Port Moresby, 22 December 1969
1828. Confidential Personal Immediate
1. Your 11975.1 On present advice all tax rules of all councils for years 1967/68, 1968/69 and 1969/70 are invalid, and probably all other council rules for the same period are invalid. Administration would be gravely remiss in permitting such a situation to continue any longer than is necessary. It affects the revenue raising authority of every council in the Territory because summonses for non-payment will have to be discontinued. It involves the unjustified imprisonment of persons previously found in default.
2. We therefore have no option but to introduce validating legislation at earliest. Only question is whether we should await scheduled meeting of House on 23rd February or call special meeting in first week of January. In relation to Gazelle situation, advantage clearly lies with special meeting. Toliman and councillors are quite unable to reconcile themselves to M.A. getting off charges on what they regard as legal technicalities. They would lose faith in us if, knowing of the technical default, we did not remedy it straight away. If, for instance, we held off acting until Tammur’s lawyer discovered the defect and used it to get him acquitted, or even if we revealed the defect and had to wait for two months before correcting it and bringing M.A. defaulters to court, this would be a major defeat for the Council. More generally, while the Administration must expect criticism for permitting the defect to go unnoticed for so long, the matter is one of national importance because it affects the legal status of a basic activity of every council in the Territory.
3. I see some side benefits in the special meeting. It will enable the Administration to present a comprehensive statement of recent events in the Gazelle and put a positive slant on our future intentions. We can also foreshadow later strengthening of the law. It will expose Oscar Tammur to very strong pressure on the tax issue itself. It may bring to light a tendency revealed in the meeting which the Minister had on Thursday with private members, for the House to involve itself in bringing the Council and the M.A. together.2 Ballard will no doubt have mentioned that there seemed to be general support for the House initiating and even participating in some kind of mediation. I would myself welcome such an initiative at an appropriate time against a background of the strong reaction of individual members against M.A. acts of violence.
4. Our conclusion therefore, after much deliberation on alternatives, is that we should seek to have a special meeting for the week beginning 5th January, to last probably two days. This will make the best of a situation that at best is an embarrassing one. I should like to emphasize that the Administration cannot expect, and does not wish, the Minister to bale it out by any public or private statement of support. All we ask is his concurrence to the course of action now proposed. Any announcement should be made here (naturally, in agreed terms), and any criticism should be directed here.
5. The procedure, since the House is in mid-session, would be to ask the Speaker to bring forward the date to, say, 8th January, with the object of a short meeting limited to validating legislation, to a minor amendment to the offences section of the local government ordinance and to a statement on Rabaul. If the speaker concurred, notice could be sent out on, say, 29th December, with accompanying drafts of legislation. We would seek specific concurrence of A.E.C. members individually.
6. Please place the text of this telex before the Minister.3
[NAA: A452, 1969/5256]
1 19 December, from Warwick Smith to Hay in response to Document 318. Warwick Smith cabled that Attorney-General’s were ‘pretty confident Curtis’s view is the correct one with respect to defective procedure and inability to sustain prosecution’. He continued: ‘Validation in respect of payments already made appears necessary and of course that validation would take care also of liability to pay tax on the part of those who have not already paid. It may well be that validating legislation should catch up liability for taxes 1969/70 as well as 1968/69 (and earlier years also). Consider special session inadvisable and not really practicable in political terms and difference [in] time-saving hardly worth it. Glad [of] your views so that [the] Minister may consider appropriate action especially having in mind probable heavy loss of face by [the] Administration’ (NAA: A452, 1969/5256).
2 See Document 350.
3 Administration perceptions of the security situation on the Gazelle were progressively more positive toward the end of the month. On 19 December, the TIC assessed that the ‘situation … remains tense but quiet. Decisive action by the Administration appears to have contained the situation and prevented further violence … There is an ever present danger, however, of isolated incidents occurring between pro-Council and M.A. elements’ (record of special TIC meeting, NAA: A1838, 936/3115 part 6). On 31 December, Hay reported to DOET that the ‘Situation has remained quiet’ (telex 10253, NAA: A452, 1969/4001).