The morning and afternoon of 23 August
49 According to Ms Doyle, it was on the morning of 23 August, that she spoke to Mr Peter Wilkins of the ABC. (It does not matter, but I wonder whether this interview was not conducted on the previous evening, the 22nd because of the time that the plaintiff was informed of it - see below.) At first, their conversation was off the record but, at the end, Ms Doyle put it on the record. Ms Doyle spoke about her feelings about the race. What she said was recorded. That recording was broadcast as part of the Lateline programme on 23 August, under the headline "Former Olympic rower discusses Sally Robbins' collapse", which comprised a discussion between Tony Jones and Olympics' reporter, Peter Wilkins, about what had happened. Also appearing on the programme was Ms Rachel Kinninmonth, who had rowed as one of the Australian women's eight team in the 2000 Olympics. Mr Wilkins introduced Ms Doyle's contribution -
"There are two sides to every story, of course, as there is to this story. There is a sense of betrayal, that they took a very strong rower, a powerful rower, under their wing and she didn't quite come up after showing some previous form. But also, Sally Robbins can feel betrayed by the crew who in her darkest hour shunned her. Both of those episodes are unfortunate.
Ky Doyle defended the crew's position in the immediate aftermath of the race because they were only hearing one side of the story and that was Sally Robbins' side of the story when she said she was giving 110 %, which hit a nerve with them. She defended it on another level too, defended those feelings of anger, Kyeema Doyle, by saying they should be angry because the whole episode - they had embraced a rower, taken a rower into their inner dreams and goals with some previous form and she feels that should have been picked up."
Doyle: I do believe we should be angry. We should be angry at ourselves that we let this niggle carry on for so long. I think we should be angry at coaches for not seeing this earlier on, we should be angry at selection processes and the hierarchy above this. There is not one person you can point the finger at. It is extremely disappointing. What do we do now? Here we are at the Olympics. Our moment is gone. I believe we were the most ready out of everyone and we wanted it the most. It's just unfortunate the trust we put into other people and the commitment that we had shown each other didn't happen, like it didn't come through, like the promises we made to each other were broken."
50 Ms Doyle's decision to allow her immediate and somewhat raw emotional response to the situation to be published was, as she said, the outcome of the emotions of anger, frustration and disappointment. In this context, the absolute ban in the media guidelines of making disparaging remarks about other team members can be seen as a very sensible rule indeed. It is a pity that it was not obeyed. It seems it did not occur to Ms Doyle at the time. That she was, however, in breach, and in serious breach of it, cannot be gainsaid. Even now, Ms Doyle appears to believe she was justified.
51 On 23 August, the plaintiff had gone to the beach volleyball venue, I think sometime in the afternoon. There, he was told on the telephone by members of the media office that Ms Doyle had given an interview to Lateline in which some disparaging remarks had been made about Ms Robbins and members of the media asked him what he was going to do about it. The plaintiff unsuccessfully attempted to contact the team Manager, Wayne Diplock and then spoke to Peter Huggett, the Assistant Manager. The plaintiff asked him where the crew members were and was told they had moved back into the Village but then gone off into town to enjoy themselves. The plaintiff told Mr Huggett, "Look, would you contact them and ask them to come back into the Village by 8 o'clock tonight and then I'd like to see them at 7.30 in tomorrow morning". He also told Mr Huggett to tell the team that they were being kept in the village because they had spoken to the media despite the earlier reminder about the media rules.
52 The plaintiff conceded that, by treating the team as a whole in respect of their returning to and remaining at the village, he had disciplined them all for what it appears only two of them had done. He said that the problem was that the team members were, as he understood it, downtown where members of the media also were and he was unable at that time to be more specific about the two particular members - Ms Wilson and Ms Doyle - who had broken the rule. The plaintiff agreed that his direction was likely to hurt the team members' feelings but denied that his request returning to and remaining in the village until his morning meeting with them should be regarded as irksome. He said that, at all events, they would have been coming back to sleep in the village that night so they were, in effect, being required to stay in the village only for three or four more hours than otherwise would have been the case. The plaintiff agreed that he intended to discipline the team to the extent that they were required to return to the village but, as I understand it, his preponderant motive was to have the opportunity to speak to the team before things developed any further and this could not, as a practical matter, be done before the morning. It would also give them an opportunity to reflect on the situation; it was often the case with mature teams, such as the rowing team, that these issues should be resolved amongst themselves and thus they needed to be together.
