgment and we

were denied access to the transcript, the registrar

Gamester(?) 11 20/3/92

would not let us see the transcript in the court

file and I did not know what had happened. We were reliant on what Sly & Weigall said, and we filed an

appeal, without seeing the transcript, and then

Mr David Bennett, QC has been kindly helping us,

and he managed to get the transcript. The letter

from the court said that Mr Justice Sheppard had

dismissed some of our notices of motion and not all
of them, and everything pointed to the fact that
the matter had not been dismissed, it was still

before the court, only the amendment that

Mr Justice Sheppard made, of his own volition, had

been dismissed. And we were advised that the

matter had not been dismissed, it was still before

the court. So we filed an amendment notice of

appeal, the index had not been settled and we were

within the correct time for that.

HIS HONOUR:	What were you appealing against?
MS CAMERON:	We filed a notice of appeal about the fact that

because Sly & Weigall told us he had dismissed it.

HIS HONOUR:  But what were you appealing against? If no

order had been made what were you appealing

against?

MS CAMERON:  We were appealing against the dismissal of his

amendment.

HIS HONOUR:  You wanted the amendment to be allowed, did

you?

MS CAMERON:  No, because Sly & Weigall said that the

amendment had succeeded and what he did was right,

that the amendment had succeeded in dismissing the

whole matter and we did - - -

HIS HONOUR:	And then you discovered that was not correct?
MS CAMERON:	Yes.
HIS HONOUR:	Now, let me stop you there for a moment because

I suspect that you are going to go on and say that

you want to appeal from the Full Court's decision,

and if that is so we need to understand whether

there is any judgment to start with, because if
there is no judgment to start with then there

cannot be very much of substance to argue about

here in this Court.

MS CAMERON: If I could just go on from there. Perhaps I

should have written down these dates for you. That

was 1 October 1991 - - -

HIS HONOUR:  It is not a matter of the dates so much, it is

a question of what orders have been made by courts.

Gamester(7) 12 20/3/92

MS CAMERON:	Sly & Weigall take the orders out and do not give us copies, and the court will not give us
copies unless we pay $7 a page which I cannot
afford, so we do not have any of the orders.
HIS HONOUR:	Have you been to the court to inspect the file

to see whether an order has been made?

MS CAMERON: This might sound an extraordinary statement:

Mr Gilroy would not let me see the court file, and

we have an affidavit from a solicitor confirming

that, that he would not let me see the court file.

So I do not know, I am terribly in the dark, I do

not know, I have not seen an order.

If I could just go on from there: the court

motion that he had stood

then acted as if the matter had been dismissed. outstanding notices of

over until after the settlement matter had been

dismissed, so it appeared as if it had been

dismissed, so we proceeded with the appeal.

Now, the appeal came before the court on

27 and 28 February of this year, and an

extraordinary situation happened in regard to the

appeal books. Sly & Weigall requested that they

wanted a great morass of material in the appeal

books. The appeal books were 12 inches thick, each

appeal book, and had we done them they would have

been about this thick, about two centimetres at the

most, and the indexes had been settled, Mr Segal,

the registrar, said he did not agree with Sly &

Weigall wanting this morass of material in the

appeal books. They wanted all of the notices of

motion that had been before the court for a great

period, in the whole matter, in the appeal books,

it was a frivolous and vexatious requirement, there

was no proper basis for it at all.

I was ill at the time and I could not get into

the court and I spoke with Mr Segal on the phone

and he said that he did not agree with what Sly &
Weigall wanted and that he agreed with me and we
set an appointment to finalize the index and when I

went into the court on that day - and the index is

in Justice Gaudron's file - Mr Segal suddenly said

that he had settled the index and we must accept

his index. When I looked at it, it was

extraordinary. It contained all of this morass of

material that Sly & Weigall wanted.	It did not
contain our notice of appeal.	It did not contain
any of the material that we wanted in it.	He had

selected certain pages of the transcript which put

Sly & Weigall's case and not our case and simply,

as it is evidenced in his document, which I think

is going to become infamous, our appeal was not put

Gamester(?) 13 20/3/92

before the court, not even our notice of appeal,

our amended notice of appeal which we had filed

after we had seen the transcript and had advice

from Mr Bennett.

He also ordered that I had to produce the

appeal books within three days and I had to produce

nine of them, nine times 12 inches. Then I was not

allowed access to the court file to the transcript

to do it and there is the affidavit from

Mr Sainsbury to confirm that, that Mr Gourier would

not let me have access to it.

Then Mr Segal wrote a letter saying, a couple

of days before the due date to do the appeal books,

that I could have access to the material that he

had decided could go in the appeal books only.	It
was an impossible situation.	I did not have the

transcripts to do it and it was impossible for me
to do that volume of work and the cost of it in the
time and he ordered that if I could not perform

this mammoth task that Sly & Wiegall could produce

the appeal books and that they did not have to give

me a copy of them and they did not have to provide

a certificate of correctness.

So, in that situation, where I did not have a

copy of the appeal books, I did not know that I was

allowed to go along to the court with our own
appeal books, I did not know that we could

disregard - I thought that the rule was that once

an appeal book was set you were confined to the

appeal book and I did not know that people take

documents along the court and just hand them up.	I
did not know that that had become an accepted
practice.

So we then come to the 27-28 February hearing

in which we appealed against - I have missed

something out. When I said before that

Mr Justice Sheppard then decided to hear the

outstanding notices of motion which he had stood

over, that hearing took place on 6 December 1991.

At that stage we had a solicitor and barrister who

were helping us without charge, and to handle those
outstanding notices of motion required a knowledge
of the entire eight or nine years of the case, and
they said they were not prepared to do that, that
they were prepared to enforce the settlement only.

So they went along to the Court on that day and sought an adjournment on the basis that His Honour had previously stood these matters over and that

they should be stood over until the settlement

appeal had been heard, and that they simply could

not handle them because they had no knowledge of

the subject-matter.

Gamester(?) 14 20/3/92

I was in hospital in Canberra here. I had

been staying with some people at Goulburn and had

been admitted to hospital in Canberra with severe

pleurisy. I had high blood pressure and chest pain

which the doctor felt may have not been associated

with pleurisy. The GP swore an affidavit and filed

in the Court saying I had been admitted into

hospital. Mr Martin has made the extraordinary

statement to the court - there have been quite a

number of medical certificates filed in this matter

over the last four or five years.

HIS HONOUR:  How do you know what Mr Martin said to the

court?

MS CAMERON:	Because it is in the transcript.
HIS HONOUR:	How did you get the transcript?

MS CAMERON:  We asked Mr Tesoriero, the registrar, who has been helpful. We asked him - you see

Mr Justice Lockhart made an order that the

transcript could go to our legal representatives,

but not to me, so under that rule we got

Mr Tesoriero to give the transcript to

Mr David Bennett, which he did.	Now, on
6 December, what happened - - -

HIS HONOUR:	Does that apply to all the transcripts?
MS CAMERON:	No, only to some of them we have got. But on

6 December Mr Martin said that - and he said this

of every medical certificate that has been supplied

to the court and they involve extremely reputable

people like Professor May and Dr Cobblestone and Dr

Burke of Macquarie Street. In each case Mr Martin

has said that I talked the doctor into filing a

false certificate; that the certificates were lies,

and he said the same of the affidavit of Doctor

Wragg, a GP.

HIS HONOUR:  Well, that may be so. Now let us get back to

the litigation.	What has happened in the
litigation?

MS CAMERON:	Yes, but you have got two appeals there and I am just saying what happened to the second one,
that these are the notices of motion, this hearing
on 6 December. Justice Sheppard adjourned and he
suggested that both the barristers, our barrister
and Rural Press' barrister, contact Dr May, in
Canberra, who was the specialist, under whom I had been admitted to hospital. Dr May did not even
know that I was involved in a court case and he
received a phone call from our solicitor asking if he would give a report on the state of my health -
and I had been admitted to hospital. I had been

Gamester(?) 15 20/3/92

there one day by then and he had some tests, but

not all of them, and he said to Mr Tebbutt, our

solicitor, that he did not have authority from me, he did not know anything about it, he did not know

who Mr Tebbutt was and he did not feel he could

discuss me and he said that he would say that the

two tests he had done up to that date had been

clear, but he had not finished doing tests and that

was all he was prepared to say.

