In great disregard for the truth, Southall deceived and misled the court over the stated attitude the witnesses had to his clients, by grossly and erroneously misquoting and misrepresenting Pagone J.
Southall misquoted Pagone J’s judgment to their Honours of the Court of Appeal [emphasis mine]:
All of them said, “Well, we’ve seen it, but we didn’t take any stock of it. In fact, we found that these people are great people to deal with“, and Your Honours can find those references from those witnesses in the judgment at Paragraphs 29-30, where His Honour looked at, I think it was McWhinny, Bishop, Dunn …
What Pagone J actually said was:
[Ms Bignell] had “no concerns as far as their standing in business” was concerned, other than the “normal regulatory issues”[1].
Mr Dunn, in his capacity as the Statutory Planning Manager with the West Gippsland Catchment Management Authority, was familiar with [man X], but was not sure whether he had ever met [man Y] …[N]either [Dunn], nor the Authority of which he was the statutory manager, had any concerns about the management or running of the Casacir quarry[2].
Mr McWhinney found the quarry had operated in the proper manner and that in relation to a few minor issues the company had been “reasonably good to deal with” [3].
Notice that not one of those witnesses said “these people are great to deal with” as Southall falsely claimed. It must also be remembered that:
- Mr Bishop can hardly give an unbiased opinion given that he is an employee who presumably values his job.
- Dunn said he had not met man Y at all previously, and
- McClure had only just met man Y and made no comment about man X who he had known for a number of years.
Southall misquoted Pagone J so that he could win the case for his clients.
[1] Judgment, Reasons at [29]
[2] Ibid
[3] Ibid