UPDATE: The AFL has revealed the independent four-person panel that will investigate allegations of racism at the Hawthorn Football Club, but according to an ABC report, the governing body has some fences to mend before the probe can get underway.
Senior lawyer Bernard Quinn KC was on Tuesday announced as the leader of the panel, with the investigation to specifically look at the period covering January 1, 2008 to December 31, 2016.
The AFL announced that Quinn would be joined on the panel by Jacqualyn Turfrey, Tim Goodwin and Julie Buxton. The panel features two First Nations representatives in Turfrey and Goodwin.
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Yet those appointments have ruffled more feathers, with an ABC report revealing the families interviewed for Hawthorn’s cultural safety review had been blindsided and did not think the panel could be truly independent if the AFL was behind it.
“Nobody from the AFL has communicated with us at all on anything,” a member of one of the families is quoted in the ABC report.
That same source was also furious about reports claiming Alastair Clarkson, who has denied allegations against him, would be allowed to start his job with North Melbourne before the completion of the investigation.
“If the AFL allows that, it shows they truly don’t care about us,” she told the ABC.
“Gillon McLachlan has previously stated that our wellbeing is at the forefront, but it does not feel like that to us.”
Lawyer Judy Courtin, who represents one of the Hawthorn families, added that an inquiry established by and funded by the AFL could not hope to be independent.
“My clients, yet again, feel they are being marginalised,” Courtin told the ABC.
“For an inquiry to be fair, its establishment should take into consideration the needs and concerns of all parties. As this family’s legal representatives, we have not been approached by either the Hawthorn club or the AFL.”
Despite those comments from the Hawthorn families and their legal representatives, the AFL’s General Counsel Andrew Dillon was adamant the investigation would “hear the perspectives of all involved”.
”These are very serious allegations, and it is important that we have an independent panel that is able to hear the perspectives of all involved and to provide natural justice to those making the claims and those who have had claims made against them,” Dillon said in a statement.
“It is also vitally important that the panel is able to complete its work independently of the AFL.
“Bernard Quinn KC, the chair of the independent investigation and panel members Jacqualyn Turfrey, Julie Buxton and Tim Goodwin are all eminently qualified barristers that will be able to provide their intellect and significant expertise to the process.
“The four-person panel, with their diverse backgrounds including in respect of Ms Turfrey and Mr Goodwin as First Nations persons will also have the ability to bring in additional outside expertise, whether that be in cultural safety, football administration or any other area the panel believes extra resource is needed.”
The AFL added that it did not know the identities of the five families who have made the historical allegations against Alastair Clarkson, Chris Fagan and Jason Burt, with a request for their identities to be disclosed rejected by the lawyers of the families.
A proposed Terms of Reference and Process Plan has been provided to the legal teams of the five families as well as those representing the Hawthorn Football Club, Clarkson, Fagan, Burt, and to Binmada, the company that conducted the initial review into Hawthorn.
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