Court Cases From NSW

Greg S (name withheld to avoid identifying his mother who is a protected person of the State) lived in his mother’s home in the southern suburbs of Sydney when the Public Guardian decided that his mother needed to be moved to a nursing home providing a higher level of care. The proposed new nursing home required the lodging of a $350,000.00 nursing home bond, whereas the nursing home at which his mother was already located did not require a bond. NSWTG decided to sell the family home in order to raise the funds which were needed, despite Greg S putting forward proposals to raise them without the property being sold. These proposals would have involved raising most of the $350,000.00 required through a loan and then meeting the repayments by renting the property out, as Greg S was not in a position to make the repayments himself. NSWTG considered the risks of a default on the loan as being too high and rejected the Greg S proposals. 

However, the idea of selling the family home caused the mother so much distress that her health became adversely affected. This, and the related turmoil and upheaval involved in having her shifted, led the Public Guardian to decide that on balance it was preferable to leave her where she was, where a nursing bond was not required. NSWTG went ahead with its plans to sell her home regardless, claiming she was better off with the cash and the guaranteed regular income it would provide, rather than keeping a capital growth asset which could earn more than twice as much income from rental payments but where a constant unbroken income stream could not be guaranteed. 

Greg S took the matter to NCAT but they refused to put a stop to the sale going ahead. Various appeal processes ensued with the issue eventually going before the NSW Court of Appeal, a division of the Supreme Court in that State. The Court could not see the need for the sale to proceed now that the funds for a nursing home bond were no longer required. Whilst it accepted NSWTG’s argument that the mother’s personal and medical needs were increasing and that her current income was not sufficient to meet those increasing needs, it did not see the shortfall as being of such a magnitude that it warranted taking the drastic step of selling the family home. Despite this, the Court decided not to overturn NSWTG’s decision to sell, suggesting only that NSWTG might take a further look at the situation. The Court did not make an order as to costs. 

Undeterred, NSWTG persisted with its plans to sell, claiming the property was not in a suitable state for renting. NSWTG estimated the improvements needed would cost about $30,000.00 to implement and claimed there were insufficient funds available to pay for them. It also held the view that it would be very difficult to find tenants who would sign a lease with Greg S living in the semi-detached section of the house. Greg S, however, had no such problems finding tenants who would do this and who were happy to take out a lease with the property exactly the way it was. None of this swayed NSWTG in the slightest in its determination to sell. Greg S described their attitude as having become an obsession and began questioning NSWTG’s motives in wanting the sale to go ahead so badly. 

Greg S took the matter back to NCAT but initially remained unsuccessful in obtaining an order to stop NSWTG from selling his mother’s home. However, the sale was stayed pending an appeal to NCAT’s Appeal Panel and to allow time for further investigations to be carried out. By the time the new appeal was heard, Greg S had been making regular fortnightly payments of $1,000.00 into his mother’s bank account for the better part of a year sourced from the money received from tenants he had found to occupy the main section of the house. This established a pattern of a reliable income stream for his mother which, on top of her other income, provided her with funds well in excess of those required to cover both her special personal care needs and day to day living expenses. It became the key factor in the decision that was eventually handed down by the Appeal Panel stopping the sale from proceeding. 

In its decision of 4 April 2017, the Appeal Panel ordered that NSWTG offer the family renting the main section of the house a 12 month lease over the entire property at a weekly rental rate of $550.00 per week. Failure to take up the lease would affirm the sale of the property. The Appeal Panel decided that Greg S should not be offered a separate lease for the section of the house in which he was living. This effectively meant that it would be left to the family renting to decide whether he could stay there or not should they take up the lease. The lease was taken up and Greg S has been allowed to continue living in the small semi-detached section of the house. This was quite a significant victory for Greg S against the odds as he achieved it without legal representation. However, his future there does remain uncertain without him having either a lease or management of his mother’s financial affairs, where he could simply find a new tenant should the current leaseholders decide to leave. 