53 The plaintiff, looking back at what happened, said that he thought that the manager, the head coach and the media liaison officer, when the rowers got off the water, should have immediately moved them through the mixed zone and into the privacy of their own change rooms where they could have a talk about what had happened and what should then be done. This would have giving the crew an opportunity to collect themselves and, I think, get past their immediate emotional response to what had happened.
54 In the early afternoon of 23 August, the team had moved from their temporary accommodation back into the Olympic Village in Athens. It appears that the accommodation arrangements at the Village involved the entire women's eight team being in an apartment together for the week. There was no space problem with this arrangement but, in the circumstances, Ms Foulkes did not think that it was a good idea. The problem, I think, was that there were strong feelings about what had happened in the race and that having all team members in close proximity could make for a difficult situation. This is powerful evidence of the strength of the feelings in the team about Ms Robbins.
55 Ms Foulkes approached Mr Huggett about the matter. When the matter was raised with him he said, something to the effect, "You are locked in the village tonight" and said this was "the order of John Coates". When asked whether the entire crew were locked in, he said something to the effect of "yes, with the exception of Sally". When asked to explain this ruling, Mr Huggett said that "it was to do with the fact that [you have] been speaking to the media during the day". She said that she had not realised that anyone had spoken to the media. She saw this as a punishment and questioned Mr Huggett about it. He simply said, according to Ms Foulkes, that it was the order of Mr Coates and that there was a meeting with him in the morning. When asked what the meeting was about, Mr Huggett said, "It was to discuss whether or not you will be sent home on a plane first thing tomorrow morning". Ms Foulkes, she says, was so taken aback by this instruction that she did not really enter into any discussion about the matter although Mr Huggett was, at all events, not very informative, citing Mr Coates' authority for what he had said.
56 It is obvious from what I have already said that several of Mr Huggett's statements to Ms Foulkes did not express what the plaintiff told him. The plaintiff had not used the expression "locked in". Nor had the plaintiff excluded Ms Robbins from the request. It may be said also that Mr Huggett did not convey the plaintiff's request that the team should be back by 8pm, which would have given them some time in town, though Ms Foulkes recollection of being "locked in tonight" is consistent with the plaintiff's timeframe. Nor had the plaintiff said what the subject of the morning meeting was to be, although it was clear enough that it was to deal with the media publicity amongst other possible relevant issues. The plaintiff had not considered sending the crew home and certainly had not suggested to Mr Huggett that this was being considered, let alone that this was one of the matters to be discussed. This may have been Mr Huggett's belief about events but he should have made it clear that this information did not come from the plaintiff.
57 Overall, Mr Huggett's unnecessarily peremptory language put the plaintiff in a significantly false position so far as the women were concerned and transformed a reasonable, moderately expressed request into an authoritarian threat. I mention this at this point since much of the defendants' case focused on what was contended to be the unfairness of the plaintiff's request and the impression that it made on the minds of some of the crew members. This contention ignores, however, the transformation of the plaintiff's request that I have described. Moreover, it was a transformation of which the plaintiff, quite reasonably, was unaware. The plaintiff's message was simple, short and polite. He had no reason to expect that Mr Huggett would do any more that relay that message, still less that he would attribute to him matters which were not the fact and to which he had not referred. It is nonsense to suppose that the plaintiff, with his manifold responsibilities, needed to cross question Mr Huggett about what he was to convey to the team and ensure that he did not add any elaboration of his own, let alone attribute that elaboration wrongly to him.
58 It was not surprising that Mr Huggett's message concerned Ms Foulkes very much or that, when she shortly after relayed it to the rest of the crew (but not Monique Heinke who was not at the village at the time), they responded emotionally, some angrily, seeing it as some sort of punishment and not understanding what they had done wrong. I think it is reasonable to suppose that a number of them felt embarrassed and humiliated. How long this lasted I cannot say but I would have thought that, after some reflection, the reasonableness of the plaintiff's direction would have been appreciated, if disliked. Part of the problem was that there had been unfortunately added to it the threat of being peremptorily sent home and this must have added considerably to their resentment.