And then Mr Martin spoke with him and Dr May

has sworn an affidavit saying that he told Mr

Martin the same thing, that two tests were clear;

that he was doing more. He told him that there

were well-founded reasons for my being in hospital;

that I was unfit to go to court to Sydney; that he

wanted to do further tests and he said that on

affidavit, and I have got the affidavit here, and

it is in Justice Gaudron's file, that Mr Martin
tried to get him to say that I had talked myself

into being admitted to hospital to avoid going to

court and Dr May said that he told him that was not

the case at all; that he agreed with Dr Wragg that

I certainly should be in hospital.

Then the court resumed. Mr Harrison, our

barrister, did not speak with Dr May. Mr Martin

told him what Mr Martin said Dr May had said to him

and Mr Harrison said to the court that he had no

reason to disbelieve Mr Martin, so he did not speak

with Dr May.

Now, Mr Martin, went back to the court and

told Justice Sheppard that he had spoken with

Dr May and that Dr May had said that there was no

reason for me to be in hospital; that all the tests

were clear and that I could leave that day and fly

to Sydney and attend court. Now, it was a blatant
lie; there is no other way of putting it, and on

that basis Justice Sheppard said, "Well, ok, we

will proceed" and he dismissed all the notices of

motion. So that was the second appeal, 839. Now,

both of these appeals came before the Full Bench on

27 and 28 February.

HIS HONOUR:	Did Justice Sheppard make any orders?
MS CAMERON:	Yes he dismissed all the notices of motion.
HIS HONOUR:	Have you seen those orders?
MS CAMERON:	No.  I have not seen any of the orders. We are

totally dependent on what Sly & Weigall tell us.

HIS HONOUR:  Right. So that what second appeal which you

instituted against what you understood were his

orders?

Gamester(?) 16 20/3/92

MS CAMERON:	Yes.
HIS HONOUR:	And that came before the Full Court.
MS CAMERON:	Yes.  What Sly & Weigall said were the orders.
HIS HONOUR:	And what happened when you got before the Full

Court?

MS CAMERON: Well, when it got before the Full Court it was

booked in for two days and I managed - it was a in Royal Prince Alfred Hospital - I had finally,

after eight cancellations, managed to get a break

in the case where I could have an endoscopy, which

I did, and Professor Gallagher had taken extensive

biopsy because I have a chronic stomach ulcer - - -

HIS HONOUR:  Just tell me what happened in the court, would

you please?

MS CAMERON: Well, I managed to conduct it on the Thursday

and, after talking all day in court the ulcer bled

because of the biopsy and the medication and it
bled quite badly and I was admitted into hospital

after court and I wanted to go to court the next

day but I just could not, the doctor would not let

me. I even tried to talk the nurses in the

hospital into letting me go to court because they

seemed to be good, reasonable, nice judges and I

wanted to go because Mr Bennett had said our case
was strong and I wanted to be there to argue it.

But I physically could not go and we got a

solicitor to take a medical certificate along to

say that I was in hospital, I was unable to go to

court, I had a bleeding ulcer and there was a high

risk of hemorrhage and Mr Martin said to the judge

that I had just talked the doctor into writing the

certificate, that it was false. They did not call

the doctor. They could have telephoned him. I had

said the day before that the doctor would be happy

to come to the court.

HIS HONOUR: Well, you did not get to court.

MS CAMERON: No. I did the day before - - -

HIS HONOUR:  What order did the court make?

MS CAMERON: Well then - and I have got the transcript here

of what happened on that day and I know the court

does not want to here this word, but Mr Martin made

35 blatant lies to the court, there was - - -

HIS HONOUR:  Just tell me what the court did, would you?

Gamester(7) 17 20/3/92

MS CAMERON:  Well the court dismissed everything because of

Mr Martin's lies. It is - - -

HIS HONOUR: Dismissed your appeals.

HIS HONOUR:  Yes. If I could just tell you some of the

lies.

HIS HONOUR:  No, I do not want to hear the lies, for this

reason, that your application here relates to an

application for special leave to appeal to this

Court on the judgment of the Federal Court.	Now,
the grounds of your appeal, if appeal is ever

instituted, will be something for you to advance in

due time. What I am endeavouring to discover at

the moment is whether there is any coherent,
understandable appeal available. At the moment I

see no copy of any order made by the Federal Court;

no copy of any order made by any judge from whom

the appeal to the Federal Court was brought. I

understand from what you have said that you sense that there has been a grave injustice done, but I

just do not understand what the foundation is for

any proceedings in this Court.

MS CAMERON:  I am about to come to it, if I could just come

to it. On the 28th, Mr Justice Northrop said,

"Well, the fact that she's in hospital, is a strong

ground of appeal and we ought not to proceed", and

he said to Mr Martin, and this is words to the

effect, "Can we just perhaps have a look and see if

there is a ground for appeal". Mr Martin then

offered, he ~aid, "Well, I'll take you through

their grounds of appeal", and he took the court

through our superseded notice of appeal and he did

not mention our main ground of appeal which

Mr Bennett said was the main ground of appeal.	He
deliberately lied to the court in saying that we
had not filed an amended notice of appeal.	I have

got a list here of the main things that he said

that were not truthful, it can be proven to be

untruthful.

HIS HONOUR:  Ms Cameron, it is nearly 10 o'clock.

MS CAMERON: Well, the point is that the court - - -

HIS HONOUR:  Just a moment. I will be adjourning in five

minutes. It seems to me that I should explain to

you what is the absolute minimum requirement before

there would be any sense in endeavouring to invoke

the jurisdiction of this Court.

MS CAMERON:	Yes.
HIS HONOUR:	There must be some judgment or order made by

the court below, in this case the Full Court of the

Gamester(?) 18 20/3/92

Federal Court, from which an appeal lies to this

Court and there must be some grounds apparent of at

least an arguable case before this Court which will

illustrate that there has been some miscarriage of

justice in the court below. Now, in order to do

that we would need to understand something of what

the orders that were made at first instance were
against which you instituted your appeal to the

Full Federal Court, that is, the orders that were

made, as I understand your story, in relation to

the enforcement of the settlement and in relation
to matters which were ancillary and were

subsequently heard by Mr Justice Sheppard. You

have told me that you have been informed that

Mr Justice Sheppard did not, in fact, dismiss the

proceedings for enforcement.

MS CAMERON: Well, that is our main ground of appeal.

HIS HONOUR:  Now, I do not know what you would be appealing

against. So if no order has been made by

Mr Justice Sheppard at first instance, I do not

presently understand what you would be appealing to

the Full Court about, and if there was nothing to

appeal to the Full Court about I cannot imagine
that there could be anything to appeal to this

Court about.

MS CAMERON:  But this is the injustice. I am quite sure Sly

& Weigall have taken out an order. They have done

in each case. There is a history in a few

instances where they have taken out orders that are

not in the transcript.	I have not got the orders.
Our legal aid is outstanding.	The judgment for the

February this year matter has not been received

yet, has not been given in the court. It is not

written.

HIS HONOUR:  Ms Cameron, I have indicated to you the

difficulties that you face in seeking any relief

from this Court if you are unable to demonstrate to

this Court that there is anything to appeal
against.	Now, I understand that you have

difficulties, you say, in getting copies of the
relevant documents which evidently, according to

your version of the facts, would express the orders

that were made orally by judges in your absence.

That, no doubt, is a problem which you face. It is

equally a problem that would be faced by this Court

if any application for special leave to appeal were

made to this Court.

MS CAMERON: Well no, because Mr Justice Toohey, when I came

before him, was faced with the same problem, and he

got the Registrar to get the transcript from the

Federal Court. Now, surely in the interests of

Gamester(7) 19 20/3/92

justice, somehow we can get these orders. Could

they be - - -

HIS HONOUR: Well, Ms Cameron, if you wish I will adjourn

the matter so that you can do what you wish to do

about it, but on the material presently before me I

would not be minded to waive any application for

fees because I would fear that if the application

for waiver were granted, a document would be filed

unsupported by any material which would allow this

Court to discharge its function.

MS CAMERON:  Yes, but how can I get the Full Court to write

a judgment by 4 o'clock this afternoon, or whenever

it is.

HIS HONOUR:  I will adjourn it to such ever time as you

choose to nominate.

MS CAMERON:  But you see tomorrow, or today - today is the

last day for filing the notice of appeal -

application for leave to appeal in the High Court.

HIS HONOUR: Well, on the material presently before me I

would not be minded to waive the fees.

MS CAMERON:  But why should we be jeopardized because the

judgment is not written yet and because we cannot

get access to the fee?	You see, I was not given a
copy of the appeal books.	I was - on the end of

the first day Mr Justice Northrop ordered that Sly

& Weigall should give me a copy and he castigated

them and said that the laws of natural justice

should apply and I should have a copy, but it this

thick and I was exhausted from the bleeding and I

could not carry it away from the court. I left it

in the court and I do not know what has happened to

it. I think they took it back. But there are

other things that I would like to say.	Can I keep
going, or - - -

HIS HONOUR: Well I think perhaps the time has come when we

should adjourn now, but the Full Court, in which I

will be sitting, will adjourn usually at lunchtime

and I could resume hearing your application, if you

wish, at half past one.

MS CAMERON:	Yes. Well I would be most grateful.
HIS HONOUR:	Very well.
MS CAMERON:	But just before we go - this is an

extraordinary situation. Well, I will say

afterward more about it but could I say now, could

this Court perhaps try and get faxed down from the

Federal Court the orders. It is just barbaric that

Gamester(?) 20 20/3/92

we cannot have a copy of the orders. It is just

extraordinary for a civilized country.

HIS HONOUR:  Yes. It surprises me, Ms Cameron, that if you

had gone to the Federal Court and asked for a copy of any order which has been made that you have not

been able to at least sight that order.

MS CAMERON: Well, I can dig out the affidavit, which I have

got here, of Mr Sainsbury which said that Mr Gilroy

would not let me see the file. You see Tebbutts
were only prepared - this is the solicitors - to

enforce the settlement. They were not prepared to

do anything else and I understand that. They would
have had somebody full-time on the case if they

had done anything other than that and they were not

prepared to do anything other than force the

settlement and all of the other things they wanted

me to do. They said that I had to do all of the

legwork and - - -

HIS HONOUR: Well, Ms Cameron, I am asked, on these

applications, to consent to a waiver of fees. Now

the waiver of fees is in relation to proposed
appeals in relation to the enforcement of a
settlement and ancillary matters. In relation to
the enforcement of a settlement, there is not
before me either the settlement itself or the order
dismissing any proceeding to enforce it or any
order that was made dismissing any appeal from that
order. In relation to the ancillary matters, there

is neither an order at first instance, nor an order

on appeal, nor any material which is sufficient to

indicate the nature of the proceedings with respect

to which you wish to institute the appeals.

Until that information is available I would

not be minded to exercise the power to order a

waiver of the fees. I understand that you say that

the difficulties that you face in obtaining that

material, those are difficulties which are perhaps
to be dealt with in other places.	So far as I can

see they are not a function for this Court to

perform.

MS CAMERON: Well, could this Court extend the deadline for

filing the applications for leave to appeal?

HIS HONOUR:  I will consider that application at half past

one.

MS CAMERON:	Thank you.
HIS HONOUR:	We will adjourn now until half past one.

Gamester(?) 21 20/3/92

AT 10.08 AM THE MATTER WAS ADJOURNED

UNTIL LATER THE SAME DAY

UPON RESUMING AT 1.31 PM:

HIS HONOUR:	Yes, Ms Cameron.
MS CAMERON:	My recollections are that before we adjourned

that I was to try and get the documents. I found,

comprise the settlement, the written offer,

amongst my papers, a copy of the opinion from which

the written acceptance and the signed agreement,
but unfortunately these are my only copies and if I

give them to you then I am without copies, but

could I show them to you and let you have a look

and then get them back?

HIS HONOUR:	Yes, you may.
MS CAMERON:	These documents are with the material that I

gave to Justice Gaudron in Sydney the other day.

HIS HONOUR:	Yes, well I will return to you the letter from Messrs Dibbs Crowther and Osborne and the documents
you have handed me in respect to the terms of settlement.

MS CAMERON:  Yes, thank you. I am just wondering if

Your Honour read - the first two documents, if they were not read with the rest of the documents,

conveys that there is no settlement, but they

amended their offer and then we accepted it by our

letter dated 8 August, and then they wrote saying

that they accepted our acceptance of their offer

and then there is the signed agreement at the back

and there is the letter here in which they say that it would be considered executed once we had signed it. And those are all in there.

HIS HONOUR:  Now, what happened in the Federal Court? We

are coming back to what I was talking to you about

this morning, before the jurisdiction of this Court

is invoked, one needs to know what the orders are

against which appeals are sought to be brought.

MS CAMERON:  Yes. Well, I have made as many telephone calls

as I can about trying to get the orders. It is

just not possible for me to get them for you today,

and in order to get them I have got to try and

raise the money to get them.

HIS HONOUR:  What money do you need to get them?

Gamester(?) 22 20/3/92

MS CAMERON:  It will probably be in the vicinity of $150

to $200, I think.

HIS HONOUR:	Why do you think you need that sort of money?
MS CAMERON:	Because they charge $7 per page.

HIS HONOUR: There is a provision in Order 36 rule 11 of the

Rules of the Federal Court that:

The Registrar shall, upon the request of any party, furnish that party with a certified or

office copy of the order entered in the

proceeding.

MS CAMERON: That is what I have argued with them, that we

should be given a copy, and the Registrar,

Mr Segal, and Mr Tesoriero, have both been adamant
that we cannot have it unless we pay for it, and a

woman as well - I cannot remember her name.

HIS HONOUR:  And you have not been able to sight the order

also, you say, is that right, you have not been

able to search the file to find the order?

MS CAMERON:  No, and I do not have a copy of the affidavit

of Mr Sainsbury, but that is in the High Court in

Sydney with the material that was before

Justice Gaudron.

HIS HONOUR: That strikes me as curious, also, because the

inference that one would draw from Order 46 rule 6 is that parties do have a right to search the file.

MS CAMERON:  Yes, well, I was advised that as well, and that

was the argument that I put to them, but

Mr Sainsbury, who was a solicitor helping us

without pay, spoke with Mr Gilroy and Mr Gilroy

said, no, that he would not permit it, and

Mr Sainsbury has put that on affidavit.

HIS HONOUR: 

You can see the difficulty that your present

applications give rise to, Ms Cameron, that is,
that this Court's appellate jurisdiction is

exercised on appeal from orders made by courts,

including the Federal Court of Australia. If there
is no order available, or no proof of the content
of any order available, sufficient to found an

appeal to this Court, then it would be futile to

permit the filing of documents merely to clutter up
the paperwork of this Court when the appropriate
material is not available for the institution of an
appeal.

MS CAMERON: 

Yes, I can understand that, and perhaps if I

could say this, that if you could extend the time

for filing of the application for leave to appeal,

Gamester(?) 23 20/3/92

then the following things could happen. Perhaps if

I could get this page of the transcript to go back

to the Registrar of the Federal Court and try and

get the orders, and also these transcripts which

were given to Mr Bennett, he has not seen them yet

because he has been in Adelaide all of this week,

and he is going to have a look at them and advise

us on the grounds of appeal, and he also wants the

judgment and the judgment has not been handed down

yet.

