Paragraphs 45 and 54, which affect particularly the chief executive at
the time of the crash, Morrison Ritchie Davis, are as follows:
45. The reaction of the chief executive was immediate. He
determined that no word of this incredible blunder was to become
publicly known. He directed that all documents relating to
antarctic flights, and to this flight in particular, were to be
collected and impounded. They were all to be put on one single file
which would remain in strict custody. Of these documents all those
which were not directly relevant were to be destroyed. They were to
be put forthwith through the company's shredder.
54. This was at the time the fourth worst disaster in aviation
history, and it follows that this direction on the part of the
chief executive for the destruction of 'irrelevant documents' was
one of the most remarkable executive decisions ever to have been
made in the corporate affairs of a large New Zealand company. There
were personnel in the Flight Operations Division and in the
Navigation Section who anxiously desired to be acquitted of any
responsibility for the disaster. And yet, in consequence of the
chief executive's instructions, it seems to have been left to these
very same officials to determine what documents they would hand
over to the Investigating Committee.
These paragraphs occur in the context of a discussion of the change in
the computer waypoint shortly before the flight and the failure to draw
it to the attention of the flight crew. The reference to the chief
executive having 'determined that no word of this incredible blunder was
to become publicly known' is, taken by itself, at least an
overstatement, because in paragraph 48 the Commissioner in effect
qualifies it. He says there that it was inevitable that the facts would
become known and 'perhaps' the chief executive had only decided to
prevent adverse publicity in the meantime. Clearly the airline disclosed
to the Chief Inspector that the change of more than two degrees of
longitude had been made in the computer early on the day of the flight
and not mentioned to the crew; these matters are referred to in
paragraphs 1.17.7 and 2.5 of the Chief Inspector's report. They were
matters which the Chief Inspector did not highlight; evidently he did
not regard them as of major importance. For his part the Commissioner
(in para. 48 of his report) states that the Chief Inspector did not make
it clear that the computer flight path had been altered before the
flight and the alteration not notified to the crew.
We are not concerned with whether or not the Commissioner's implied
criticism of the Chief Inspector's report is correct. The complaint made
by the applicants is that the criticisms of Mr Davis in the two
paragraphs that we have set out are based on mistake of fact, not on
evidence of probative value. It is also said that he was not given a
fair opportunity to put his case in relation to such findings, but what
the applicants most stress is the way in which the Commissioner dealt
with the evidence.
In particular they point out that the evidence of Mr Davis, not
contradicted by any other evidence and correctly summarised in paragraph
45 of the Commissioner's report, was that only copies of existing
documents were to be destroyed; that he did not want any surplus
document to remain at large in case its contents were released to the
news media by some employee of the airline; and that his instructions
were that all documents of relevance were to be retained on the single
file. Their counsel submit in effect that in converting this direction
for the preservation of all relevant documents into a direction for the
destruction of 'irrelevant' documents--a word used by the Commissioner
as if it were a quotation from Mr Davis--the Commissioner distorted the
evidence. And it is said that the description 'one of the most
remarkable executive decisions every to have been made in the corporate
affairs of a large New Zealand company' is, to say the least,
far-fetched.
Counsel for the applicants point also to the fact that there is no
evidence that any document of importance to the inquiry was destroyed in
consequence of the instructions given by Mr Davis. The gist of the
contrary argument presented by Mr Baragwanath was that Mr Davis was
fully cross-examined about his instructions; and that 'it was open to
the Royal Commissioner to find that there were in existence documents
which never found their way to that file and that the procedures were
tailor made for destruction of compromising documents'.