Public servants challenge coroner’s bushfire report
Public servants challenge coroner’s bushfirereport
27 February 2007
published by www.abc.net.au
Australia — Four senior public servants in charge of the handling ofCanberra’s 2003 bushfires have lodged an application to review the findings oflast year’s coroner’s report.
Former Emergency Services Bureau chief Mike Castle,former chief fire controller Peter Lucas Smith, planning officer Rick McCrae andincident controller Tony Graham have taken the action in the ACT Supreme Court.
Court documents state the four men want the court toquash adverse comments made against them by the coroner, Maria Doogan, in her800-page report into the fires.
The application states the men were denied proceduralfairness by the coroner, that she exceeded her jurisdiction and exhibited bias.
The matter will be brought before the court on March 13.
