Introduction
In the recent past, corruption has become an everyday day-to-day practice where individuals in influential positions engage in corrupt dealings without fear and shame. As such, many individuals have been denied justice and what is rightfully theirs even though a justice system is supposed to protect their interests. Although the justice system can issue court orders to summon the corrupt individuals and ultimately serve justice to the afflicted, the court orders are often ignored. The accused parties issue illegitimate reasons as to why they did not fulfill the court orders. Thus, Australia's justice system but across the globe remains incapacitated if the parties involved are unwilling to comply with the issued court orders.
Corruption in Australia’s Car Industry
Corruption in Australia’s car industry takes many forms and involves various organizations, all in the car industry. The corrupt companies' ability to work together further acts as a barrier to achieving justice. It is almost impossible for a single individual to fight for justice against multiple organizations. The case involving Mercedes Benz Australia, the car manufacturer, Garry Crick Auto Group, the car dealer, and David Bevis, the client depicts how the strings of corrupt activities are carried out in Australia's car industry. David Bevis, just like any other client, had purchased his Mercedes van from Crick auto group, but the van started to have numerous issues shortly after. The client took the van to Crick for diagnostics even before the van's warranty expired. In all incidents, the car dealer refused to give the client the paperwork associated with the diagnostics. The reluctance to issue the client with the paperwork is one of the many forms of corruption that car dealers, not just Crick, use to ensure that the clients do not have enough evidence that would be presented in court to seek a replacement or a refund. Often, clients like Bevis only have their word of mouth as evidence, which is not acceptable in a court of law, and end up losing the case while the accused wins.
Another form of corruption highlighted in Bevis's case is the accused parties' refusal to obey and observe timelines set by the court without a legitimate reason. The court had demanded that for any party to be exempted from compliance with the court order, they must prove to the court that their efforts to fulfill their obligations were halted and frustrated by the Covid-19 pandemic. Mercedes Benz Australia failed to meet court timelines by failing to file and send their evidence (SOE) statement to their complainant on time. Instead, Mercedes sent their SOE via postal address, which arrived on 14th April 2020, six days after the court's set timeline (Bevis,2020). This is despite the option to send the SOE electronically. Mercedes claimed that the document was too large to be sent electronically to their defense, which was not legitimate. Crick Auto did not submit their SOE entirely despite the standing court timelines. As shown by Mercedes and Crick, the refusal to perform their obligations as required by the court is yet another form of corruption and obstruction to justice because justice delayed is justice denied. Without the two companies fulfilling their obligations as required, justice for Bevis is delayed and is ultimately denied.
Intimidation and frustrations are yet another form of corruption tactic often used in the car dealership industry to ensure that a client does not get justice. On numerous occasions, Mercedes and Crick Auto attempted to silence and stop Bevis from seeking claims of his van with threats of being suing him, giving incorrect information regarding the kilometers covered by the van from August 2017 to 2020. Neither Crick Auto nor Mercedes had access to Bevis's van since August 2017; any information given regarding the van's kilometers after August 2017 is false. Moreover, the client states that the van has not been in operation since August 2017, and it cannot, therefore, have traveled the kilometers stated. Additionally, although Mercedes had offered to issue a refund to the client, the refund was extremely low ($ 27,700) compared to $72,760.31, which the client claimed and was approximately the market value (Bevis,2020). These, in addition to numerous other intimidations, both the accused parties were only meant to derail Bevis from achieving justice while the companies benefit at his expense.
Conclusion
The car industry in Australia is one of the most corrupt industries in the country. Both the manufacturers and the car dealers colluding to intimidate their clients and eventually make acquiring justice impossible. Bevis's case is not an isolated case but reflects the day-to-day operations of a majority of companies in the car industry. Therefore, laws and policies specially created to protect the interests of the clients and the car dealers/manufacturers must be implemented to curb corruption and eliminate it.
