Statement from Tammy Franks MLC Regarding Failure to Lodge Tax Returns

29/10/2011 by Tammy Franks MLC

Yesterday I appeared before the Magistrates Court to answer a charge of failure to furnish documents.

This case was not about non-payment of taxes, or any attempt to minimize or avoid my obligations in terms of tax payments to the ATO.

I stress that I have always paid my taxes through PAYG and have always declared my Tax File number when required.

I have entered a plea of guilty however, as I accepted that I had not fulfilled my obligations to the ATO in terms of lodging my annual returns.

All outstanding returns have since been lodged and I believe I am in fact likely to be entitled to a refund. This of course will go towards whatever fines the Court imposes on me in November.

I deeply regret the chain of circumstances that has led to these proceedings.

Whilst it is no excuse, I have been facing extremely distressing personal circumstances, including a marriage breakdown and family court proceedings which had contributed to my inability to redress this error in the time frame required.

I take sole responsibility for my personal error.

I sincerely apologize to the South Australian public and to my party and my colleagues for any embarrassment that this causes them.

Tammy Franks
MLC

Labels are for jars, not people

My favourite tale of the foibles of focus groups is one where earnest public servants were trying to get their words just right for people over the age of 65. They duly gathered people fitting this description together to ask them what terminology they preferred. “How do you feel when we call you a senior” they asked, “or perhaps you prefer older Australian” and “does the term pensioner appeal or exclude anyone here?” Eventually one man piped up with: ‘Can’t you just call me Barry? That’s what everyone I know calls me.”

Barry’s request, while amusing, gets straight to the heart of the trouble with labels and the real harm of stigma. When we use the label we can miss seeing the whole person.

Labels are very useful…

for jam jars, filing systems and clothing stores.

Where labels become less useful is when they are applied to the human condition. Where there is no such thing as ‘one size fits all.’ That label is never going to reflect the depth or diversity of the person.

But regardless, we label people and of course we even label ourselves.

I’m not sure that will ever change.

When this labelling is constantly negative it can, however, create stigma. Underneath the language of the mental illness labels are the misconceived fears that people might be sad, mad, bad and dangerous to know. Misconceptions not backed by the facts.     

Little wonder then that those with lived experience of mental illness are sometimes so fearful of the stigma of a mental illness itself they are reluctant to seek help for the condition. In fact, many people report that the attached stigma as far more difficult to manage than the illness itself.

There is a better way.

Reducing discriminatory attitudes towards mental illness would mean people would be much more likely to talk about their mental health needs and seek support and treatment earlier. We know that when that treatment is sought and found early there is a significant economic benefit, by reduced demand on crisis point services or productivity loss.

For the half of us who will or have experienced a mental health disorder at some point in our lives we’d probably appreciate the changed attitudes more than any monetary benefits. 

Anti-stigma mental health campaigns are proven to reduce the costs to society of mental illness. In fact, research from the London School of Economics based on the Scottish SEE ME  initiative identified that for every £1 spent on that anti-stigma social campaign there was an economy-wide saving of more than £8. Research on the LIKE MINDS LIKE MINE campaign in New Zealand identifies a similar return on investment.

But even those figures pale in comparison with the benefits of an improved quality of life for people living with mental illness.

To date, New Zealand, Scotland, England, Canada, the United States of America and Ireland have all seen the value in ending the stigma and discrimination of mental ill-health.

This week the Queensland State Government launched the CHANGE OUR MINDS campaign and has invested $8.5 million over the next four years with a challenge to the federal government and also to the other states to do the same.

My question is will the South Australian Government now rise to that challenge?

 If it did, I’d happily file that under the label of ‘Great Leadership’.

Jumps Racing Update

Thanks to everyone who supported my Animal Welfare (Jumps Racing) Amendment Bill to ban jumps racing in South Australia.

The thousands of people who contacted me and my Parliamentary colleagues show overwhelmingly that the community does not support jumps racing. There is no doubt that your emails, letters and phone calls sent a clear message that politicians can no longer ignore.

As you’ll have heard however, my bill did not have the numbers to pass through the Upper House on Wednesday night.   

There are however many positives to be taken from the experience. This is by no means the end of the campaign to ban jumps racing.  It is in fact more like ‘quarter time’ in the game, and there are a number of factors that have emerged that are indeed ‘game changers’.

We have now for the first time on the record the Law Society’s submission that along with supporting the bill, also opined that jumps racing may in fact already be in contravention of the existing Animal Welfare Act section 13 (1) and 13 (2). This salient point was circulated to all MPs and was publicised via a media release that generated substantial media interest.  

I am very grateful to the Animal Law Committee of the Law Society for producing such an extensive submission. This in turn has given the RSPCA (and possibly others) the ammunition to consider a legal challenge to jumps racing.

The public statements from former SAJC CEO Mr Steve Ploubidis openly and aggressively challenging the ‘common wisdom’ of the pro-jumps arguments of the TRSA were also helpful, albeit coming late in the piece.

I was pleased the bill received support from my parliamentary colleagues the Hon Kelly Vincent and the Hon Ann Bressington,  as well of course as my Greens colleague the Hon Mark Parnell.  Comments from Independent Hon John Darley indicate that he is at least open-minded and no doubt could be provided with further information to address his specific concerns.

We have also seen from the comments of the Hon Ian Hunter that the ALP does not speak with one voice on this topic and we now know from ‘corridor conversations’ that he is by no means the only MP that did not share the ‘party line’ (which consisted primarily of a regurgitated version of the Thoroughbred Racing SA (TRSA) “Arguments in Favour of Jumps Racing” document that formed the basis of part of the Liberal response also).

We know too that the Liberals are keen to be seen as animal lovers and this gives us scope to refine our lobbying.

We were also informed by a backbencher that the ALP had not in fact debated the bill in their Caucus (despite it being on the Notice Paper for some months prior to yesterday). Conversations with many members also indicate that current Minister Kenyon’s opinion that the 2001 corporatisation of the racing industry somehow left it above and beyond the law are not shared by all of his colleagues.  In fact, we have received legal opinions from a number of sources that suggests this is simply ludicrous.

The impending change in leadership within the ALP after October 20^th will obviously offer possibilities too for a re-invigorated campaign looking to influence the Premier-in-waiting Jay Weatherill and what will almost certainly be a reshuffled front bench. I certainly hope I can count on your continuing support with this.

It’s been an enormous amount of work to get this far, but this effort has generated the interest and awareness we need to take the campaign further.  

Special mention should be given to the Coalition for the Protection for Racehorses, the RSPCA, the Animal Law Committee of the Law Society of SA and Animals Australia,  all of whom have contributed significantly to the campaign to ban jumps racing to date.

With all these factors combined,  it gives me great hope that jumps racing is now clearly on the wrong side of history. It didn’t get banned on Wednesday, but it has a limited future. The campaign is not over with the defeat of this bill. With your ongoing support we can and will ensure that we will finally see an end to jumps racing here in South Australia in the not-too-distant future.

Thank you again for your support of my bill and the campaign to ban jumps racing.

Tammy x

PS If you’d like to stay in touch with the campaign to Ban Jumps Racing here in South Australia you can join the mailing list for the Coalition for the Protection of Racehorses by sending an email to local co-ordinator Meagan:  mlamming@bigpond.com

 PPS If you have not already, you may also be interested in becoming my facebook friend or a following me on Twitter. Tx