59 Perhaps an hour or so after the discussion with Mr Huggett, later in the afternoon, a number of the crew went for a walk to try to calm down and the mobile phones of three or four of them started ringing. Ms Foulkes remembered Ms Doyle talking to a reporter but did not recall specific details of what she said.
60 Ms Foulkes thought that the team needed some help, especially because there were some younger crew members who might be tempted to talk to reporters if the reporter used the device of being a sympathetic listener. The group discussed the issue and, I think, agreed that it was necessary to be careful. Ms Foulkes said that, up to this point, she had not recalled the media conditions in the agreement but that, at all events they reflected her personal view about the desirability about speaking to the media and she would not anyway make a statement that was critical of another team member.
61 About ten minutes after Ms Foulkes overheard Ms Doyle's conversation with the reporter she decided that she would call the plaintiff and ask for help. He did not answer his mobile telephone so she left a message on his voicemail to the effect, "We need help. Things are out of control". This was about mid-afternoon. So far as the plaintiff's recollection goes, he received a message that Ms Foulkes had telephoned at 4.00pm. At one point in his evidence he said there was no text but then said that the message from Foulkes was to the effect that, "I really need some advice about the race and as to what is happening to us and how to deal with it". He recalls only one message. The plaintiff said that, although he wrote down the fact that he received a call from Katie Foulkes at 4pm, he did not return it because by that time he knew that he was meeting the team at 7.30 the following morning and regarded that as the appropriate opportunity to give this advice and information. I gather that the plaintiff also thought that he preferred to deal with the team members as a group. Furthermore, he was busy with other responsibilities.
62 Following the call to the plaintiff's telephone, Ms Foulkes went to see Mr Huggett again in the team manager's room. By then she was in tears, which was out of character for her. She said to Mr Huggett words to the effect that the team needed some help, that things were getting out of control and that the media had starting calling their mobile phones. Mr Huggett's response was not sympathetic. She said he replied, "You girls should have been nicer to Sally". Ms Foulkes was confused by this response, indeed dumbfounded, and asked Mr Huggett what he meant, in what respect had the team not been nice to her. She does not recall what his response was except to remember that he was not forthcoming with any help. She recalled that at this time Wayne Diplock, the Team Manager, was somewhere in the vicinity.
Team members meet with Mr Eales
63 Mr Eales was a rugby union player, a former captain of the Wallabies and a highly respected athlete. He had been assigned the role of athlete liaison officer at the 2004 Athens Olympics. There were several such officers. Mr Eales was assigned to a number of teams, including the rowing teams. He had been present at the rowing venue for the final of women's eight and observed most of the race. He did not actually see Ms Robbins collapse in the boat but did notice shortly after that she was lying down. After the race, he caught a bus back to the Olympic Village. On the bus were both administration and competitor members of the Australian team, but not the rowers. Julie Dunstone was there and mentioned that, when the women's eight boat had returned, there were members of the media around and, as I gather, some comments had been made in the heat of the moment. Ms Dunstone did not describe with any particularity what had occurred. Sometime after Mr Eales returned to the Olympic Village he telephoned the plaintiff and said that, if there was anything he could do to help in is role as an athlete liaison officer, to let him know. Mr Coates thanked him for his offer but did not immediately take him up on it. No criticism was directed at the plaintiff by the defendants about this and I therefore to not need to say more than there was no reason for the plaintiff at this point to think that anything other than normal support was necessary.
64 On the following day, 23 August, Vicky Roberts, the captain of the women's rowing team and a member of the women's eight crew, telephoned Mr Eales and said that she would like to have a chat to him about a way forward. The evidence does not disclose when this occurred, but I assume it was some time after the team returned to the Village. Mr Eales was aware that there was publicity back in Australia concerning the women's eight final, some in favour of Ms Robbins and some on the side of the crew. He told Ms Roberts that he was very happy to have a chat but that he was at that particular time watching other events to which he was committed and he would not be back in the Village until about 10pm. They arranged to meet at that time. Mr Eales then telephoned the plaintiff and said to him, in substance, that he was meeting with the women's rowing eight that evening and would speak to him afterwards.
