By Paul Homewood

The Federal Court has devastating blow against mainstream Australians, against freedom of speech and against freedom of speech on climate change by overturning the earlier decision in the Federal Circuit Court which held that Dr Peter Ridd was unlawfully dismissed by James Cook University.

Alarmingly, this decision shows that contractual provisions guaranteeing intellectual freedom do not protect academics against censorship by university administrators. The time has come for the Morrison Government to intervene.

This has been Australia’s David vs Goliath battle, with Peter Ridd on one side, backed by thousands of ordinary Australians, and JCU on the other side who secured some of the most expensive legal representation in the country in Bret Walker SC to stifle the free speech of one of its own staff.

Dr Ridd, a professor of physics at JCU, was sacked by the university for misconduct for questioning in the IPA’s publication Climate Change: The Facts 2017 the climate change science around the Great Barrier Reef and for public statements made on the Jones & Co Sky News program.

He is now apparently considering his legal options in relation to a challenge in the High Court of Australia. If he does decide to take up that fight, the Institute of Public Affairs – as well as thousands on mainstream Australians – will continue to support his fight for freedom of speech on climate change.

JCU has engaged some of the most expensive legal representation in the country to stifle the free speech of one of its own staff, despite crying poor about university funding in the wake of coronavirus. It creates a massive chilling effect for any academic engaging in public debate in Australia.

The University’s shameful actions prove without doubt there is a crisis of free speech at Australian universities. Many academics are censured, but few are prepared to speak out and risk their career, particularly if faced with the prospect of legal battles and possible bankruptcy.

The case has identified a culture of censorship when it comes to challenging claims surrounding climate change and the Great Barrier Reef. JCU to this date has never attempted to disprove claims made by Dr Ridd about the Great Barrier Reef.

https://www.spectator.com.au/2020/07/peter-ridd-the-federal-court-delivers-a-devastating-blow-against-free-speech/

That last sentence says it all.

UPDATE

Peter Ridd has issued this statement:

Dear All,
Very bad news. JCU succeeded on appeal. We need to read the details but for the moment I would like to say the following.
Universities are different from other workplaces because it is expected that, on occasions, there will be vigorous debates on important and controversial issues. It is essential that academics can engage in these debates without fearing that a wrong word could end their career.
Among my crimes was saying that universities in general were “Orwellian” because they only pretended to value free speech. I also said, based upon years of evidence, that another institution’s work was untrustworthy because of systemic deficiencies in their quality assurance processes. I “satirised” the university’s disciplinary processes against me by implying it was “amusing”.
If universities can crush any robust debate by deciding there is a lack of respect or collegiality, where does this leave an academic who might want to say something of which the administration might disapprove? Better to remain silent.
This case is not an isolated incidence of a university acting to stifle debate. Universities claim that Academic Freedom is “in their DNA” but their actions indicate otherwise. And yet both State and Commonwealth governments continue to fund the universities and fail to insist on traditional standards of decency, academic freedom, and freedom of speech. This is a failure of government as much as a failure of a university.
While JCU had its knee on the neck of free speech – our governments looked on and did nothing.
Fundamental concepts such as academic freedom of speech should not be decided by a few words in a work contract of a malignant university. Higher protection is necessary.
This has always been a battle between the little people and the establishment. I was fired for calling for better quality assurance of science of the GBR and climate change. This science has been used to make government regulations causing major economic damage to Farmers and many other workers of the industries in North Queensland.
I was supported by donations from thousands of people. I thank them all. Also, thanks to my legal team.
I am very sorry that your donation has so far not resulted in a better outcome.
I respect the decision of the Court. I will be seeking legal advice as to my next steps.

https://www.gofundme.com/f/peter-ridd-legal-action-fund

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July 23, 2020 at 05:18AM

Australia’s obscenely generous subsidies and Feed-in-Tariffs for domestic solar resulted in millions of households blanketed in panels. The consequences for the power grid have been diabolical; its management is now a daily nightmare. Western Australia’s fixation with heavily subsidised solar power is threatening to destroy its once wholly reliable electricity grid, thanks to its sporadic and […]

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July 23, 2020 at 02:31AM

Peter Ridd loses, we all lose

On 2 May 2018, Professor Peter Ridd was sacked by James Cook University for serious misconduct. It all started when he called-out his colleague Terry Hughes for falsely claiming healthy inshore coral reefs were dead from climate change and deteriorating water quality.

Ignoring the first censure in April 2016, Professor Ridd went on television in August 2017 and explained in an interview with Alan Jones and Peta Credlin why so much said and written about the Great Barrier Reef, including by scientists at the Australian Institution of Marine Science, is ‘untrustworthy’.

The interview was to promote a book that I edited, Climate Change: The Facts 2017. The book, published by the Institute of Public Affairs, begins with a chapter about the Great Barrier Reef in which the orthodoxy on Great Barrier Reef science is challenged, in particular reporting on coral calcification rates. In that interview – that contributed directly to Peter Ridd’s sacking – the main argument was, and continues to be, for better quality assurance of coral reef science.

It is a fact that the Australian Institute of Marine Science refuses to release 15 years of coral growth data – because it contradicts the claims of high-profile activists that coral growth rates are in decline. They are not. But the false claims are central to their fundraising strategy. Never mind the truth.

The first finding handed down by Judge Salvatore Vasta back in April last year case concerned the photographs taken in 1994 that Terry Hughes used to falsely claim Acropora corals that were alive in 1890 are now all dead. Peter Ridd had photographs taken in 2015 showing live Acropora and the need for quality assurance of Hughes’ claims.

Judge Vasta found in favour of Peter Ridd and ordered that the 17 findings made by the University, the two speech directions, the five confidentiality directions, the no satire direction, the censure and the final censure given by the University and the termination of employment of Professor Ridd by the University were all unlawful.

It was very significant that Peter Ridd won on the issue of academic freedom: that he did have a right to ignore the university administrators and continuing to speak out about the lack of quality assurance and explain how and why important scientific institutions had become so untrustworthy.

The University never accepted that decision by the Federal Circuit Court, and they have never conceded that Terry Hughes was wrong to suggest all the corals were dead, when a documentary has since been made showing them to be alive. Further, they have never supported any calls for the coral growth data to be made public.

Instead, the University appealed, and today the University won in the Federal Court. In the judgement, Peter Ridd’s academic freedom is portrayed as his ‘personal opinion’.

It is not Peter Ridd’s personal opinion that the corals are alive, and the Great Barrier Reef resilient to climate change. It is fact. I’ve seen the coral reefs whose health is contested with my own eyes: they are very much alive.

What is dead is academic freedom in Australia.

Universities should be understood by the judiciary as different from other workplaces because it is expected by the ordinary Australian that, on occasions, there will be vigorous debates on important and controversial issues. It is essential that academics can engage in these debates without fearing that the use of plain and colloquial English could end their careers.

Yet today, the university’s appeal was upheld on the basis Peter Ridd was un-collegial in stating plainly that his own university and the Australian Institute of Marine Science are ‘untrustworthy’ because of systemic deficiencies in their quality assurance processes. Further, it was mentioned that Peter Ridd did ‘satirise’ the university’s disciplinary processes in a personal email.

Today’s decision means that James Cook University, and other Australian universities, will continue to crush dissent and sack academics who campaign for the truth.

Full post

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July 23, 2020 at 01:42AM

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