After 15 years in harness racing’s wilderness, former champion NSW reinsman Greg Bennett’s long march to freedom is over after the QLD Civil and Administrative Tribunal (QCAT) this week declared Bennett to be a fit and proper person to hold a Class A Driver’s License.
In 2011 was stood down from the sport and later disqualified for 7 years for failing to answer questions before a special Harness Racing NSW inquiry into corruption in the industry (the ‘Green Light Scandal’) and for failing to produce his iPhone when directed to to do by Stewards.
Since the expiration of the disqualification Bennett had applied on multiple occasions to be relicensed, primarily in NSW and, more recently, in Queensland, but each application had been refused.
Bennett appealed the license refusal decision to the QCAT, and made the eminently sensible decision to engage the services of the cross-state legal dream team of Hammond Nguyen Turnbull lawyers (with former harness racing licensee Peter Morris as his solicitor) instructing the Magic Man James E. Murdoch KC as his barrister and advocate.
Against all believed and perceived odds, the dream team won.
Based on the representations and submissions put forward by the dream team, presiding QCAT member John Lobban, a former Managing Partner of leading law firm Ashurst, decided in Greg Bennett’s favor.
Considering the totality of the evidence before it, and taking into account his faultless conduct since the expiration of his disqualification, and the references of support for Bennett provided to him by 11 people including a former Chief Steward Barbara Scott, QCAT found that Greg Bennett IS a fit and proper person to hold an A-Grade drivers license.
Top quality legal representation doesn’t cost, it pays.
Just ask Greg Bennett.