March 27, 2023 — 1.05pm
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A former Australian Tax Office employee-turned-whistleblower is set to stand trial over a series of offences after a judge ruled that Commonwealth whistleblower protection laws did not shield him from prosecution, in a decision labelled a “major blow” to Australian democracy.
But the reasons for the South Australian District Court’s decision, handed down on Monday, are suppressed on an interim basis, pending a hearing on Tuesday afternoon.
The Commonwealth Director of Public Prosecutions sought the suppression on the basis of potential prejudice to his criminal trial in October.
Richard Boyle worked in the ATO’s debt recovery division in Adelaide and made headlines in 2018 when he blew the whistle on aggressive debt recovery tactics used by the tax office, revealed in a joint media investigation by The Age, The Sydney Morning Herald and ABC’s Four Corners.
He was charged in 2019 with a raft of offences, subsequently reduced to 24 charges, including telephone tapping, recording conversations without the consent of all parties, making a record of protected information and in some cases passing the information on to a third party. If convicted, he faces prison.
Boyle had sought to rely on the Public Interest Disclosure Act, the whistleblowing law for public servants, to shield him from a criminal trial. He applied for a declaration from the South Australian...
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