From: Ray Norman <raynorman7250@gmail.com>
Date: Sunday, 15 June 2025 at 4:11 pm
To: Sam Johnson <sam.johnson@launceston.tas.gov.au>, Contact Us <contactus@launceston.tas.gov.au>, Mayor Matthew Garwood <matthew.garwood@launceston.tas.gov.au>, The Premier <premier@dpac.tas.gov.au>, Minister Vincent <kerry.vincent@parliament.tas.gov.au>, Hon Madeleine Ogilvie <madeleine.ogilvie@parliament.tas.gov.au>, Minister Guy Barnett <guy.barnett@parliament.tas.gov.au>, Local Government Division <localgovernment@dpac.tas.gov.au>, Joe Pentridge <joe.pentridge@launceston.tas.gov.au>, Councillor Hugh McKenzie <hugh.mckenzie@launceston.tas.gov.au>, Councillor Andrea Dawkins <andrea.dawkins@launceston.tas.gov.au>, Councillor Andrew Palmer <andrew.palmer@launceston.tas.gov.au>, Councillor Lindi McMahon <lindi.mcmahon@launceston.tas.gov.au>, Councillor Alan Harris <alan.harris@launceston.tas.gov.au>, Councillor Tim Walker <tim.walker@launceston.tas.gov.au>, Councillor Susie Cai <susie.cai@launceston.tas.gov.au>, Councillor Alex Britton <alex.britton@launceston.tas.gov.au>, Councillor Danny Gibson <danny.gibson@launceston.tas.gov.au>
Subject: AGAIN: The culturally appropriate and dignified means of the respectful disposal of a person's mortal remains in Launceston
Dear Mr Johnson,
Apropos my email to you yesterday and my further research it is now clearer to me that:
- It is within your bailiwick to determine who is a 'prescribed person' for the purpose of respectfully disposing of a deceased person’s body; and
- Likewise, it is within your delegated powers to determine who is a fit and proper person to be granted the status as a ‘prescribed person’; and
- Moreover, it is within your delegated authority to delegate to suitable and appropriate individuals the authority to act in your stead if you so wish and to set criteria for being appointed as a prescribed person – For example. a magistrate, a Justice of the Peace, a community leader et al.
Arguably, what needs to be assured is that a prescribed person is a fit-and-proper person to hold such authority given the public health issues and the security issues that come into play. Indeed, Gawler Environment Centre in South Australia [Link] has produced an exemplary model that sets a standard to be emulated by every Local Govt jurisdiction.
Indeed, this centre’s strategic purposefulness sets a standard that Tasmania/Launceston needs to be adhering to in contrast to Launceston’s WASTE MANAGEMENT CENTRE where resources are consigned to in order to wastefully dispose of them. Much the same can be said of Launceston’s cemetery and cremator. Launceston’s declaration of a CLIMATE EMERGENCY in 2019 figures among Australia’s most disingenuous policy determinations given that even changing the sign over the gate to RESOURCE RECOVERY CENTRE has been assiduously resisted by Council’s management.
All that said, I look forward with great interest to your response to the proposition that you are able to effect change in regard to the prevailing sensitivities and sensibilities in respect to the legal, safe, dignified respectful disposal of a person’s mortal remains in the jurisdiction you manage. Moreover, I look forward to you demonstrating the possibility of leadership and change in Tasmania’s 29 Local Govt. areas.
Regards,
Ray Norman
....................
Dear Mr Johnson,
I write directly to you as my research suggests that in Launceston you are the person with the authority, and thus best placed, to provide the information that I am seeking – see https://cca7250.blogspot.com/.
It seems that you are the person with the delegated authority to deem that someone is a ‘prescribed person’ and is thus a person who has the authority to respectfully dispose of the mortal remains of a person in your jurisdiction. My research also seems to be telling me that, say in my own case, I would not be required to hold any formal qualifications nor would I be required to be certified in any way, except it seems, by being deemed by you to be a ‘prescribed person’.
Question: What might inhibit you in deeming me to be a prescribed person?
By extension this seems to suggest that on your own cognisance you are able (empowered?) to deem me, or anyone like me, who seeks to be a ‘prescribed person’, to be deemed to be a ‘prescribed person’. If this not the case, can you please illuminate the error that I’m apparently relying upon.
If the context in which a statement is proffered is not known, then an appropriate response to it is difficult if not impossible. Therefore, I need to contextualise what I am putting to you. Quite simply to be a ‘prescribed person’ in a cultural context the person would need to be an adherent of the cultural norm that applies to an assertions and/or question.
My position is that in the here and now in Launceston:
- There is a diversity of cultural realities; and
- There is a multilayered grouping of religious adherents; and
- There is a significant percentage of people who are non-religious; and
- There is a significant percentage of people who are antithetic to religious belief systems.
In turn this may well mean that people deemed to be prescribed persons are not accepted as ‘practitioners’ able to deliver the services in question here, and is needed at the time of a group member’s death except by engaging with someone in the Funeral Industry.
Moreover, on the assumption that anyone seeking to become a prescribed person would/should need to:
- Be able to demonstrate that they have police and other appropriate security clearances; and
- Be able to demonstrate that they have the wherewithal to transport and handle bodies in accord with health regulations and other legislation; and
- Be able to deliver their services without causing offence within a diverse and divergent community.
It seems that while you may well be requiring all of the above in:
- Accepting someone as a ‘prescribed person’ ; and you and/or the Director off Local Government
- You are apparently requiring the candidate to be prescribed person and to be operating a business in the ‘Funeral Industry’; plus
- Concerningly, these things can be deemed to be non-compliant, or compliant, by subjective assessment; and
- The means of becoming a prescribed person are opaque and this appears to be bureaucratically convenient..
The principal prohibitions on restrictive trade practices in Australia are contained in Part IV of the Competition and Consumer Act 2010 (Cth). They prohibit practices, conduct, arrangements, transactions or provisions that are either: Per se illegal, such as cartel conduct and resale price maintenance.
That being the case, it arguably an extraordinary position for a Loal Govt officer to be in given the opportunities for corruption and other untoward outcomes and behaviours.
Question: If by extension your delegated authority, and its outcomes arguably can be demonstrated to be a ‘restive trade practice’ how might it be that you can hold a position that has a dubious foundation if not one blighted by dubious outcomes?
Indeed, it has been claimed that the Funeral Industry operates in ways that it can ‘gouge’ its clients on privileged grounds and thus affording ‘privileged persons’ their quasi monopoly – or at least their uncompetitive advantage arrived at bye deeming.
Apparently, you claim to be taking action via the Carr Villa Memorial Park Cemetery Management Plan. Indeed, it is said that over the next 12 months Council’s management is committed to working with the Office of Local Government to explore ways to work directly with the community towards more elastic outcomes.
While it would significantly shift the operating model of Carr Villa, it seems to be hollow rhetoric in the face of the perceivable inconsistencies and inequities unprescribed people experience:
Bureaucracies acting in accord with their own sensibilities rather than their community's cultural sensibilities and sensitivities; and
- Do so while arguably being aa fit-and-proper-person who might otherwise be deemed able to be a ‘prescribed person’ but are nonetheless being denied the opportunity to meet their community’s cultural ‘requirements’ etc.
Given that it is not possible to postpone ‘death’ until a bureaucracy can catch up, and belatedly, with the prevailing cultural sentiments and sensitivities in a community it is understandable in a sense. However, it it does need to be called out as BUREAUCRATIC HUMBUG. I submit that the position that you seem to taking, and its lack of urgency, is being deemed to be acceptable simply because those most affected are dead and those around them are in grief.
Should I be missing an important point I look forward to your early response correcting my position.
Regards,
Ray Norman
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