The RCD, as it is sometimes abbrev’d(!) has started public meetings again. This is in our interests, as we are keen to talk to the Commissioner when he holds meetings in WA. Our case may well be the ONLY such case.
As many of you will already know, we put two submissions in over 2 years ago, arguing that an organisation can be mistreated just like an individual can. The events were serious and improper mistreatment of our Executive Officer and the illegal removal of assets (worth around $1mill in 2010) from BHA.wa whose role is support for adults with hearing loss, and which we are now less able to undertake eg without offices in East Perth, government disability grants, trainers for a dozen lipreading classes a week and employees able to offer advice, advocacy and multiple social activities for isolated members.
The events happened over a decade ago (2010-2013), and all attempts at redress then appeared to fail. Nevertheless, certain actions were taken, like the removal of the whole Board and the Executive Officer (EO) of the offending organisation, by 2015. Was that enough? What would you recommend we do now?
One submission was by OUR then-EO, describing her personal mistreatment, improper arrest warrant leading to heart attacks and health consequences — all for advocating for her disabled members and their community. The second submission was by the Board, detailing the improper loss of our assets when BHA.wa was focussed on advocating for and supporting those with hearing disabilities. Afterwards all of these services were closed down. The fact is that we have fiduciary duty as directors to recover these assets.
A summary note to a lawyer recently summarised it:
We lost all our assets after a failed ‘merger’ with [XXXX]… our members have lost assets, home (a house in E. Perth) and even our name. Our manager was harassed, called a Judas, improperly dismissed, then arrested and suffered 2 heart attacks. All charges later dropped. The events all instigated by the corrupt EO and Board members from [XXX] in 2010-2013. The EO and all Board members now replaced but no redress or recompense. . Yet…
Our last Executive Officer was seriously mistreated after she questioned the legality of the selling of all BHA.WA’s assets (including our lovely little house in East Perth. I’ll change this to a link on Google Maps asap) by the 2009-2010 BHA.wa Board. So you can imagine that we are very keen to attend the public hearings of the RCD when it meets in Perth later this year.
Here is the link again: