Talk:Victims Compensation Tribunal

Revamp
I have reverted the article to an earlier version from 2009, before Bachaven began contributing. The article was in a very poor state. I think it is important to point out that Wikipedia is not a place to publish personal essays, and articles should maintain a neutral point of view.

There were numerous problems with the previous state of the article:


 * The background section quoted a lengthy portion of a speech made by a politician opposed to the original establishment of the tribunal. Information about the political debate at that time is appropriate to include in an encyclopedia article. However, lengthy quotes should be avoided where possible, and authors ought to try to work briefer quotations into sections that summarise the views expressed. This Wikipedia essay on the use of quotations provides helpful guidance. Further, authors should avoid representing only one side of a debate. In this instance the Labor government of the day controlled the state legislature and succeeded in passing the act that established the Victims Compensation Tribunal; I believe their point of view should therefore be considered notable and summarised in this section.


 * Several instances of "essay-style" writing. For example, "Is the tribunal inquisitorial in nature?", "No authority has established that S.140 of the Evidence Act (NSW) does otherwise than reflect the common law. The principles are well known.", "A reasonable person could well ask how a Tribunal of Fact that does not seek evidence from the nominated defendant and does not permit an appeal by that person know that it has always make a correct judgment?", and "NO SUCH WORDS HAVE EVER APPEARED IN VICTIMS COMPENSATION LEGISLATION IN NSW". This type of language is not appropriate in an encyclopedia article.


 * Excessive criticism of the Tribunal without inclusion of opposing views. This violates the requirement for articles to express a neutral point of view. The article said that the Tribunal awarded compensation to claimants who made "probably fraudulent" claims, called the Tribunal "inadequate, unbalanced, and unfair", and accused the NSW government of a "cover-up".


 * Original research. For example, the 'High Probability of Fraudulent Claims' section not only included several uncited statements, where claims were cited, they were often used to reach original conclusions. This violates Wikipedia's policy of no original research.


 * Inadequate referencing. Many sections included no references at all.

I will try to improve the article from its current state in the near future. I encourage any users wishing to edit the article to familiarise themselves with Wikipedia's policies and guidelines so that their future contributions can help to improve the article. In particular, the neutral point of view, verifiability, and no original research policies are applicable here. --superioridad (discusión) 23:53, 6 October 2011 (UTC)

Seriously problematic article
The single reason I am not reverting Bachavens edits again is that I suspect it will result in edit warring. I draw attention to the introduction: ''The purpose of this article is (...) to demonstrate that due to its policy not to notify nominated defendants the very real possibility that fraudulent awards have been made and that these procedures are in breach of International Law. As evidence of this position the article analyzes the contradictory judgments...'' This is a long and winding personal essay, which should not be on WP. Superp (talk) 21:44, 15 February 2012 (UTC)

update: having spent hours reviewing this article yesterday, my conclusion is that it is not a neutral, balanced, factual article worthy of WP. In its entirety it is written as an essay, building up to a single predetermined conclusion and citing sources where these help support that conclusion. In fact the article says so in its introduction: this article is written to demonstrate (...) and analyze. No amount of editing will solve that basic problem.

In addition, I have done spot checks and verifications of no more than 5% of the article, and found:


 * an entire section (now removed) copy/pasted from an external source, in violation of copyright
 * several cases where references where given for alleged facts and quotations, where the referenced sources do not contain those facts or quotations
 * a reference citing a source which does not exist
 * many cases where Bachaven presents not just externally verifiable facts, but mostly his own conclusions. Those conclusions have no verifiable independent sources.
 * material which Bachaven reproduces from his own memory, with no verifiable source

Attempts were made to repair the mess, both reverted by Bachaven:
 * User:Superiority restored the article to a usable state and then started improving it.
 * I too restored it to a usable state

Not only is this article unbalanced, it identifies many people by name, and connects them to serious crimes, or supposedly quotes them on contagious matters. Given the low rate of success I had in finding verifiable sources, I find this especially worrying and bordering on slander. Superp (talk) 12:22, 16 February 2012 (UTC)

You allege that this article contains:

facts or quotations; no verifiable independent sources.
 * several cases where references where given for alleged facts and quotations where the references sources do not contain those
 * a reference citing a source which does not exist
 * many cases where Bachaven presents not just externally verifiable facts but mostly his own conclusions. These conclusions have
 * material which Bachaven reproduces from his own memory with no verifiable source.
 * material which borders on slander.

With the exception of point 3 of which there is one example, you have not provided any examples to back up your argument. Until you do so I am unable to make any further comment other than to point out that your research is faulty and your conclusions inaccurate. For example, what are the names that are connected to serious crimes which cannot be verified. I trust you are not referring to Victor Edward Stals who made a false claim of compensation to the NSW Victims Compensation Tribunal. The falsity of the claim is verified by the Judgment of Justice Levine in the Marsden matter which is available publically. Levine did not accept Stals as a witness of truth as opposed to Judge Coorey in the NSW District Court. The difference being that Levine heard Stals in the witness box whereas Coorey merely examined an affidavit of claim. As both cases were open to the public with the Marsden judgment and hundreds of interlocutory judgments available on the internet, it cannot be claimed that Stals' name is subject to a non-publication order. Indeed his name also featured in articles in Justinian and the Sydney Morning Herald which covered both the Marsden trial and the Compensation Judgment of the District Court. While the articles published in the Sydney Morning Herald are no longer available on the internet, they are available on microfiche and can be found in the NSW State Library. The articles in "Justinian" are only available to subscribers of this internet journal. If you wish me to provide you with hard copies of these articles please provide a postal address.

I have demonstrated that this Tribunal is unbalanced through reference to the thoughts of other people, for example, Peter Breen, former member of the NSW Upper House who made extensive remarks about this issue before the Parliament and recorded in Hansard and Senator Heffernan, current member of the Liberal Opposition in the Commonwealth Parliament. I have also included a quote by Dr Freckelton, Barrister at Law and Adjunct Professor of Law at Monash and Melbourne Universities in relation to Victim Compensation Tribunals in general.

It is quite wrong of you to make such allegations without quoting examples as you deny me the opportunity to correct your research and misunderstandings. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Bachaven (talk • contribs) 15:40, 2 May 2012 (UTC)

Use of Actual Name
Once again I have gone through this article and replaced Mr Stals' name with a pseudonym. Bachaven defends the use of the name with the following comment:

As both cases were open to the public with the Marsden judgment and hundreds of interlocutory judgments available on the internet, it cannot be claimed that Stals' name is subject to a non-publication order.

While someone conducting a very specific search may well discover his name within Austlii or Hansard online documents, I believe it is an unnecessary invasion of his privacy to have his name published throughout this article on the readily searchable Wikipedia. I do not see how the use of his actual name lends any extra weight to the points that Bachaven makes in the article.

Hashisan (talk) 13:00, 25 July 2012 (UTC)