Vendetta !

It was a prosecution that intrigued the nation and it splashed across newspaper headlines all the way to the High Court of Australia.   This nation's top anti-corruption body accused one it's leading prosecutors of a crime and went relentlessly after her, despite a complete lack of evidence of guilt.

Margaret Cunneen emerged from the battle - victorious.   The finding of the High Court went her way and what surprises many people is that nothing has changed.   The people who run ICAC are still sitting at their desks in full control and many months later the only action seems to be a whimper.  ICAC will soon be required to face a Parliamentary Enquiry - to explain it's actions.

In government service, the maxim that the buck stops at the top is the usual credo.   It was quite clear that the pursuit of Margaret Cunneen was a personal vendetta and without substance.  It was quite clear that ICAC would not back off and it was money from the public purse that was being expended on what many saw as an ongoing vendetta.

Despite a High Court ruling that ICAC pay all of Margaret Cunneen's legal costs, ICAC seems to be backsliding and still carrying on that vendetta.  It is stubbornly refusing to cough up and settle the bill and it looks like Cunneen may have to go back to the High Court to get it's ruling enforced.

To most people, any sort of court action is a financial disaster.  The higher the court, the greater the costs and legal representation by a top silk can run to many hundreds of dollars a day.  Cunneen has presented ICAC with a bill for $ 230,000 and the crime fighting body is proposing to only remit $ 138,000 - despite it's own costs in the High Court action running to $ 183,000.

That is the absurdity of the "appeals "system.  Whatever type of win you achieve in any court seems open to challenge by way of appeal, and that means issues can go unresolved for years.  The whole system of law is based on a legal pyramid.   The decision of a lower court can be subjected to the findings of a higher - and supposedly - wiser court, but at the very apex of that pyramid is the High Court of Australia.

What ICAC has chosen to do is adopt a nit picking approach to costs that have already been the subject of a finding by that highest legal body.   There is every indication that trying to challenge every item contained in Cunneen's legal bill will entail an army of accountants making various interpretations, many of which involve the tactical strategies used by the various legal minds that were applied to the case.   It is absolutely certain that such a challenge to a legal bill will - in itself - generate - even more expense.

This is a case where the state government - which is the entity which created and controls ICAC - should step in and end this whole sorry mess.  ICAC messed up badly and made a very unwise decision to go after Cunneen on shaky ground.   It is sheer arrogance that the vendetta continues.

An apology would be in order - and that legal bill should be promptly paid without further question.
That still leaves the matter of what needs to be done to ensure that ICAC does not make the same sort of error in the future  !