VICTORIAN CIVIL AND ADMINISTRATIVE TRIBUNAL
human rights DIVISION
HUMan rights LIST	
vcat reference No.H228/2023	
CATCHWORDS	
Application under s 75 of the Victorian Civil and Administrative Tribunal Act 1998 for summary dismissal of application for an order under the Equal Opportunity Act 2010.	

APPLICANT	Rohan Brown	
RESPONDENT 	Maree Nugent	
BEFORE	Senior Member Anita Smith 	
HEARING TYPE	Decided on the papers 	
DATE OF ORDER	27 November 2023	
CITATION	Brown v Nugent (Human Rights) [2023] VCAT 1315	

Orders

1	The application under section 75(1) of the Victorian Civil and Administrative Tribunal Act 1998 (Vic) for summary dismissal of unjustified proceedings is granted.
2	The application for an order under the Equal Opportunity Act 2010 (Vic) is dismissed.

Anita Smith
Senior Member			

APPEARANCES:		
For Applicant	In person 	
For Respondents	R.A. Kornhauser, General Counsel	

Reasons
Outline
1	On 27 June 2023, the applicant submitted an application under section 105 of the Equal Opportunity Act 2010 alleging that the respondent, authorised or assisted discrimination against him and discrimination on the grounds of political activity.  It also alleges obstruction of justice, corruption, and malfeasant misconduct which are matters outside VCAT’s jurisdiction. Other materials submitted by the applicant also allege fraud, false arrest and false imprisonment, wilful and criminal misconduct and overreach of authority. Again, these are matters outside VCAT’s jurisdiction. The applicant asserts that his ‘political belief or activity’ is that “courts are run by the police and that they actively engage in malfeasance and obstruction of justice as a matter of course”. 
2	The respondent is registrar of the Magistrate’s Court of Victoria whom the applicant describes as a service provider.  
3	On 4 July 2023, Senior Member Steele made orders of VCAT’s own motion for the parties to make submissions and for VCAT to determine whether the application should be struck out or dismissed under section 75 of the Victorian Civil and Administrative Tribunal Act 1998 without a hearing. On 21 August 2023, time for submissions was extended to 1 September 2023 at the request of the applicant.  Senior Member Steele’s order referred to the decision in Brown v Hannan (Human Rights) [2023] VCAT 482 which involved the same applicant. 
4	The applicant’s submissions reiterated the allegations set out above but did not address the section 75 application. 
5	The respondent’s submissions sought the summary dismissal of the application because it is misconceived, frivolous, lacking in substance and an abuse of process. 
6	The file was assigned to me for decision on 19 October 2023.
The application
7	The application contains many allegations but scant detail about the basis of these allegations. 
8	The respondent’s affidavit and submissions explain that the applicant is a defendant in Magistrates Court proceedings. In April 2023 the applicant emailed a staff member in the Court seeking the issue of witness summonses against 77 persons, including senior judicial and political figures. On 2 May 2023 a Registrar declined to issue the summonses because they did not consider it likely that the person summoned would have in their possession or control the material evidence. On 11 May 2023, Magistrate Lawrence listed charges against the applicant to be listed for special mention on 11 October 2023 when the applicant could give reasons why the summonses should be issued. VCAT has not been informed of the outcome of the special mention.
The section 75 application
9	The respondent has detailed the principles relating to summary dismissal of a proceeding.  They were also set out in detail in Senior Member Steele’s decision in Brown v Hannan. As I am aware that the applicant has access to the submissions and that decision, I do not intend to repeat the principles here but simply to record that I have had regard to those principles. 
10	The respondent argues, first, that the applicant’s stated ‘political belief or activity’ is not a protected attribute under the Equal Opportunity Act 2010.  The respondent relied upon Member Thwaites’ reasoning in Brown v Legal Aid  where he concluded that:
73.	…A belief is not political where it has no bearing on the form, role, structure, feature, purpose, obligations, duties or some other aspect of government.
11	The respondent argues, second, that the applicant appears to have made the claim in the area of provision of goods and services and that the issue or non-issue of a summons from a Court is not a service. In this respect the respondent relies on Senior Member Steele’s decision in Brown v Hannan and drew an analogy between the statutory role of a Chief Magistrate and the role of the respondent. 
12	The respondent further argues that because the issue of summons is listed for special mention, the application invites VCAT to review the actions of a judicial officer and is therefore misconceived for the same reasons as set out in Brown v Hannan. 
13	Finally, the respondent argued that she is immune from the operation of the Equal Opportunity Act 2010 and that she has no power to issue or not issue a summons. 
14	The applicant, as noted above, did not respond in any meaningful or rational way to any of these submissions. 
Findings
15	The respondent’s submissions are correct in all respects. The application is obviously and patently defective in all of the ways that the respondent has submitted. 
16	
The application is dismissed because it is misconceived, frivolous, lacking in substance and an abuse of process. 

Anita Smith
Senior Member