HIS HONOUR:  Ms Cameron, I would not be prepared to extend

the time for the lodging of an application for

special leave to appeal without giving your

opponents an opportunity to be heard on that

matter, but if you are able to get the material

which would justify the extension of time, that is

if you were able to put the papers in a sufficient

order to allow a rational consideration of the

question of whether time should be extended, and

give notice to the opposing party, then of course

you would be at liberty to apply for an extension

of time even though the time has first expired.

MS CAMERON:  But you see the problem is that today is the

last day, and if we miss out then we have had it.

HIS HONOUR:  It does not follow that you have, as you say,

had it. If you subsequently are able to apply for

an extension of time, and you support your

application with sufficient material to justify the

extension of the time. But at present I am not

satisfied that you have the material, or that you

will acquire the material, to justify either the

extension of time or the granting of special leave.

MS CAMERON:  I am sorry, Your Honour, I did not quite catch

that last point.

HIS HONOUR:  I said I am not presently satisfied that even

if time were extended now you would in due course

obtain the necessary material which would found an

application for special leave to appeal or an

appeal.

MS CAMERON:  But the material that I require is, as I

understand it, the judgment and the orders;

eventually we must get the judgment and the orders,

surely.

HIS HONOUR: Well, there are procedures in the Federal Court

for doing so; they are not procedures which are to

be implemented in this Court.

MS CAMERON:  But you see, the judgment has not been written

yet.

Gamester(7) 24 20/3/92

HIS HONOUR:  Which makes one wonder, Ms Cameron, whether the

appeal that you seek to institute is one which

would properly be instituted at all. In fact, in

one case, as you told me this morning, no order had

been made dismissing the application.

MS CAMERON:  Well, that was our claim. Now, Sly & Weigall

say differently.	But that is not the matter that
we are corning to the High Court on.	The matter

that we would be corning to the High Court on this

time would be the 27 and 28 February dismissal and

that is a subsequent one.	We have not got the
orders for that or the judgment.	I understand the

judgment has not been handed down yet, but there is

going to be - the judges have said that they are

going to give a judgment. And you see, the point

that I would like to address Your Honour further

about, which is terribly important, is that - may I

please sit down?

HIS HONOUR:	Yes, of course.
MS CAMERON:	Thank you.  My concern is that the judgment may

not disclose our main ground of appeal or help the
case, in that Sly & Weigall tried to say to the
court that the ground for appeal and the whole
problem arose out of the day before we say it rose,

and if the judgment is given on the basis that our ground of appeal was what happened the day before,

well then I am just wondering how we can, within

that framework, get through the fact that it was

decided on our superceded notice of appeal and not

on our actual notice of appeal which we had before

the court. The issue, as I see it, rests on the

fact that Mr Martin lied to the court and said that

we had not filed a subsequent notice of appeal,
which we had, to the one that he argued before the

court. He offered to take the court through our

notice of appeal and it was the wrong notice of

appeal.

HIS HONOUR:	Is there anything further you wish to say?
MS CAMERON:	Yes, there are quite a few things.  How much

time can I have now?

HIS HONOUR:  So long as it is relevant you can have as much

time as you wish. We may have to adjourn again so

that I can sit in the Full Court in a part-heard

matter, but you are under no limitation of time,
but you are under a limitation of relevance, so
that unless you can address the subject, then I do

not wish to hear you.

MS CAMERON:  I understand that. You see, I have here that I

have been advised to ask you if you could make

these orders - you see, there are two separate

Gamester(?) 20/3/92

matters. One is the application for leave to

appeal, and the other is seeking an order that the Federal Court comply with the Legal Aid Commission

Act and stay the matter under that Act. I have the

transcript here where the Federal Court refused to

stay it when the appeal was pending, and

Mr John Coombe spoke with Mr Richardson at the

Legal Aid Commission in Sydney and he said that he

felt sure we would get legal aid because the two

things that had been left out of the application by

accident were the letter from Mr Kemp on our

prospects of success, and evidence of my

impecuniosity and the fact that Gamester has never

traded and does not have any assets. Both of those

things were not included in the application, and

the letter rejecting it said that we had to supply

evidence of those two things.

BRENNAN J:  Ms Cameron, I do not wish to interrupt you, but

if you are seeking to invoke the jurisdiction of

this Court, there are two possible jurisdictions
that you may wish to invoke: the first is an

appellate jurisdiction, that is, to hear appeals

from the Federal Court. Now, if an order was made

by the Federal Court refusing to stay any

proceeding, and if that order was then taken on

appeal to the Full Court of the Federal Court and

the Full Court of the Federal Court made some
decision about it, then you have a foundation, at
least in the sense of having an order, which can be
the subject of an appeal. Now, there is nothing in
the papers here to show what orders have been made

with regard to that.

MS CAMERON:  But I have gone on to the other subject, the

third one. I have now gone on to the application

for an order nisi and forcing them to stay it under

the Legal Aid Commission Act.

HIS HONOUR:  Then, in that case, you are seeking to invoke

the jurisdiction of this Court in what is called

its original jurisdiction?

MS CAMERON:	Yes.
HIS HONOUR:	And that is, to order the Federal Court to

discharge its proper functions and duties in

exercise of their jurisdiction.

MS CAMERON:  Yes. You see they heard the appeal - - -

HIS HONOUR:  Now, where is there the slightest evidence that

the Federal Court has made some order which is

erroneous in the light of its jurisdiction?

MS CAMERON:  It is here in the transcript. I asked for a

stay -

Gamester(?) 26 20/3/92

HIS HONOUR:  No order has been made?

MS CAMERON: Again, I have not got the order from the court.

HIS HONOUR:	Who made the order?
MS CAMERON:	Mr Justice Northrop.  It is here in the

transcript, he said that he refused the stay under

the Legal Aid Commission Act.

HIS HONOUR:  Is the Legal Aid Commission Act Federal or

State?

MS CAMERON:  It is State. I am not sure which Act it is,

but there is an Act which says that where there is a lacuna in law, in regard to overlapping of State

and Federal law, that the State law applies.

HIS HONOUR:  Was an appeal instituted against

Mr Justice Northrop's decision?

MS CAMERON:	To refuse it?
HIS HONOUR:	Was any appeal instituted against that?
MS CAMERON:	No, because I came to the Court, to

Mr Justice Toohey on this point, and he found that

there had not been a decision made one way or
another, again because there was a problem because

I did not have the transcript at all or the orders.

And then we went back and asked Mr Justice Lockhart

to rule one way or the other and he did not, again,
and then I went back before Justice Gaudron about

it, and she said to go back and get a decision one

way or another, and if he said no to come back.

You see, the problem is the time. The big

problem I have got is that Sly & Weigall are now

racing ahead in trying to bankrupt me and wind up

Gamester to stop me from continuing with this

litigation, and one of the orders that they had

dismissed before the court, when I was in hospital,

was a notice of motion which the taxing officer

told me to file, asking that a taxation be set

aside, because they told me that they had cancelled

the appointment with the taxing officer, and then

they went to the appointment and the taxation - - -

HIS HONOUR:  You are going on to something other than the

mandamus, are you not?

MS CAMERON: 

I am explaining why it is urgent because - - -

HIS HONOUR: 

I understand that you believe it to be urgent,

but in order to get mandamus you must be able to
show that the court has failed to exercise a

jurisdiction which it is bound to exercise.

Gamester(7) 27 20/3/92

MS CAMERON:	Yes. Well, here it is in the transcript.
HIS HONOUR:	You have spoken of Mr Justice Northrop and then of having gone back before Mr Justice Lockhart.
MS CAMERON:	I am sorry, and then -
HIS HONOUR:	And then, after Mr Justice Northrop was said to

have made some order you subsequently went back

before Mr Justice Lockhart.

MS CAMERON:  No. This is the Full Bench transcript here and

I asked the Full Bench to make an order and the

Full Bench refused to make an order - I am sorry, I

asked the Full Bench to stay it, under the Legal

Aid Commission Act, and the Full Bench refused to

and it is here in the transcript.

HIS HONOUR:  In what way has the Full Bench in that case, in

your submission, failed to exercise its

jurisdiction?