65 Mr Eales met with Ms Roberts, Ms Foulkes and Ms Wilson in one of the meeting rooms at the Village at about 10pm. By the time he came to give evidence he did not recall more than the thrust of the conversation. Mr Eales said that the women were "very uncomfortable about the circumstances they were in at that stage and…the pressure that they were under from the media". He said that he gathered that "they were scared of the situation that they were in" which was unfamiliar to them and "wanted help with the way to move forward…from a situation where they had so much hype…surrounding their situation". He said there was some anger, which he described as "general" but that it was not "really" directed towards Ms Robbins "in a hostile way". He said that they mentioned that Ms Robbins was at the centre of the issue but could not recall anything specific about this. However, he was emphatic that they did not say anything critical of Ms Robbins. Mr Eales said that his response was, in substance, to suggest that they should move forward and that this could be done negatively or towards "healing the situation". Mr Eales told them that it was unfortunate that things had reached the present point, where there was "uncontrolled speaking" but added, "It is going to be important that something is said to the press going forward". So, at the end of the discussion, he suggested that to move the matter forward it was necessary to speak with Ms Robbins as well and told the women that he was happy to talk with her in their presence or else talk to her alone. They said that they would prefer Mr Eales to speak with her alone. This is what then happened. Mr. Eales said that, at this time, Ms Robbins was "very, very upset, very scared, in an environment that she had never experienced before and never anticipated experiencing". He said that he tried to get an understanding from her as to what happened and told her that the other team members "were going to need to know…and that [she] would need to be able to have some explanation for that". He told her this because he had gathered from the other three women that "they wanted Ms Robbins to explain what had happened". Ms Robbins said that she understood this need. The conversation took about twenty minutes or so and, by then, Ms Robbins had settled down.
66 Mr Eales then called the three other team members back into the room and reiterated the point that he had already made that the matter "could go towards healing or it could go towards maintaining animosity". It is not clear from Mr Eales' evidence whether he had learned of animosity amongst the team from the three women he had first spoken to or from Ms Robbins or perhaps both. However that may be, their response to these possibilities was that "they absolutely wanted to head towards healing, they wanted to be seen as a united group moving forward but they needed an explanation from Sally before being able to do that". Mr Eales said that Ms Robbins then gave an explanation. At the end of the meeting, Mr Eales repeated what had already been a theme of the meeting, that at some time there would have to be an explanation to the public, through the media of course, for what had happened, I take it not only by Ms Robbins but also the team and that an explanation would have to be made to the plaintiff because, as head of the team, he deserved an explanation. It is evident that that this was agreed. It was also agreed that they would meet with Mr Eales in the morning the meeting with the plaintiff and that this meeting should involve the whole team. I think it is significant that the women did not raise with Mr Eales any issue about being required to stay in the village that night until they spoke with the plaintiff in the morning. This suggests that this was not, by that time, seen by them as an unreasonable direction.
67 Ms Foulkes was less satisfied with the meeting than Mr Eales thought, largely because of undercurrents of which he was unaware. As Ms Foulkes described it, by the time of the meeting with Mr Eales the situation was that there was a great deal of speculation by team members about the possible response of the AOC or team management to what had occurred, not so much in the race but what some team members had done after the race. Ms Foulkes recalled that there was a preliminary agreement that the race itself would not be discussed since what had happened was not going to be shortly resolved. There is very little detail in Ms Foulkes' evidence about what had been done by team members but it is clear that there was a great deal of media speculation about the attitude of the team to Ms Robbins and other suggestions that the management was considering returning the team to Australia overnight. Ms Foulkes thought that it would be useful for Ms Robbins to communicate to the public what had happened in the race, that this had happened before and that the team had been very supportive of her through training and into the Olympic competition. She also wanted Ms Robbins to say that her problem was a psychological rather than a physical one. Ms Foulkes said that stopping for physical causes seemed to be more out of a rower's control than stopping for psychological reasons and that therefore the latter cause seems to let the team down in a way that is not the case with a physical difficulty. At all events, plainly enough some at least of the team thought it was important that Ms Robbins should acknowledge that she had a psychological rather than a physical problem. (Ms Foulkes and some other members of the crew had thought that this problem might have led to her having been stood down from the team. Indeed, Ms Foulkes and the coach had discussed the matter for some time and, during the week of the Olympics, whether Ms Robbins should step down. I discuss later how this matter developed, since the defendants' appear to place some importance on it.) It will be recalled that it was decided that Ms Robbins should come in to talk with Mr Eales and the others left the room. It was then that that Ms Foulkes saw Ms Robbins' interview with Channel 7 to which I have already referred. She was so upset by it that she did not feel she wished to speak to Ms Robbins at that time. Thus Ms Roberts collected Ms Robbins and brought her to the room.
