Inquiry system flaws laid bare once again

ONE of the silly habits we indulge in instead of real, game-changing, reforming action is the cynical idea that making rules to try to prevent some sort of behaviour, or more likely misbehaviour, resolves whatever problem the solution is aimed at.

We imagine that by, say, banning smoking in cars carrying children that we have resolved an issue and strengthened our culture around child protection and public health awareness. Once the legislation is on the books we close the book and forget about enforcement — intent is not matched by commitment and the integrity of our entire system is tarnished. We fool ourselves imagining a problem has been resolved when it has just been brushed under a carpet of indifference.

This simple but undermining principle has given rise to decades of tribunals of inquiry, all established with the highest of motives — we are assured — but all nearly worn down to something pretty close to irrelevance by meandering, endless evidence and legal challenge after legal challenge. By the time most of those multi-million inquiries reach something approaching a conclusion it must be viewed through the prism of history rather than current affairs — even if those conclusions cannot include a finding of fact against an individual!