MS CAMERON: Well, it has failed to stay the matter under

the provision of the Legal Aid Commission Act. I

think it is section 57 which says, where an appeal

against the refusal of legal aid is pending there

must be an automatic stay.

HIS HONOUR:  Is that something which is directed to State

courts or Federal Court?

MS CAMERON:	It is not directed to any court and - - -
HIS HONOUR:	I see.
MS CAMERON:	And the Legal Aid Commission people said that there is case law on it that where you are allowed
to apply for legal aid for a Federal Court matter you get - all of the provisions apply, not just
part of the provisions.
HIS HONOUR: Well again, as at present advised from the

material before me, I see no evidence that the

Federal Court has failed to exercise the

jurisdiction which it was bound to exercise.

MS CAMERON:	But I can show it to you; it is here.
HIS HONOUR:	But it may be that there is some basis on which you might appeal from some order that has been made
by the Federal Court, but in that event I do not have the order of that court before me.

MS CAMERON:  But this is the Full Bench. We cannot go

higher than the Full Bench of the Federal Court

and - - -

Gamester(7) 28 20/3/92

HIS HONOUR:  I think you appreciate sufficiently,

Ms Cameron, that documents have to be produced in a

form which allows this Court to deal with them; not

matters which appear in a transcript handed up from

the bar table.

MS CAMERON:  No, well I did not know that. I thought the

transcript could be used as a substitute for the

order.

HIS HONOUR:  Is there anything further you wish to say?

MS CAMERON: Yes. So, does that mean that - I have just got

a bit confused - what do I do about that situation?

HIS HONOUR:  It is a matter for you, Ms Cameron. The Court

is not here as a legal advisor. The Court is here

to decide matters, not to advise litigants.

MS CAMERON:  I did not see how we could appeal to the Full

Court from the Full Court.

HIS HONOUR:  It may not be appealing to the Full Court from

the Full Court. You could seek, if you had the

basis for it, special leave to appeal to this Court

from the Full Court, but then you are in the same difficulties with regard to establishing what the

subject-matter of the appeal is about and whether

you should have special leave to this Court in

order to institute an appeal.

MS CAMERON: 

I understood that where it was a straight-out

failure to perform a duty which is very clear, like
an Act of Parliament, that mandamus was the

appropriate course.

HIS HONOUR: 

You have not persuaded me that there is any

case for mandamus in this case so far, Ms Cameron.

MS CAMERON:  But I could do that by showing you the

transcript. It is here in the transcript.

HIS HONOUR:  If you wish me to look at the transcript, I

will look at the transcript.

MS CAMERON:  Yes, thank you. It starts on the bottom of

page 62, the last two sentences and then it goes on

to page 63.

HIS HONOUR:  Yes, well I see there was an application for an

adjournment which was refused. You then made it

clear that you were applying for a stay, and the

Court said that if there was any difference, then

it was refused also.

MS CAMERON:  Yes.

Gamester(7) 29 20/3/92

HIS HONOUR:	Yes, very well.
MS CAMERON:	What I am asking is, can you make them stay it

because of the Act of Parliament?

HIS HONOUR:  As at present advised, on the material before

me at the moment, I am not satisfied that there is

any basis for the issuing of an order nisi for

mandamus directed to the Federal Court.

MS CAMERON:  Well what do I have to do? Do I have to get

the order - - -

HIS HONOUR:  I am not here to advise you, Ms Cameron.

MS CAMERON: Right. I am sorry, but by afternoon I am just

too tired to concentrate. Did you say that you

will not give an extension of time to file and that

I need to get the orders and then apply to file it

out of time? Is that what you said, I am sorry, I

am just not concentrating.

HIS HONOUR:  I said that I was not prepared, at present, to

extend the time limited for the lodging of an

application for special leave to appeal.

MS CAMERON:  Yes, and did you say that if I get the orders

and then apply, you still do not think we will get

it or - - -?

HIS HONOUR:	I do not know whether you will get it or not.
MS CAMERON:	I thought you said that you did not think we

would.

HIS HONOUR:	I am not satisfied that you would.
MS CAMERON:	That we would get it out of time.
HIS HONOUR:	I do not know whether you would get it out of

time or not. Now, Ms Cameron, I do not propose to

answer any more of your questions. If you have any

further submissions to make I will hear them.

MS CAMERON:  Yes, I have. I am just trying to get it sorted

out. There is one point in here that I would like

to clear up: the Federal Court have combined both

of these appeals. Could they be combined as one

appeal to the High Court as well?

HIS HONOUR:	Have you any further submissions, Ms Cameron.
MS CAMERON:	Yes.  Are you able to rule on that, that we

have to do it as one, because the Federal Court

did, or do we have to do it as two?

Gamester(?) 30 20/3/92

HIS HONOUR:  I am not proposing to answer that question,

Ms Cameron.	Have you any further submissions to
make?

MS CAMERON:  Yes, now the other thing that I have got here

is that - I have not finished addressing you on the

grounds for special leave to appeal and the merits

of it, but I had only just started that before

lunch and there are very important grounds that I

have not covered. Do I cover those or do I not go

into them or what do I do?

HIS HONOUR:  Ms ·cameron, I have endeavoured to indicate to

you that the papers as they presently stand before

me do not start to indicate that this is a case
where either an appeal lies if special leave were

granted or that special leave should be granted.	I
do not know even the subject-matter of the
decisions against which you propose or wish to
appeal.	Now, in those circumstances there is no

purpose in you speaking about any sense of
injustice that you have about the orders that have

been made, in the absence of any indication of what

those orders are.

MS CAMERON: Right. Because the application for special

leave to appeal that has been filed was filed

before I had seen the transcript and before I had

been able to get legal advice about it.	I have
read the transcript.	I have not had legal advice,

but there are very important and very strong

grounds for appeal which are not in the material

that is before you. I started to tell you about

them before and I have not finished. Shall I

finish those or - I am sorry I just cannot

concentrate. Do I finish them? If one of the

reasons on which you decide is the prospects of

success of an application for special leave to
appeal, then you have not got the important grounds

before you because that was done before the

transcript was available.

BRENNAN J: Well, if they are not there, they are not there,

Ms Cameron, are they?

MS CAMERON: Well, shall I tell you what they are?

BRENNAN J:  If you wish to. I will give you five minutes

in which to do that.

MS CAMERON:  One of the important ones is that our notice of

appeal was not before the court, and that Mr Martin

led the court through our superseded notice of

appeal, and he also tried to say to the court that

the appeal was based on the day before. And he

said that he used the judgment of the day before

Gamester(7) 31 20/3/92

which we have not appealed against because it is

not relevant to anything. It has been superseded.

We applied for an adjournment on the basis

that in two days time we were going to have legal

representation and the judgment did not mention

that, and it could be argued very strongly. The

point is that that judgment of the day before was

before the court, but not any of the material that

was before Mr Justice Sheppard on the day that he

made the judgment, and we wanted that put in the

appeal books, and it was not put in the appeal

books.

There is also the very important point that

Mr Martin told the court that Sly & Weigall had given us seven days notice in writing of the

hearing of the matter 839 which he had not done,

and he had, in fact, told the court when I was

there that he did not wish to have those notices of

motion heard. They were heard the following day in

my absence, so not only was the seven days notice

not given, but he deceived us in saying that he did
not want to have them heard, and we feel that that

is a very important ground for appeal.

If I only have five minutes, those are the

most important ones which I can see, but as I said

before, we have not yet had advice on what the

grounds are.

HIS HONOUR:  There is one other matter that you should

consider, and that is the question of the

application for mandamus to the Federal Court, in a

matter which would involve the interests - - -

MS CAMERON:  Yes, but I have not finished what I wanted to

say.

HIS HONOUR:  I am sorry, proceed with that.

