Sunday, November 16, 2014

Open Letter to the Board of NZ Bridge

Wayne Burrows

10 Glen Place

Palmerston North

16/11/2014

To whom it may concern,

Open letter to the board of NZ Bridge.

I read the minute quoted below in the NZ Bridge minutes 24 August 2014. It interested me as it obviously references the case involving me that was before the Bridge Appeal Tribunal. I am deeply concerned that the information provided to the NZ Bridge Board appears to be unrelated to any facts of the case and therefore that the NZ Bridge Board was manipulated into any decision made.

“Bridge Appeal Tribunal

Moved that as it appears that the appellant is not offering to settle consistent with the Tribunals Memorandum a further memorandum be authorised to be filed by our Counsel confirming that the Board seeks that the appeal be set down for hearing subject to each party providing appropriate security for costs, or otherwise be dismissed.”

In particular there is no basis for the statement “it appears that the appellant is not offering to settle consistent with the Tribunals Memorandum”. After receiving the ‘Tribunals Memorandum’ I had direct contact only with Fergus More the NZ Bridge honorary solicitor. There were two telephone calls and an email exchange in which Mr More sought information and I responded. The first telephone conversation was the most substantial. The second very brief, initiated by me and only clarified whether Mr More still required some additional information that we had previously discussed – he did not.

At no time in any of those conversations or emails with Mr More did I in any way indicate that I was unwilling to settle as per the ‘Tribunals Memorandum’. Any suggestion that I did so by Mr More or by any board member in the discussion, for example Graham Wakefield, was not based on any factual information.

I had what I considered were by and large constructive conversations with Mr More throughout the appeal process. In the significant telephone conversation in the period covered by the board minute Mr More offered to find out what assurances could be given to me that NZ Bridge would accept the conditions of the ‘Tribunals Memorandum’ going forward and indicated clearly to me that he would recommend to the board that they accept the resolution proposed in the ‘Tribunals Memorandum’. The following are direct quotes from Mr More in the conversation 15 August 2014:

1.        “... my advice to NZ Bridge will be to accept what the tribunal is suggesting.”

2.        “I want to ask of you what would you say would be enough to bring closure to the appeal?”

3.       “Well why don’t you write to me, without prejudice to yourself with what you would want to be guaranteed in the sense of it going away. Do that for me.”

4.        “I am going to go back to NZ Bridge and indicate that if we are to try and achieve an outcome to this appeal we wont look at what brought us to this point but we will look at the future to see what assurances can be given you in terms of how it is that you could continue in the future to play the game in circumstances where we dont actually have any of these old issues resurfacing”.

As stated the conversation was constructive and I believed Mr More and I were working towards a resolution in terms of the ‘Tribunals Memorandum’.

Subsequently NZ Bridge filed a memorandum as per the above minute from the NZ Bridge board that stated

“Counsel has indicated to the appellant that NZ Bridge would have accepted closure of the appeal proceedings as initiated “without prejudice” by the Tribunal Chair…”

Such statement was entirely false and inconsistent with any conversation or email that I had with Mr More. The memorandum filed also included the statement:

“Given Mr Burrows chooses not bring closure as the Chair has proposed”

I filed a letter to the tribunal chair that included:

“I never indicated at any stage, to NZ Bridge nor to Mr More, verbally or in writing, that I would not accept the conditions of the memorandum from the Tribunal Chair.”

Therefore the NZ Bridge memorandum based on the quoted minute was plainly and I believe deliberately false.

I am not writing to revisit the issues of the appeal nor of the prior decision by the CDDC, however I think it is particularly concerning that someone, superficially Mr More – as he was the only NZ Bridge representative that I had direct contact with (save for Graham Wakefield’s attendance at one teleconference with the appeal tribunal) – although I speculate more likely a board member, manipulated the NZ Bridge Board by providing them with false information that I would not accept a proposal and then subsequently wrote a memorandum to the Appeal Tribunal that was knowingly false with regard to information that NZ Bridge had ‘indicated’ to me and again indicated I was unwilling to settle, when no such information had been given to NZ Bridge from myself.

I hope that you would be equally concerned that as board members you have been manipulated by some seeking to be deliberately untruthful.

I also hope that as board members you would call to account those among you who have provided the board with false information in this regard.

Yours faithfully

 

Wayne Burrows

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