Paula Carew was her father’s carer during the latter years of his life. In July 2012 her father inherited $520,000.00, three years after having had his finances taken over by NSWTG. Paula Carew and her father wanted to use the money to buy a home so that he could have a secure roof over his head for the remainder of his life. NSWTG opposed their application on the grounds that the father should not be seeking to purchase a property at such a late stage in his life. They were also concerned over the potential difficulty in selling the property after his death as the intended location for the purchase was in a small country town in regional NSW where there was not much demand for property. 

Paula Carew took the matter to NCAT but was told that at her father’s age (he was 91 years old at the time) he should be in a nursing home, rather than in her care, and there was therefore no need for him to be purchasing a property. Paula advised she was not even given an opportunity to address the Tribunal before having her application dismissed. She took the case to the Supreme Court of NSW but that Court saw no reason to overturn NSWTG’s decision, saying that it did not see it as the Court’s role to be telling NSWTG how it should manage their clients’ funds. The Court ordered both sides to pay their own costs but this did not deter NSWTG from taking $140,000.00 out of her father’s funds to cover their legal costs.

Paula’s father died in September 2016. By this stage his funds had dwindled to less than $120,000.00 as a consequence of the legal battles fought over his rights to own and live in his own home, together with the costs involved in shifting house on four separate occasions during this period when property owners decided to sell or cease renting out the properties in which he had been living. It took NSWTG a further two years to settle the estate following the father’s death. In the meantime Paula, a woman in her mid sixties and approaching her elder years, was forced to live on the streets or set up her bed in horse floats out in the countryside. This is just another example of how NSWTG manages its clients’ finances and for which it charges exorbitant fees. 

Paul Contempree was just 14 months old when he suffered third-degree burns to both his legs due to a hot water scalding accident. The injuries required the amputation of all of his toes on his right foot while he had to undergo extensive skin grafting over the decades that followed. He had been living on a disability pension in his mother’s home when NSWTG made the decision to sell the property. This occurred not long after his mother had been placed in a nursing home which was requiring a bond payment. The mother also had some other outstanding debts which needed to be paid off. Her weekly income was insufficient to meet her ongoing expenses and special care needs at the nursing home, not to mention NSWTG’s own bills for unspecified property expenses and management fees. However, the mother’s situation was certainly not so dire that there were no other options available but to sell her home and these should have been given proper consideration in view of her strong objections to the sale. 

Paul Contempree had no funds with which to engage a solicitor to fight NSWTG’s decision to sell his mother’s home against her wishes. His only means of defence was to stay put in the house and refuse to move out after the Administrative Decisions Tribunal affirmed NSWTG’s decision to sell.. NSWTG proceeded to take him to the Supreme Court in order to gain possession of the property and have him evicted. This effectively meant in law that Paul was being taken to court by his own mother to have him removed from her home, with NSWTG acting on her behalf in their role as her financial manager. All this to bring about the sale of her property which she did not want sold in the first place. 

Paul Contempree was in no position to present a defence against NSWTG’s legal team and the Court made the order on 16 July 2014 that NSWTG be given possession of the property. A delay of six weeks was granted before the writ of possession was to be executed. Paul Contempree was ordered to pay his mother’s legal costs for the proceedings which NSWTG had brought about on her behalf despite her strongly expressed objections. The mother ended up having the funds taken from her account to pay for these proceedings. Paul Contempree was evicted from his mother’s home by the Sheriff on 25 November 2014. Since then he has been living on the streets or in a small two man tent in northern NSW or south-eastern Queensland. This is the way the State of NSW treats its crippled and physically disabled citizens in the 21st century. 

Paul Contempree has set up his own website to warn people what to expect if they should ever have the misfortune of having their finances placed in the hands of NSWTG. The site is called The New South Wales Public Trustee And Guardian Exposed. Paul provides a detailed account of the poor treatment he and his family suffered at the hands of NSWTG, using colourful language to describe his family’s abusers. Readers of Paul’s website will be left in no doubt as to the emotional state he was left in as a consequence of all the abuse. He believes NSWTG’s treatment of his mother caused her early death. His site includes valuable links to numerous news reports with details of abuses and corrupt conduct by public trustee officials across Australia.. He also provides links to various other websites and organisations, including my own, which deal with this issue. Paul is to be congratulated for the work he has put in to bring all this information together.