MS CAMERON:  The final thing that I wanted to say, and I

would plead with you, you might think this is not
relevant, but I plead with you to hear me on it

because it may or may not be relevant but it is

terribly, terribly important. One of the main

notices of motion which Mr Martin said - Mr Martin

told the Full Federal Court that all of the notices

of motion in the main matter had been dealt with by

the court and they have not, and one of the main

ones which has not been deal with was a restraining

order on Rural Press, and anyone associated with

them, from having anything to do with me or coming

anywhere near me, because I have been threatened

several times that I will be murdered if I tell

anyone about this case, and Mr Lindsay Houghton of

Sly & Weigall said to me on the phone on 26 January

Gamester(?) 32 20/3/92

of this year that if I did not keep quiet very soon
something would be done to me to make sure that I

did keep quiet.

I have been before this court for nine years,

over 200 directions hearings, not one of our

affidavits of evidence have ever been heard, not

one witness has ever been heard, and it is a simply

extraordinary story, and if we cannot continue and

seek to enforce this settlement in the High Court

the case comes to an end, and I have to make a

decision as to what I am going to do.	I have one
of two alternatives.

HIS HONOUR:  The question of relevance comes in again now,

Ms Cameron, and that is what is the material on

which you wish me to make a decision. It will not

be what your future plans for yourself are, it is
what is the decision that has been made by the

court below which justify any interference by this

Court.

MS CAMERON:  What I am putting to you now is what the police

have told me to put to the Federal Court, and to

any court that I go before, and to any person who

has anything to do with this case, and I plead with

you to listen to me because - - -

HIS HONOUR:  I do not propose to listen to you as to your

future plans, Ms Cameron.

MS CAMERON:	What can I say?
HIS HONOUR:	I do not know what you can say.  You have said

a fair amount and in the course of it you have made

some substantial allegations against people who are

not here to defend themselves.

MS CAMERON:  Could I perhaps ask this: that we have a

hearing when they are here to defend themselves,

and that their evidence be examined and that we

call Dr May?

HIS HONOUR:  I think you are sufficiently familiar with the

procedures of the Court to know what the limits of

that are, Ms Cameron.

MS CAMERON:	I beg your pardon.
HIS HONOUR:	I think you are sufficiently familiar with the

proceedings of the Court to know that you are here,

either to appeal from a decision in the court below

or to invoke some original jurisdiction such as

mandamus.

MS CAMERON:  But you mentioned before - I cannot remember

exactly what you said, but you said something abut

Gamester(7) 33 20/3/92

you could not hear a certain application without

the other side being here, and I am wondering if we

could adjourn this to a day when they can be here.

I mean, I agree I think they should be here and I

think there should be a fair and proper hearing of

the allegations.

You see, we are going to have the

extraordinary situation soon where the public is

going to hear about this case before the Court

because I have either got to just live the rest of

my life destitute or sign a contract with

publishers for a book to be published.	I do not
want to do that.	I have said countless times that

I do not want to do it.

HIS HONOUR:  Have you finished all the relevant material you

wish to place before me?

MS CAMERON:  Yes. I would just like to say that what I

would like you to do if you can would be, if the

grounds of success on the appeal are important, if

we could have another hearing date after we have

had the benefit of advice from Mr Bennett, and if

we could have the other side here.

HIS HONOUR:	Is that all you wish to say?
MS CAMERON:	No, there is a lot more that I would like to

say, but I think that you will just say that it is

not relevant.

HIS HONOUR: If it is relevant, I will hear it. If it is

not relevant, I will not.

MS CAMERON:  I plead with you to listen to me, to what I

want to say. Can I just have five minutes?

HIS HONOUR:  No, you cannot have five minutes now. You can

have five minutes when the Full Court adjourns if

you wish, and I will hear you then. I must go now

to sit in the Full Court, and when the Full Court

adjourns I will come back to this Court and I will

hear you then for five minutes.

MS CAMERON:  I am sorry to take up more time. What time

will that be?

HIS HONOUR:  I do not know, whenever the Full Court is

finished. You will have to wait and discover what

time that is. Whenever the present case is

finished there, I will resume my seat here.

MS CAMERON:	Yes.	You do not mind doing that?
HIS HONOUR:	I do not mind doing that.	You will be able to

find out when the Full Court is finished by either

Gamester(?) 34 20/3/92

observing the Court, which is in Court No 2, or by

making inquiries of the Registry who, provided you

let them know where you will be at any moment, will

then let you know when you can come back here.

MS CAMERON:	Yes, and you will then tell me exactly what you have decided because I cannot really
concentrate - - -
HIS HONOUR:	We will see what happens when we resume

sitting, Ms Cameron.

MS CAMERON:  Thank you.

AT 2.10 PM THE MATTER WAS ADJOURNED

UNTIL LATER THE SAME DAY

UPON RESUMING AT 3.10 PM:

HIS HONOUR:	Yes, Ms Cameron.
MS CAMERON:	During the break I have managed to get some

very truncated advice, because we still do not have

the judgment, but just on the transcript -

HIS HONOUR: Sit down if you wish to.

MS CAMERON:  Thank you. The advice that I have received is

that it is just a very preliminary examination of

the matter because we do not have the judgment, we

only have the transcript, is that the rules need to

be examined and the procedures need to be looked

at, but perhaps we should be asking the Federal

Court to rehear the matter on the basis that the

Court has been misled because of the strength of	the misleading of the court and that deals with
this situation where I say to you, "Mr Martin has
lied to the court", you get upset because I say he
has lied, I get upset because the Court will not
hear the evidence of it - I have lost everything I
owned, my home, everything, because Mr Martin has
lied to the court, and the advice is that the court
should address that. They should examine the
evidence of it and the way to do it is to ask the Federal Court to rehear it and what I would like to
do is to - I ask you if I could just give you one
example of the way in which the court was misled -
I have the evidence here, if I could do that.

HIS HONOUR:  What has that got to do with the waiver of fees or an order nisi for a mandamus?

Gamester(?) 35 20/3/92

MS CAMERON:  It is to do with the ground, the denial of

natural justice and the prospects of success.

HIS HONOUR: Denial of natural justice in what matter?

MS CAMERON: In each one. In each one we have been

dismissed because the court was misled and in the

two matters which are the subject of the appeal in

February.

HIS HONOUR:	I do not see that what was said in court, and which you now say, was said falsely in court goes
any distance towards establishing the prospects of
success if you were to institute an appeal on those
orders.
MS CAMERON:	Taking the last one, the February matter, I

think it was Mr Justice Northrop said the fact that

I was in hospital was a strong ground for an

appeal, and then he said, "Perhaps we should see if

there is an arguable case", and that is when, we

say, Mr Martin misled the court and that he

made - almost without exception his statements were

not truthful, and he knew they were not truthful.

To start with, he offered to lead the court through

a notice of appeal which was not our notice of

appeal before the court. It had been superseded

with a notice of appeal after we had received legal

advice and seen the transcript and the judgment,

and he misled the court by taking them back and

saying that the appeal was based on the events the

day before the actual dismissal took place.

HIS HONOUR:  Ms Cameron, unless I can see some relevance in

what you are saying, I do not think I should permit

you to continue making statements under the

privilege of this Court which is damaging to the

reputation of people who are not present.

MS CAMERON:  Could I perhaps show you the two conflicting

statements in the transcript on an affidavit?

HIS HONOUR:	Yes, I will see whatever you wish to show me.
MS CAMERON:	I am sorry to take up your time.

HIS HONOUR: It is not a question of taking up my time. It

is a question of your identifying some relevant

issue. Now, I appreciate that you are not legally

qualified and on that account you might find it

difficult to identify what are the legal issues,

but before you invoke the jurisdiction of this

ultimate Court in Australia you must be in a

position to bring a problem here which is capable

of legal solution.

MS CAMERON:	I understand that, yes, I do.
Gamester(?)	20/3/92
HIS HONOUR:	And if you cannot do that, then you must find

your remedy elsewhere.

MS CAMERON: Yes, I understand that. If I could just have a

moment to find things.

