📂 The briefcase that could have unlocked a national scandal had I publicly exposed the contents
In October 1993, I provided Robert Nason of Coopers and Lybrand (Auditors) — who was accompanied by his secretary, Ms Hurley—with documentation indicating that the Ericsson-manufactured testing equipment used by Telstra when testing my service lines, as well as in specific terrain locations across Australia, was not compatible.

I first received this information on 3 June 1993, after two Telstra senior technicians from the Victoria Metro Network inadvertently left an unlocked briefcase at my premises in Cape Bridgewater. Inside were details on several complex Telstra Difficult Network Fault (DNF) customers, including me.

I copied the contents and sent them to AUSTEL (now called ACMA). I also met with AUSTEL representatives in Melbourne twice over the following two weeks, as some of the attached documents couldn’t be transmitted through my older-style roll-paper fax machine.

Rather than leaking the material to the media for a fleeting headline, I chose to alert the government. This decision led Senator Richard Alston, then Shadow Minister for Communications, to write several papers on the matter. The Hon. David Hawker MP also referenced the Ericsson equipment’s failures in his electorate of Wannon, where my Cape Bridgewater Holiday Camp was located.

On 25 February 1994, Senator Alston addressed the Senate, citing the severity of the Ericsson problem and naming me as the individual who, according to Telstra technicians, had rightly exposed the issue as it worsened.

🧾 Arbitration: Suppressed Evidence and Compromised Testing
Despite Robert Nason’s findings in the Coopers & Lybrand COT report, which indicated that Ericsson equipment was obsolete and needed to be replaced, Telstra continued to use this outdated equipment throughout the COT arbitrations. This decision ultimately harmed the claimants against Telstra. The arbitrator, Dr Gordon Hughes, was aware of the situation but did not require Telstra to utilise the more up-to-date equipment recommended by Nason, which was necessary for ensuring that the COT case received the justice the claimants deserved.

On 7 and 8 April 1994, four of the nine COT Cases, including mine, raised concerns about the faulty Ericsson testing equipment with Robin Davey (Chairman) and John MacMahon (General Manager) of AUSTEL. We were assured that this equipment would not be used during the Service Verification Testing (SVT) of our service lines in arbitration and mediation.

However, on 11 October and 16 November 1994, AUSTEL wrote to Telstra condemning the SVT testing conducted at my premises in September 1994 as grossly deficient. I did not see these letters until seven years after my arbitration—one year past the statute of limitations. Had I received them in time, I could have appealed the arbitrator’s findings, which falsely stated my business was no longer experiencing faults after July 1994.

Worse still, on 2 February 1995, I alerted AUSTEL that Telstra had covered their SVT testing with a statutory declaration signed by the same Peter ——— whom AUSTEL had previously criticised in their October and November letters.

This was the same Peter ——— referenced in the Senate Hansard dated 24 June 1997, which revealed he had advised a Telstra whistleblower that I—and four other COT Cases—had to be stopped at all costs.

He also instructed AUSTEL during my arbitration to consult Telstra before releasing technical information to the COT Cases. On 6 April 1995, he refused to conduct further arbitration tests at my camp, despite being reminded of their purpose: to test my Ericsson telephone service.

Lane Telecommunications, the arbitration consultants present that day, also declined to test the service. The arbitrator later acknowledged that Lane had reviewed at least 4,000 of my claim documents—80% of which were Ericsson-related. Yet I have never received these documents back, despite clause 6 of the arbitration agreement requiring their return within six weeks of the decision (11 May 1995 in my case).

Ericsson later purchased Lane Telecommunications Pty Ltd during the COT arbitrations. Let me be clear: Ericsson acquired Lane despite Lane’s sworn oath not to disclose any arbitration material to outside parties. Once purchased, all COT Cases’ private business and technical data became Ericsson’s property.

🔄 From 1993 to 2025: The Echoes of a Whistleblower’s Warning
ACMA was the respondent in both my Freedom of Information and government document requests, and the matter was heard by the Administrative Appeals Tribunal between February and October 2008, and again from October 2010 to May 2011.

I was seeking Ericsson-related documentation that Telstra had retained—information that, after Ericsson acquired Lane, was reportedly used to assist Telstra’s arbitration defence against the COT Cases. We had alleged that Ericsson’s telephone exchange equipment was responsible for widespread call dropouts and outages.

 

The Briefcase 

Ericsson AXE faulty telephone exchange equipment (1)

Telstra senior management finally visited my business, a five-hour drive from Melbourne. Within five minutes of saying hello, Mr Smith, I knew I was in for another round of untruths.

I should have known better. It was just another case of 'No fault found.' We spent some considerable time 'dancing around' a summary of my phone problems. Their best advice for me was to continue doing exactly what I had been doing since 1989: keeping a record of all my phone faults. I could have wept. Finally, they left.

A little while later, in my office, I found that Aladdin had left behind his treasures: the Briefcase Saga was about to unfold.

Aladdin

The briefcase was not locked, so I opened it and found it belonged to Mr Macintosh. There was no phone number, so I had to wait for business hours the next day to track him down. However, what was in the briefcase was a file titled 'SMITH, CAPE BRIDGEWATER'. After five gruelling years fighting the evasive monolith of Telstra, being told various lies along the way, here was possibly the truth, from an inside perspective.

The first thing that rang alarm bells was a document that revealed Telstra knew that the RVA fault they recorded in March 1992 had lasted for at least eight months, not the three weeks that was the basis of their settlement payout. Dated 24/7/92, and with my phone number in the top right corner, the document referred to my complaint that people ringing me get an RVA' service disconnected' message with the 'latest report' dated 22/7/92 from Station Pier in Melbourne and a 'similar fault reported' on 17/03/92. The final sentence reads: 'Network investigation should have been brought in as fault has gone on for 8 months.'

I copied this and some other documents from the file on my fax machine and faxed copies to Graham Schorer (the spokesperson for our COT group). The next morning, I telephoned the local Telstra office, and the Telstra technician who had been providing my private and business information to a person called Micky, who Telstra admitted to the AFP on 14 April 1994, had been chosen by Telstra to listen to my telephone conversations, came out and picked the briefcase up.