John Linton ....according to Ronald Reagan are: "We're from the government and we're here to help". It is sad but true that democracy as a system of government has proven to be as useless a form of government as every other oppressive process that proceeded it and, as now defined in the countries that practice it, is simply a method of ensuring that the citizens of any country inflicted with this process are systematically raped and looted by a venal 'elite' called "major political parties" whose single objective is to 'obtain power' (they are so blatant they actually continually use those words) for the sole purpose of personally obtaining wealth and privilege paid for by the citizens of the country they 'govern' - "govern" in their terms being a synonym for extracting the most personal monetary gain from their 'term in power' in the shortest possible time.
In Australia it is very hard to find, since Federation, any person elected to Federal parliament who became a 'minister' who didn't leave politics incredibly more wealthy than he/she entered it. Given the quantum of the total remuneration paid to any individual during their 'parliamentary career' it is fortunate that the ATO is a 'government department' (controlled by a 'minister') because in what other way than bribery and its equivalents could any of these very average people, whose employment record before being given access to the 'trough' demonstrate a bare ability to make ends meet, have become 'millionaires' when they left?
......and then there are the even larger numbers of democracy's gift to increasing any country's levels of indolence, sub-mediocrity and sloth - "public servants" - one of democracy's quainter examples of twisted humour using the word "servant" to describe an uneducated and ill mannered pos whose only concept of 'public' is to attend a work place to use the computer and telephone facilities paid for by the Australian citizenry to deal with aspects of their personal life and whose concept of "service" is the frequent use of the 'hold' button on their telephone so they can reduce to an absolute minimum the interruptions from the "public" in doing that.
For all of my life I have accepted that "government" was an untouchable monolith that ruined various people's lives because it had the means to do so and possessed a universal attitude of uncaring and incompetence that made every Australian's life more miserable than it would be if none of them existed.....and that there was nothing any citizen could do about it. Doubtless that is still almost certainly true but I intend to at least try and do something about it because it has simply gone much too far and it makes me really angry that government drones can be allowed to carry out what I see as deliberate and systemic fraud.
Exetel is now going to take a court action to have the TIO closed as being a 'criminal' organisation based on a level of incompetence, lack of knowledge and unconstitutional actions that even Australian's, who are mostly as apathetic as the governments they tolerate, shouldn't have imposed on them.
I recently wrote to the TIO (on behalf of Exetel) giving them examples of how they routinely broke the rules of their constitution and requesting a commitment from them that they would cease acting unconstitutionally. I eventually received a reply (at the very end of the deadline) saying that in the five instances cited in my complaint that they had acted "incorrectly" in four instances and that they would "credit the charges" and in the 5th instance they believed the issue was correct (although the circumstances were identical to the other four - presumably they weren't prepared to admit 100% culpability).
It wasn't the point of my letter at all....though their admission that a minimum of 80% of the cases cited were in fact wrong actions is an indication that they didn't have a metaphorical 'leg to stand on'.
I had asked, using the five examples (and they were simply that - examples of what constantly happens NOT the only instances of this gross constitutional breach) for the TIO to give an assurance that it would thenceforth not continue to act as if it was a law unto itself with no obligation to instruct its employees to comply with the legislation under which it was set up. My concern was that the TIO (its personnel) continually acted in only one interest, irrespective of the facts, and that was to 'earn' as much revenue for itself and to maximise that revenue the TIO personnel were instructed to break the 'rules' under which their constitution required them to operate as a matter of course.
So we will now start proceedings against the TIO. The fact that the TIO could so casually dismiss the clear incidents of unconstitutional behaviour with a "so we screwed you over but, hey, now you are getting so uptight - here - we'll credit you for our wrong actions" response is quite breath taking. However they managed to screw themselves by admitting that in each of the incidents they had breached their own constitution and there are dozens more examples of that particular breach affecting Exetel and doubtless tens of thousands affecting other companies (although getting higher, I wonder why, the number of TIO complaints against Exetel is a tiny fraction of all TIO complaints).
Based on information I have been provided it will be interesting to see what a discovery process about the directions made to the personnel who are breaching the constitution turns up. Enough to have the TIO closed down? No-one will ever know until someone finally says:
"...but this is just plain wrong and a government simply can't do this."