68 As Ms Foulkes recalled it, the evening meeting then broke up with not much being achieved except that it was understood that there would be a public communication of Ms Robbins' situation. It was agreed that there should be another meeting the following morning before that which had been arranged with the plaintiff. Some time after the evening meeting with Mr Eales, Ms Foulkes received a message from a friend that the plaintiff had said the team was un-Australian. Ms Foulkes was very upset and indeed, physically sick.
69 I accept that Ms Foulkes' evidence is her best and honest recollection of the meeting with Mr Eales. However, I do not accept her judgment about its significance. At the press conference on the morning of 24 August, she said (at a time when the events were still fresh, in contrast to when she gave evidence) -
"…Fortunately we've had John Eales step in and give us some great guidance to be able to sit down as a group and again resolve as a group these issues and to be able to come forth and speak to you all as a group which I think is fantastic and again a sign of our team of how strong we are….
[Later on the following exchange occurred -]
Q: Katie you said before that you felt isolated from the rest of the team. Is there an example where someone from outside the rowing fraternities had something to say about the incident, maybe inside the village? Katie?
Foulkes: No, no, no nothing, nothing specific like that. I think maybe bringing it back to the question before of um how we became united again. All it took for someone, in the case of John to help us out and sit us down in a room and it literally took a couple of hours late last night, and that was more the concept. We just needed a bit a guidance, we, we were very emotional and once someone could assist with that we were right on track."
70 Even accepting Ms Foulkes present view accurately described her feelings at the time, objectively the meeting was very worthwhile. It was a positive step towards dealing in a constructive way with the issues that had arisen concerning both the media and, just as important, the unhappiness and animosity amongst the team. A significant catalyst for this occurring was the step taken by the plaintiff to require the crew to return to the Village. I do not suggest that he foresaw quite what happened but he certainly expected that being together would engender some reflection about what was happening and hopefully some process towards resolution. In this respect, I think that that the good sense of the plaintiff's intervention was entirely vindicated, for all that it may have given rise to some resentment in the crew, a response that might well have not occurred at all events had Mr Huggett spoken more moderately. It is also worth mentioning, I think, that Mr Eales' involvement at Ms Roberts' invitation was exactly the kind of role he was there to perform and vindicates the decision of those responsible, no doubt the AOC, that someone like Mr Eales should be available to help the athletes with problems that might arise.
71 Following his meeting, Mr Eales reported to Mr Coates, going to his room in the administration section at about midnight. He reported that the women's crew had been talking about what had happened and, although no conclusions had been arrived at, it was planned to meet again in the morning and Mr Eales would report to him again after that meeting. The plaintiff's account is somewhat more detailed (see below).
72 As planned, Mr Eales again met with the rowers on the morning of Tuesday, 24 August 2004. All the crew were present except for Monique Heinke. (Her absence was explicable and is not relevant.) He was surprised to see that the women were in their full Olympic uniform, obviously a matter of some significance. He briefly repeated to the whole team what he had said at the previous meeting, the essence of which was, as he saw it, "to work out a way forward". Ms Robbins then spoke to the team and described what had happened to her. A number of the crew wanted Ms Robbins to say that her problem was not a physical one and that she should say that publicly and also that she should say that she had had this problem before. Mr Eales did not recall that any criticisms were made of her. Several of the crew aired their feelings about what had happened and raised various matters (which Mr Eales did not detail) and then, as Mr Eales put it, "We spoke about what was the way forward". In dealing with this aspect, Mr Eales said that Ms Robbins and probably one or two other crewmembers would need to meet the press. However, the response of the team was that everyone should be present. Mr Eales added the point, obviously agreeing with this approach, that what was to be said, "needs to come from the heart" and he counselled against reading a statement. It was also agreed that there was a need to explain to the plaintiff - as well as to the media - what had occurred. So far as the plaintiff is concerned, Mr Eales said that he was entitled to have from the team an explanation both as to what had happened in the race and their conduct following the race.