HIS HONOUR:	Yes.
MS CAMERON:	I am sorry, these will no longer be stapled

together, but they are mostly short. Now this is a

page from a transcript of 6 December 1991 and this

is the affidavit of Dr May and Dr Wragg and

Mr Tebbutt, and there is also one there, an

affidavit of mine, and then this is the transcript

of 28 February, where Mr Martin said that our

Mr Harrison had spoken with Dr May and he has not.

HIS HONOUR:  And what is this to show? That the court was

mislead about your physical condition, is that

right?

MS CAMERON:  Yes, and Mr Martin said, in his submission to

the court on 28 February, which was the last appeal
which we are seeking to bring to this Court, that

the matter which we were appealing against was

dismissed because of the medical evidence put

before the court, and perhaps I should find that
page where he said that, because that is probably

the most conclusive thing of all. Yes, it is on

this same page. And the other one - unfortunately

I do not have the transcript here, but I think it

is in the file before Mr Justice Toohey, which was

here in this Court, so it would be here, in which

Mr Martin said that he did not wish the notices of motion heard.

HIS HONOUR:  Now, you wish me to read the which is numbered

14, dated 6 December 1991, is that right?

MS CAMERON:	Yes, and the other page, which is -
HIS HONOUR: Just a moment until I read this one first.

Now, that is the page 14, and now you wish me to

read page 97 of 28 February, is that right?

MS CAMERON:	Yes, thank you.
HIS HONOUR:	Now, who was representing you on 28 February,

anybody?

MS CAMERON:	No.
HIS HONOUR:	Were you present in court when this happened?
MS CAMERON:	No, I was in hospital.

Gamester(?)	37	20/3/92
HIS HONOUR:	And then this is the affidavit of Dr May.	Is

that right?

MS CAMERON:	Yes.
HIS HONOUR:	And you wish me to read that?
MS CAMERON:	Yes, and also there is the affidavit of

Dr Wragg, Mr Tebbutt and an affidavit of mine.

HIS HONOUR:	Do you wish me to read Dr May's affidavit?
MS CAMERON:	Yes, if you had time it would be helpful to

read them all, but his is the important one.

HIS HONOUR: Yes, I will. Yes, I have read those affidavits

and including your affidavit, but your affidavit

only up to the point where it deals with the

adjournment and the medical evidence about the

adjournment.

MS CAMERON: Another very serious point is that on

29 November 1991 Mr Martin said to

Mr Justice Sheppard that he did not want heard

notices of motion for which he had to give us seven

days notice in writing. They did not ever give us

the notice in writing and we did not know they were being heard, and they were dismissed in my absence.

Yet Mr Martin told the Full Court on the 28th that

he had given seven days notice, and he had not at

all.

BRENNAN J: Is there anything further?

MS CAMERON: Well, the other very strong point of evidence

is that the stamped amended notice of appeal which

Mr Martin said in the transcript that he had not

received, that we had attempted to file it after

the index had been settled and that the court had

not accepted it, which is incorrect. It was filed

and accepted and stamped by the court before the
index was settled.	Mr Martin said that to the

court that he had not received a copy of it, and
then he again misled the court in telling them that

the amended notice of appeal was not greatly

different from the non-amended one. So he tripped

himself up in that he had seen it and it was not

correct to say that it was not different from the

first one because it was, and it raised a most

important point of appeal, and that was not

considered by the Full Court.

Another note that I have just made here is

that - I do not believe in saying something behind

somebody's back, to put it more or less in slang

terms. I wish Mr Martin was here. This is the

problem, you see. We do not have hearings when we

Gamester(?) 38 20/3/92

are both present. We only have hearings when I am

not there, and I think that this issue of Mr Martin

misleading the court should be fully aired.	The
point is we have lost every round in this case.	I
have lost everything I own because Mr Martin has
been allowed to discredit me to the court, but the
court accepts that.

Nobody has ever said to Mr Martin, "You must

not criticize Mrs Cameron when she is not here", it

is just accepted and he has gnawed away at this

court for nine years. He has said - the most awful

things that he has said are that I get doctors to

write false medical certificates. Now doctors are

outraged. They want a special hearing. Two of

them have suggested to me, why do we not - can you

not get a special hearing of the court and all the

doctors would go along and tell the court that they

have not written false medical certificates, and

confirm the evidence.

Going over the history of this case, not one

medical certificate has been believed by the court

because Mr Martin has said that I - words to the

effect - that I have talked the doctors into

writing false certificates and swearing false

affidavits. It just flies in the face of any

common sense or anything that is logical, that I

would have extraordinary powers to get people like

Professor May, or Dr Cobblestone or Dr Burke to write false certificates. In criticizing the

medical certificates he is not criticizing me, he

is criticizing the doctors, and I think that point

has escaped both the court and Mr Martin.

During the break I have had time to try and

understand what the position is and what you have said to me and again I apologize for taking up so

much of your time when before we have had advice

and before I am fully aware of what we should be doing and what the proper course is. Again this comes back to this point of legal aid. If only we

could wait until we had the legal aid or - you see, another point was, Mr Bennett and a junior counsel,

Mr Armfield, said that they would act for us

without payment if we could get a solicitor to

instruct them and we could not get a solicitor on

the 27th and the 28th, but we could get one
thereafter and if we could get a proper hearing now

we could have legal representation and if we get

the legal aid, well then, they will be paid.

I have got two areas of comment here that I

would like to make, if I could, and one area is

probably - would come under the category of

irrelevance other than - I simply do not have the

money to pay the fee. I am back to the position

Gamester 39 20/3/92

now where I cannot even afford to pay my Medibank

Private insurance which means that I go back on to

the public hospital waiting list and I desperately

need medication all the time. I have to take a new

drug called Lo-set for my stomach which I cannot

get without an endoscopy and I have had to cancel
it eight times. I had one in February, I have got

to have them every month from now on and I will be in hospital on Monday and Tuesday of next week and

also on Saturday of next week I have got to go to

hospital for tests.	I have managed to get one done
on a Saturday.

The only other thing I was going to say to you

is, if the time could just - I was going to ask you

for Monday and I have just remembered that I have

to go to hospital - if it could be extended till

Wednesday, I could either perhaps try and borrow

the money again, or if Mr Bennett is back from

Adelaide we could get further advice on what we should be doing, whether or not we should be trying

to get the Federal Court to rehear it on the basis

that it was misled, or what to do. I was wondering

if you could stay the orders until - if I can

borrow the money - to stay the orders and - - -

HIS HONOUR: Stay what orders?

MS CAMERON:  The main problem we have got is that the orders

that Mr Martin - the Federal Court put a stay on

all the cost orders because a term of the

settlement is that each party pay their own costs

and Sly & Weigall had to give us seven days notice

to remove that stay and they did not do it, and not

only did they not give us the notice, they deceived
us by asking the court not to hear us, saying they

did not want those motions heard, and then as soon

as I was in hospital they then had them heard and

dismissed which means that they can now proceed to

bankrupt me. They know that they will not get
anything from me.	We have written to the directors

of Rural Press and offered them any access, any

examination of my affairs they want to see that I

just do not have anything that they could possibly

get.

HIS HONOUR:  Ms Cameron, this litigation has been going on

for how many years?

MS CAMERON: It is into its ninth year.

HIS HONOUR:  Ninth year. How many orders would have been

made in that time, do you think?

MS CAMERON:  I do not really know, but there would be quite

a few - I mean, more than quite a few.	I just do
not know.

Gamester(?) 40 20/3/92

HIS HONOUR:  You see, there seems to be a plethora of

litigation of a very diffuse kind. Now, by that I

mean that it is very difficult for you, and because

it is difficult for you, difficult for any court,

to understand what are the issues for determination

at any stage. Now, here we have three applications

for consideration today; they are applications for

the waiver of fees to institute yet one more

proceeding in this long and sorry chapter.

