Summary Judgment

CDPP v Brady & others [2015] VSC 246

Supreme Court of Victoria

This summary is necessarily incomplete. It is not to be used in any later consideration of the Court’s reasons. The only authoritative pronouncement of the Court’s reasons is that contained in the Court’s published Reasons for Judgment: DPP (Cth) v Brady & others [2015] VSC 246.

19 June 2015

1 These proceedings concern allegations that two subsidiaries of the Reserve Bank of Australia (Note Printing Australia Limited and Securency International Pty Ltd), and some of their former employees or agents, conspired to bribe foreign officials in order to secure banknote printing contracts in several foreign countries.

2 On 19 June 2014, the Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade, acting on behalf of the Commonwealth of Australia, obtained a limited suppression order in relation to a small portion of the evidence that may be led at some future trial in these proceedings. The DFAT order was structured in such a way that some of the terms of the order could not be published without disclosing the suppressed information.

3 The Australian news media were informed of the DFAT application one week before it was heard, and did not attend the hearing to oppose the making of the suppression order.

4 A copy of the DFAT order was provided to the news media, on the same day that it was made. No news media organisation sought to exercise their statutory right to challenge the DFAT order, once they received a copy of it.

5 On 29 July 2014, WikiLeaks published a copy of the DFAT order, together with a sensational and inaccurate press release about the alleged nature and effect of the DFAT order. The WikiLeaks publication involved a clear and deliberate breach of the law.

6 After the WikiLeaks publication, many media organisations and individuals republished the DFAT order, or directly or indirectly disclosed its contents.

7 Subsequently, three news media organisations applied to have the DFAT order revoked, in light of the events that have occurred since the WikiLeaks publication.

8 For the reasons set out in the attached reasons for decision, Hollingworth J has determined that the DFAT order should now be revoked.

9 Of particular concern to her Honour was the fact that the widespread on-line dissemination that has already occurred overseas cannot now be undone. Whilst the court has

DPP (Cth) v Brady & others [2015] VSC 246 1 SUMMARY power to make orders which have effect within Australia (including orders requiring the removal of material already published in this country), it cannot make orders controlling publication of the DFAT order outside Australia. Unlike the case with most suppression orders, it is the publication overseas that has the capacity to cause the greatest harm in this particular case.

10 On 19 June 2015, her Honour published formal orders revoking the DFAT order. DFAT has informed the court that it wishes to consider whether to appeal against those orders. Accordingly, in order to preserve the status quo in the meantime, her Honour has granted a temporary stay on her orders until 14 July 2015. This means that the original DFAT order of 19 June 2014 remains in place until that date (or further order).

DPP (Cth) v Brady & others [2015] VSC 246 2 SUMMARY