Where Do Our Tax Dollars Go: A Case Study (Part 11) - The Cast
Note: The views in this post are my own, based on my lived experience and personal recollection. My ERA proceedings against the Department of Internal Affairs are ongoing. All supporting documents and evidence will be disclosed through that process.
I want to thank everyone who has taken the time to read this series and share their feedback. Someone gave feedback that with so many people involved, it is hard to keep track of who is who. That is fair. So, I am going to fix that.
Gabriel García Márquez faced the same problem when he wrote One Hundred Years of Solitude. The Buendía family was so sprawling that he put a diagram at the front of the book. Readers could turn back to it whenever they lost the thread. I am taking inspiration from that.
This post is a map. Two diagrams. Same organisation. Same people. One year apart. June 2025, before I was placed on forced leave. June 2026, three months after my dismissal, and three months since the entire team transferred to the Public Service Commission.
Team structure in June 2025, based on my recollection to the best of my knowledge
Team structure in June 2026, based on my recollection and information available to me at the time of publishing.
The transfer moved the people, what about the problems?
The Manager Technical Operations role is vacant. That is my former role. Lisa Gibson has been Acting Manager Technical Operations since July 2025, when I was placed on forced leave. That is almost twelve months in an acting capacity with no confirmed appointment. Her substantive role, Product Marketing Manager, sits vacant in Fraser Buchanan's team. Who authorised an acting arrangement of almost a year with no resolution?
Kylie Matson was Technical Specialist in June 2025. By June 2026 she is Lead Process Analyst. Her former role is vacant. That appointment happened while an active investigation, commissioned and paid for by DIA, was still running. Kylie had multiple roles in that. What governance process approved that?
In June 2025, a senior adviser sat in Fraser Buchanan's team. They raised a complaint against Fraser through the PSA and then left. The circumstances were never made clear to those of us who were there. Someone else now holds that role.
Richard Ashworth was the decision-maker in my dismissal. He was simultaneously a witness in the external investigation. He attended two mediations with me as DIA's representative before that investigation concluded. I have raised this conflict of interest formally and repeatedly. Nobody has paid heed to it.
On 30 March 2026, the Public Service Commission released an updated Code of Conduct stating that chief executives are responsible for the culture and conduct of their organisations. I was dismissed on 31 March 2026. The entire team transferred to PSC on 1 April 2026.
Paul James was Chief Executive of DIA when retaliation complaints were filed against a whistleblower. He was CE when that whistleblower was dismissed. The Code of Conduct did not appear to apply to him.
Sir Brian Roche is the Public Service Commissioner. His office has indicated he will not get involved because the investigation belongs to DIA. But the team is no longer with DIA. It is with PSC. So which code applies now, and to whom?
It has been more than two months since that transfer. Can anyone point to a single example of this Code of Conduct being successfully applied? I think all taxpayers would like to see that data.
This series is called Where Do Our Tax Dollars Go. We will keep exploring that question. In time, we will know where some of those dollars went, where they could have gone instead, and how to shine a light on what is not being reported and should be.