73 It is obvious that the team had already moved forward substantially from the situation of the previous 48 hours. No doubt individuals still had some issues outstanding and, perhaps strong feelings about them. However, the most obvious and very positive feature about what was now happening was that the crew were acting as a team. The other very important element of the situation is that this occurred, essentially, out of their own personal resources of good sense and maturity, aided somewhat - I think by way of articulating what they would eventually have arrived at themselves - by Mr Eales' helpful involvement.
74 So it was that, when the plaintiff attended the meeting, he met a team and not a number of feuding individuals. They had already decided what they wanted to do. Ms Foulkes spoke first on behalf of the team and others then raised particular matters. Mr Eales was not able to recall, when he gave evidence, precisely what was said, but did retain a general recollection of the meeting, in substance that the crew "wanted to move forward" and wished to explain to the public what had happened and for this purpose to have a press conference. He said that there was no hostility expressed towards Ms Robbins but she was expected to explain what had happened. He said that no one mentioned in the meeting of Monday night that what had happened to Sally Robbins during the final had happened before. During the meeting one or other crewmember mentioned that they had not had any experience in dealing with the press in the circumstances and asked what should be done. The plaintiff said that he would arrange for Mr Hamill to speak to the crewmembers about the conference and Mr Hamill came into the meeting shortly after for that purpose. He did not deal with the issues that were to be raised but answered questions about dealing with the press generally. Amongst other things, the team decided that Ms Foulkes would speak first, then Ms Robbins and then Ms Wilson and then they would all be available to answer questions from the media. Mr Eales stated that neither he nor the plaintiff told the team what they should or should not say at the impending press conference.
75 Ms Foulkes said that she approached the morning meeting with Mr Coates in an extremely nervous state in the sense that the team was perceived as having done something very wrong to be called un-Australian and, as she believed, was about to be sent home. Ms Foulkes had spoken to all the team members (perhaps not Ms Robbins) to make sure that it was agreed that the meeting with the plaintiff was not about the race as such but "it was about coming together and making sure that our Olympics didn't end there and then". It was Ms Foulkes who asked the team to attend the meeting in uniform. Amongst other things, the crew captain, Ms Wilson, said that she wanted to apologise to the plaintiff for speaking to the media and she apologised to the team as well. Ms Foulkes said that, as she understood it, the main reason that the team had for wanting Ms Robbins to say that she had stopped rowing before, that this was due to psychological and not physical reasons, and that she had been supported by the team in working through the problem was that "the public was seeing this poor young thing that had just pushed too hard at the beginning of a race and that we had been awful to her". In part, this response arose from the interview which Ms Robbins herself gave, to which I have referred, when she was in tears and suggested, Ms Foulkes said, that the team (as distinct from a particular team member) had threatened to throw her out of the boat and this made the team look bad. Ms Foulkes said that a couple of her crewmates who were very good friends had become very distressed about the fact that they seemed to be being portrayed in the media as having acted in a nasty way. Ms Foulkes said that she had not herself seen this but she was reacting to what her friends had communicated. Ms Foulkes said speaking for herself, but I think it likely to be true of the other team members, that they wanted an end to the unfavourable publicity that the team had been apparently receiving in Australia: they wanted to show the team as united once more.
76 When the meeting with the plaintiff commenced, Ms Foulkes recalled Mr Eales making some preliminary remarks summarising the discussions so far, when the plaintiff interrupted apologising for his actions, implicitly for the un-Australian comment and saying that he had acted more unprofessionally than had the team members. Ms Foulkes then raised with the plaintiff the three points to which I have adverted. She did not raise anything about going home because, I think, she thought that the situation had moved along somewhat and had become much less confrontational, especially having regard to the plaintiff's apology. The team had already agreed that there would be no negative comment made by members about another member of the team. Ms Foulkes said this followed from the media agreement. That may be but it was necessarily implicit in the agreement to show a united front.
