Testimony of John St. Vincent Welch
February 9, 2005 12:23 am by Gene BorioTestimony of John St. Vincent Welch
Mr. Welch was CEO of the Tobacco Institute of Australia from Jan. 21, 1991 to the end of April, 1992. He contacted the law firm Slater and Gordon after the McCabe judgement to talk about the TIA’s Document Retention Policy. He has been interviewed on a number of Australian TV shows, including “60 Minutes.”
He will be cross-examined Wednesday via live feed from Australia at 2:30 PM.
He doesn’t seem to have much hard evidence to back up his allegations. A few of those “Read and Destroy” documents would help, or corroborating testimony from coworkers, though it’s unclear how far down the chain at TIA the documents in question went. Far enough to keep two shredders busy, at least.
Some portions of Mr. Welch’s testimony:
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Q. Did the TIA have a document retention policy at the start of your tenure at the TIA?
A. Yes.
Q. Was it a written policy?
A. Yes.
Q. What was the policy?
A. . . . when we were in receipt of documents that were potentially damaging to the industry and/or the member companies, once they’d been read they were to be destroyed.
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The Document Retention Policy was primarily a document destruction policy designed to make sure that potential “guns” were destroyed. The name “Document Retention Policy” was a misnomer. It’s purpose was to minimise the TIA library.
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Some documents from the member companies would explicitly say “read and destroy,” so those would simply be shredded after reading. All drafts of correspondence and documents were destroyed. Other decisions, such as determining which documents were potentially harmful to the industry, were more difficult. In those instances, one would consult with the government and public affairs officers of the member companies or others such as Clayton Utz and Steven Klotz. There also would be occasions where I would get instructions from a member company to determine whether the TIA possessed a certain document, and if so, to destroy it.
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Q. Previously, you stated that correspondence would often include instructions to “read and destroy”. How frequent was correspondence of this kind?
A. Frequent. There were two shredders in the office and as you received mail it would frequently be shredded after being read and/or circulated in-house.
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When I arrived morale was low and the TIA had not done a particularly good job of applying the Document Retention Policy, in that many documents that should have been destroyed had not been destroyed. The TIA’s lack of vigilance in implementing the Policy became a subject of frequent discussion on the part of the member companies and Clayton Utz. As a result, both the member companies and Clayton Utz took a more hands on approach in ensuring that the Document Retention Policy was applied and that potentially damaging documents were destroyed.
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Later in my tenure, the Document Retention Policy was made a major priority. Whereas the Document Retention Policy may have been around twentieth on the list of the TIA’s priorities previously, it became extremely important, the second, third, or fourth priority at the TIA.
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Q. Do you recall whether there was ever any discussion between member companies at the monthly TIA meetings over which documents each member should destroy?
A. Yes. The only reason that the TIA existed was so that there would be an industry voice and industry cohesion on certain issues. It was not unusual for someone at a meeting to sit down and say, “Has anybody got such-and-such a survey? Has anybody got such-and-such a document, and if you’ve got it, we at this company didn’t like it, and we’ve got rid of it and we suggest you review it if you’ve got it.”
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The basis for commissioning the scientific studies discussed at TIA meetings was not science, it was litigation, legislation, or public affairs concerns. Whenever any scientific report was published that was negative for the industry, it was standard practice that the member companies would immediately seek to hire a scientist who would do research or a study that would produce a result that was favorable to the industry. If the anti-industry research said “white” the member companies would contract for a report that said “black.”
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The flip side of destroying our own documents was to try to acquire documents held by the anti-smoking organizations.
Q. How did you do that?
A. As the anti-smoking organizations were not as careful as the industry about getting rid of documents, the TIA paid individuals to go through the dumpsters and rubbish of antismoking organizations in order to find any potentially relevant documents relating to their plans or their funding.
Q. Did TIA employees go through the anti-smoking trash?
A. No. The TIA contracted with a private inquiry agent, Winston Gregory & Associates. Winston Gregory employed a number of individuals who would go through the antismoking organizations’ garbage. Mr. Michael Rigo was one such person - Mr. Rigo was nicknamed “the garbageman”.