lawyers threaten freedom of speech

An interesting article re Trio


Trio was a Ponzi scheme, a mini-Madoff if you like. Flader's operatives set up a fund, the Astarra Strategic Fund. Astarra would later become Trio.

The money poured in as Morningstar kindly bestowed its four-star product rating, and assorted financial planners dumped their clients' savings into Trio for hefty commissions.

Yet the touted returns were not real - they were made up. And as the super flowed into the fund it was siphoned off via Hong Kong to ''invest'' in hedge funds in the Cayman Islands.

Financial planners, custodians, trustees, lawyers, asset consultants, auditors, regulators - they all missed it. And while the regulators dithered, or in APRA's case were missing in action entirely, it should be said there is no way to quarantine entirely against fraudsters and reckless operators.

What could help is reform to the defamation laws. Australian defamation laws are among the most draconian in the world. Powerful vested interests persistently use their lawyers to threaten the mainstream press while bullying and shutting down small website activists trying to have their story heard.

It is no exaggeration to say that the greatest threat to freedom of speech in this country are lawyers.

It is time our defamation laws were brought into step with the rest of the world.


Read more: http://www.smh.com.au/business/the-quintessential-selling-tool-20120608-201gz.html#ixzz1xxGeweLZ