77 Ms Foulkes said that most of the team members did not speak. Most of them did not wish to do so because it was agreed that only the three points should be communicated. There was a concern that, if a general discussion ensued, it would have been emotional and, as I understand her evidence, not useful. Ms Foulkes did not recall whose idea the press conference was, although by the end of the meeting it was clear there was going to be a press conference. Nor did Ms Foulkes recall whether the plaintiff mentioned anything about the media rules, although she thought it would have been mentioned. Ms Foulkes did not feel that the media conference was an opportunity to speak to the Australian media on what had happened in the race. She was hoping that Ms Robbins would do that. She understood that she could not talk about what had happened in the race since to do so would have been to comment on someone else's performance, contrary to the media rules. Indeed, Ms Foulkes, as one of the spokespersons for the team for the purpose of the press conference, said that the main thing she wished to make clear was that the team had been reunited.
78 As far as the plaintiff's evidence about these events goes, I have already mentioned that he was informed by Mr Eales of Ms Foulkes' request for a meeting and immediately agreed to that course. He said that Mr Eales told him that the outcome of the meeting was, in substance, that "they had started this as a team together and they wanted to finish it together and they wanted to put that message across". The plaintiff said that he told the crew at the 7.30 meeting at the outset, in substance, that he had called the team back to the Village and wanted to see them because, despite being reminded by team management about the media guidelines prohibiting criticism of fellow team members, there had been another interview in which one of the crew (he may have named Ms Doyle) had done this. He then added that he should congratulate them, that they had handled matters much more professionally than he had by coming to see him in uniform and he apologised for saying things which he should not have said - plainly enough, a reference to the "unAustralian" comment.
79 The plaintiff said that Ms Foulkes led the following discussion. She said, in substance, that the team would like the opportunity to present to the media the fact that the campaign was started as a team and they wanted to finish it as a team. The plaintiff asked if the team wanted him to make that statement on their behalf at the usual media conference or would one or two of the members want to be present. The response was that the team would all like to go to the conference and this was why they were dressed in their uniforms. The plaintiff said that he told the team that he had a press conference at 9am, that he would conduct that conference and inform the media that there would be another conference at 10am for the team to attend. The plaintiff asked who was to speak on the team's behalf. It was agreed that the speakers would be Ms Foulkes, Ms Robbins and Ms Wilson. What they would say was not discussed except, I take it, in the most general terms, in the sense that the thrust of the press conference was that the team started together and finished together. The plaintiff said that he had learned earlier that morning that Ms Robbins had failed to finish races before. The rowers told him at the meeting that they had been working on this and that is one of the matters they wanted to talk about. The plaintiff said that he did not discuss with the team any particular questions that the media might ask. It appears from what the plaintiff said at the conference that he left the meeting unequivocally assured that there would be no more criticism of team members.
80 The plaintiff left the meeting and went down to the main press centre to host a press conference at 9am with members of the softball team and the men's pair rowing team. The team members then arrived with Mr Eales and spent a little time together in a room before they went out to meet the media at 10am. The plaintiff could recall only that at this brief meeting there was a discussion about the order in which the three team members were to speak but no detail was gone into of what they were going to say.
81 The plaintiff categorically denied at any time prior to the press conference telling any of the team members what to say at the press conference. I accept this evidence. I think it is patently true.
82 Speaking generally, Ms Foulkes said that she had felt feel bullied and pointed to the threat about being sent home and being locked in the village. She felt that she needed to co-operate or "I am in bigger trouble". However, this does not suggest that she would have acted in any different way had those influences not been present. She also said that she wanted to do the "right thing" by the plaintiff in that he, together with all the members of the team, wanted the "situation in terms of media just to…settle". She did think that he had a personal interest in the sense that he wanted to protect the Olympic Games and, as I understand her, the AOC from adverse media attention.
83 I come to Ms Doyle's account. She said that she does not remember much about the meeting with the plaintiff on the Tuesday morning but remembers how she felt at that time. She apologised to the plaintiff for breaking the media agreement, as I understand it, because she had been told by Mr Huggett that she must apologise to him or she would be sent home for breaking it. Whether Ms Doyle herself thought that it was a good thing that the team should show themselves as united as the others proposed is not clear. She said that she did not remember agreeing not to criticise anybody. She said that her decision not to say anything negative about Ms Robbins was motivated by a desire not to be sent home from the Olympics.
