AWB Secret Documents Safe For A Little Longer
AWB Secret Documents Safe For A Little Longer
July 18th, 2006: The Australian Wheat Board has won an injunction preventing the Cole Commission from accessing 1300 requested documents.
The decision was reached this afternoon in the Melbourne Federal Court. Justice Neil Young said he did not believe Commissioner Terence Cole QC should have the power to determine the legal status of the documents.
AWB claims that the 1300 documents are protected by legal privilege and therefore cannot be used by Commissioner Cole in his inquiry into whether AWB paid kickbacks to the regime of Iraqi dictator Saddam Hussein, in breach of UN sanctions. Yesterday AWB’s lawyers denied the company was trying to hide the documents, with counsel for AWB, James Judd QC, telling Justice Young “AWB has no desire to conceal these documents from appropriate authorities, subject to the privilege”.
The Cole Inquiry was given the power to seek the documents last month by the Government but the injunction will prevent the documents being seen by the inquiry until the matter is resolved. The case has been set for a directions hearing tomorrow.