MS CAMERON:  But see, Sly & Weigall have done that on

purpose. See, to take the settlement as an

example, I went to the court with, I think, four

documents: the written offer, the written
acceptance, acknowledgement of the acceptance and

the signed document, and I said it will probably

take two hours to enforce, which is what we were

advised. Sly & Weigall said "No, it will take

days." Then they filed masses, inches of

affidavits and away we went on this great morass of

litigation and I say, and the court transcripts

confirm, that Sly & Weigall have mushroomed this

litigation into this great morass, for two reasons:

one, they have benefitted from the fees; and the

other is, it has just bogged it, it has just caused

an impossible situation.

HIS HONOUR:  Ms Cameron, just listen to me for a few

minutes. We have three applications here for a

waiver of fees, two of them relate to a filing fee

for appeals, a third relates to a filing fee for an

order nisi. The two which relate to appeals

relate, I now understand, to appeals from orders

made by the Full Federal Court. We do not have,

presently in Court, either the orders made by the

Full Federal Court or the orders made at first instance from which the appeal to the Full Federal

Court was brought. Nor do we have any of the

reasons for judgment, either of the judge at first

instance or of the Full Federal Court.

Before waiver of fees is ordered, it is

necessary to be satisfied that there are some

special reasons for waiving them and included

within the content of this notion of special

reasons is some appreciation that there is a

prospect of success or at least of arguability of

the proceedings.

If I do not have either the orders or the

reasons given by the courts below, I cannot be

satisfied that there are special reasons.

MS CAMERON:	I understand that.
HIS HONOUR:	Let me finish.  The third application relates

to the order nisi, and that is an order nisi

Gamester(?) 41 20/3/92

directed, it would seem, to Mr Justice Lockhart and

it relates to three matters, two of which are the

appeals which have gone to the Full Federal Court.

So that, on their face, it is suggested that

Mr Justice Lockhart has failed to exercise some

jurisdiction which is vested in him in matters

which have gone to the Full Federal Court.

MS CAMERON:  No, I am sorry - you see, that is the problem

with computers. That should have read just "the

Federal Court". I used the old form.

HIS HONOUR: Whether that is so or not, whether it is the

computer's fault, I do not pause to say. All I am
saying is that before, again, there is any waiver

of fees in relation to that, there must be

something to indicate that it is at least highly

arguable that if an order nisi is granted there is

real defective jurisdiction which can be remedied

by the granting of the mandamus.

MS CAMERON: That is what I showed you in the transcript.

HIS HONOUR:  You may think that you showed that to me in the

transcript. I can only say that what you showed me

did not satisfy me that there was any failure on

the part of Mr Justice Lockhart to exercise a

jurisdiction that was properly vested in him.

MS CAMERON:	No, I mean the Full Court, Mr Justice Northrop.
HIS HONOUR:	The order nisi is, supposedly, directed to

Mr Justice Lochart.

MS CAMERON:  I forgot to change it on the computer.

HIS HONOUR: Perhaps you did, but that rather raises the

whole problem of, are we going to, as it were, deal
with shifting sands with changing subject-matters

every time there is some defect in the proceedings?

I think, Ms Cameron, you have understood from

what I have just said what the problems are, and unless you can say something to me now to remove those problems from my mind, I propose to make an

order dismissing your applications.

MS CAMERON:	Yes, well I can say this that - - -
HIS HONOUR:	Now, you understand what it is that has caused

me to say what I have said?

MS CAMERON:	Yes.
HIS HONOUR:	So unless you can say something relevant to

those matters I will make the order and adjourn the

Court.

Gamester(?) 42 20/3/92

MS CAMERON:  You see, I have just come out of hospital and I

did these documents from the computer from the time

before when it was before Justice Gaudron, and it

was against Mr Justice Lockhart, and I just simply

forgot to change it in the computer. That should

be against either the Full Court or

Mr Justice Northrop, who is the lead judge.

In regard to getting the judgment of the Full

Court, I understand it has not been given yet.	The
judgment has not been written yet.	I cannot do it

until Wednesday, but on Wednesday I can quote those

two rules that you mentioned before and approach

the registrar again and try and get the orders.

But as far as the judgment of 28 February is

concerned, that is what I have not got. I suppose

I could write a letter saying it is required

urgently.

What I am asking is even if you could just

extend the date for filing, say, till Wednesday or

Thursday next week, one of two things could happen.

I could try and find out when the judgment will be

ready, and also I could get some more advice, and

if I know that I cannot get the fee I could perhaps

try and borrow it.

You see, the problem is that - a very strong point which I want to say is that we did not start

this litigation. Rural pursued us. Rural pursued

Gamester Pty Ltd, and we were advised to

cross-claim in the Federal Court, and the solicitor

advised combining me as a party and Mr Parker and

Mr Starkey as a party.	I do not believe in
litigation.	I think it is for people without

sufficient commoij sense and decency to resolve

their problems, and usually for people who are

spending other people's money.	I just do not
believe in it, and here I am nine years later.	I
have lost everything that I own because I applied
for legal aid because I was sued.	I have never had

my story heard by the court which is an

extraordinary situation.	I have lost my health.
It has cost me a marriage.	It has cost the most

extraordinary fights in our family over money that

I have borrowed and I cannot pay back.	I often
think of committing suicide.	I do not know what
else to do.

There is one option, I can sign a contract

with publishers and tell the story and join people

like Lindy Chamberlain and these people who - I

mean I have not followed it because I am not all

that interested, but I do not think that the public

should have to get their damages by publicity. ·

There are people who do not like the indignity of

that sort of thing.

Gamester	20/3/92
HIS HONOUR:	We do not seem to be getting very much further

along the lines of relevance, Ms Cameron, so in the

circumstances - - -

MS CAMERON:  If I could just ask you - if you could just say

if you could - because I have just come out of
hospital - I realize that I am not well prepared -

I have not got the material and - what I am saying,

if you can give me a few days I can get the orders

and I will try and find out when the judgment is

going to be ready and I can - and if I fail to do

that by the time it gives me a few days to once

again try and borrow the money. I understand it is only $200 to file the - and also the most important thing is that I can get some advice, that

Mr Bennett is back from Adelaide and I can get some advice as to what we should do and I plead with you to just give us a few days so that we can - - -

HIS HONOUR:  Ms Cameron, it has been pointed out to you that

if documents are in a proper form and if there is a

proceeding which is a viable proceeding, then it is

open to you to apply for an extension of time even

though time has expired. As the documents appear

to me, at the moment, to be in such a state that

even if I were to grant an extension of time of a

week or more it would be most unlikely that they
would be in a form which would justify the making

of any of the orders presently sought. In those

circumstances I do not propose to hear any further

submissions from you unless you address one of the

matters which I earlier mentioned to you.	Now have
you anything to say about those matters?

MS CAMERON:	Which matters were they?
HIS HONOUR:	Matters of the availability of the material

which is necessary to have in hand in order to establish a viable case for an appeal or order

nisi.

MS CAMERON:  Yes. What I would like to do is get the

judgments and I feel that if I can go to the

High Court again with those orders and say that you

pointed the orders out to me, I am hopeful that I

can get them.

HIS HONOUR:  You understand that I drew your attention to

some provisions of the rules of the Federal Court.

I said nothing to you and you are not at liberty to

say anything to anybody else as to any advice I

have given you or any course which I think any

other person or officer is obliged to take.

MS CAMERON:  No, but could I just say that you drew my

attention to them?

Gamester(?) 44 20/3/92

HIS HONOUR:  You may say that.

MS CAMERON: Yes, that is what I was going to say. If I can

get the orders - you see, as I see it, we need

three things:  we need the orders; we need the

judgment; and we need some advice about the

grounds of appeal. I could get those if I could

have a bit of time. The other thing that I do not

understand is if, when I have got all of that, can

I then apply again to have the fee waived or what is the position if we do not get the fee waived

today?

HIS HONOUR:  I am not proposing to give you any further

advice, Ms Cameron. In the circumstances, I do not

propose to extend any times, nor do I propose to

make any order on any of the summonses. Each of

the summonses is dismissed.

The Court will now adjourn to a date to be

fixed.

AT 3.49 PM THE MATTER WAS ADJOURNED SINE DIE

Gamester(?) 45 20/3/92