84 Ms Doyle said that she was terrified of the press conference because she said she knew that she would not be able to answer the questions in the way that she wanted to answer them. She explained this by saying that, if she was not allowed to comment on anyone else in the crew; how could she answer a question that raised, for example, the issue whether she would row with Ms Robbins again or as to what happened in the race? And also, of course, she could not talk about conversations that she had had with the other crewmembers about the matter. Ms Doyle said that she had felt extremely upset and extremely angry about being placed under what she described as "house arrest". At the conference Ms Doyle was still angry with Ms Robbins because she thought that she had not done the right thing in the boat. Had she been asked about whether Ms Robbins should have been competing, as I gather, Ms Doyle would have said that in substance the choice of the team was made by others. However, she maintained that she would not have made any negative comment about Ms Robbins at the conference, despite her antagonistic feelings. Ms Doyle said that, at all events, all the team members agreed on what line was to be taken and she understood that the media rules meant that she was not allowed to comment on what happened in the race.
85 It has been necessary to set out this perhaps overly detailed account of the evidence concerning the meetings with Mr Eales and the plaintiff before the press conference of 24 August to deal with the major contentions of the defendants seeking to justify the imputations against the plaintiff. The evidence is clear that there was nothing directly said or done by the plaintiff that brought about the team's decisions to conduct a press conference and on the agreed line that should be taken. It is nonsense to suggest that the team had been cowed or bullied into making these decisions, in particular the decision not to criticise Ms Robbins. The absence of any criticism of her selection to the team was closely related to this important element of the agreed approach. There is no evidence that the plaintiff or, indeed, anyone else suggested, let alone directed, the crew not to raise this matter. I am quite confident that no such suggestion was made. It is self evident that almost any other course than that agreed (and, indeed, followed) would have been very destructive. This was undoubtedly obvious to the team. With the possible exception of Ms Doyle, that the media guidelines forbade disparagement of Ms Robbins was substantially immaterial. The team itself had decided that that they wished to move forward and show themselves as united. I do not think that this was a pretence: given that there were strong feelings about what had happened, given that there were issues that needed to be worked through, the team was nevertheless united in every important sense: they would work through those matters as a team.
86 From a management and leadership point of view, the plaintiff's request that the team return to the Village and stay there until the morning meeting with him undoubtedly focused their minds on the need to resolve the situation and gave them an opportunity to do just that. In retrospect, the plaintiff's approach should be seen as having made a vital contribution to the resolution of the crisis that had been developing. Also of great importance was that the team should come up with an agreed course of action themselves, without any direction from anyone else, including the plaintiff. That this happened in the face of their strong feelings about what had happened in the race is a tribute to their maturity and good sense, which were very much demonstrated in the ensuing conference.
87 It is obvious that, to come to a team decision about what was to be done, the crew needed not only to get together but also have time to work through to that point. I expect that the fact that they were to meet with the plaintiff at 7.30am the following day was something of a spur to their decision-making since it is clear that they would wish to present him, as Chef de Mission, with a solution to what had had been happening and, I should think, a sensible response to his criticism about speaking to the media contrary to the guidelines, spurred also perhaps by his "un-Australian" remark. I do not doubt that, whatever Mr Huggett had said, the team would have wanted a resolution of what was a most distressing situation. The only fair conclusion is that it was the team and not the plaintiff who decided what approach was to be taken at the press conference and the fundamental purpose of the conference was to present themselves as a united team. Furthermore, it is obvious that this course was the best course to take in the circumstances and I do not think it can be seriously contended otherwise. In short, the team did not wish to analyse the race itself, or the selection process, or Ms Robbins' performance. What they had decided to do was present themselves to the media and, hence, to the public as a united team worthy of representing Australia. They succeeded.
88 That this is so is evident from the press conference itself. I have carefully watched the video of that conference. Everything I have said about its purpose is demonstrated, not only by what was said, but also the manner in which it was said. In fairness, I set out the entire transcript of the Channel 9 video (with some irrelevant editorial changes for ease of reading) -