Hernandez Hearing - Govt Contrives More Delays Bossano damns ‘fraudulent' attempt to silence Giraldi home allegations
In a further attempt to keep the lid on damaging disclosures about alleged mismanagement and abuse of those in care within the Social Services Agency, Government appointed lawyer Mark Isola - who on occasions himself sits as chairman of the Industrial Tribunal - this week again declined to provide important material to the hearing in which Joanna Hernandez is seeking redress for wrongful dismissal from the Agency. Although Isola demanded - and was given - details of the statements and affidavits Hernandez and Bossano have obtained to back her claims the lawyer has consistently failed to supply them with similar material - though he has been called upon to do so several times by Chairman Isaac Massias. The Government's lawyer also spent two days of the hearing last year challenging the relevance of the evidence of 28 witnesses whom Hernandez wished to subpoena.
(Isola's remarkable array of legal arguments - most of which have been rejected by both the Supreme Court and the Appeal Court - while appearing on behalf of the Government in the Hernandez hearing, have prompted a request by Joe Bossano that the lawyer recuse himself from a separate hearing. In this instance, Isola is set to chair a tribunal sitting to consider a case for unfair dismissal brought against one of the Rock's gaming companies - and in which the defendants are expected to rely on some of the arguments which the lawyer advanced in the Hernandez hearing.)
TRIBUNAL TO BE REVIEWED Recent developments in this and other tribunal hearings have prompted the Progressive Democratic Party to repeat its manifesto call for the workings of the Tribunal to be reviewed. "These cases underline the need for the functions and workings of the tribunal to be modernized along with the rules which apply to the hearings and evidence,' PDP leader Keith Azopardi told VOX yesterday.
At a sitting of the Tribunal on Tuesday called to prepare ‘case management' - the way in which the lengthy hearing scheduled for April will be run - chairman Isaac Massias gave Isola seven days in which to set out in writing his reasons for refusing to disclose the information Hernandez and her pro deo representative Joe Bossano have requested for almost a year. It is not clear whether the written reasons will copied to Bossano.
Hernandez was dismissed as manager of the Dr Giraldi Home following her ‘whistle blowing' to disclose a string of abuses alleged by members of her staff. And although she submitted more than a dozen written complaints to her superiors, little if any action was taken and Hernandez was "told to shut up."
Later a member of her staff was taken into a locked room by the then head of the Agency Isabella Tosso and another senior member of staff and coerced into making false allegations about Hernandez, she claims. The woman was so upset that she told several of her colleagues about the statement and the threats; and it is details of this incident as well as other damning material that the former manager of the home believes Isola is trying to have covered up.
"In 40 years of tribunal hearings I have never encountered this sort of behaviour, these sort of delaying tactics," a furious Bossano said after Tuesday's hearing took its unexpected twist. Questioning the legitimacy of Isola's approach, the former trade union leader argued that the Government-appointed lawyer was forcing Massias "to turn the tribunal into a court of law...which it was never meant to be."
Isola was also questioning the relevance, and the "degree of relevance", of some of the evidence. "I've never before heard an employer use such an argument; what's more it is a fraudulent argument," he fumed
Some of the allegations contained in the evidence Hernandez plans to submit date back for more than a decade - when the home was run by a Church trust - and Isola argues that such evidence is irrelevant. However, as these involve a staff member who continued to be employed not only after the Giraldi Home was taken over by the agency but was still there when Hernandez took over as manager, Bossano's suspicions that the Government-appointed lawyer is again resorting to delaying tactics are not easily dismissed.
PROLONGED ABUSE These particular claims of prolonged abuse are further clouded by the fact that one of the staff at the time was related to a lawyer who at one stage was briefed by the TGWU on Hernandez's behalf.
Massias was unavailable to reply to VOX's questions in relation to the new twist the sorry saga of the Hernandez hearing took on Tuesday and, as he was leaving almost immediately for the UK, would not be available until next Monday, we were told. The questions were simple and straightforward and VOX's readers - as well as some members of the Rock's legal fraternity - would be interested in the tribunal chairman's answers.
The questions are:For how long can a lawyer acting for the Government in a tribunal hearing disregard the chairman's instructions that he should provide the opposing team with documents and/or information before some form of action is taken?
Does the tribunal chairman have any powers to compel advance disclosure of information (such as witness statements or affidavits) which either side intends to submit?
Is it possible that the regulations governing industrial tribunals are open to two interpretations - one for lawyers and another for complainants who cannot afford them?
"The hearing is no longer about me - in fact, in a way, it has never been simply about me and the way I was treated," Hernandez says with the simple sincerity that has been a hallmark of her evidence to the tribunal. "As a carer, and one who cares for those who need our help, what this has always been about is to make certain that abuses and neglect are brought to an end...and for good,' she adds.
http://www.vox.gi/Local/Hernandez_Hearing_Govt_Delays-25012008.html 
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