5 May 2022
“I’m Not Coping Anymore”
On 5 May 2022, after months of notifications, pleas for assistance, requests for updates, and repeated attempts to have my legally binding Injury Management Plan implemented, I sent another email.
This one was addressed to governance at ACU. It also included my local member, Chris Minns, then Leader of the Opposition, and his electorate officer, Cheryl Han.
The subject line was simple:
“I’m Not Coping Anymore.”
By this point, there could be no misunderstanding about the seriousness of my situation.
My employer knew.
The insurer knew.
The regulators knew.
The elected representative who had become involved knew.
And governance knew.
I had repeatedly explained that my Injury Management Plan had never been implemented. I had repeatedly explained that I needed proof of employment. I had repeatedly explained that my financial situation was becoming critical. I had repeatedly explained that I was experiencing significant psychological harm.
Yet nothing changed.
In that email I wrote:
“I’m not coping anymore. I need the injury management plan implemented and proof of my employment urgently.”
I explained that I was traumatised, paralysed by fear, and could not continue to be neglected.
I wrote:
“I cannot be neglected anymore.”
I reminded them that I had a right to recover at work. I attached material about recovery and return to work because I was still trying to remind the employer of obligations that should never have required reminding.
I was not refusing return to work.
I was begging for it.
I was begging for the legally binding plan to be implemented.
I was begging for cooperation.
I was begging for communication.
I was begging for basic human decency.
I wrote:
“I’m begging for support, kindness, compassion, empathy and human contact. Urgently.”
At the time, settlement on my home was approaching. I needed proof of employment. I needed certainty. I needed my statutory entitlements restored. I needed the employer and insurer to do what they were legally required to do years earlier.
Instead, I was left waiting. Again.
This is one of the most difficult emails for me to read now because it captures a moment when the mask had completely fallen away.
There was no formal language. No legal arguments. No technical discussion.
Just a human being in distress asking for help.
A worker with more than twenty years of service to her university.
A worker who had followed processes.
A worker who had reported hazards through the proper channels.
A worker who had complied with every request.
A worker whose Injury Management Plan existed on paper but not in practice.
And despite all of that, there was still no urgency.
No intervention.
No implementation.
No support.
Universities often speak about dignity, inclusion, wellbeing, mental health, and social justice. Politicians often speak about listening to vulnerable people and taking action when systems fail.
But leadership is not measured by public statements.
Leadership is measured by what happens when someone is vulnerable and dependent on the system you control.
On 5 May 2022, I was telling governance, my employer, and my elected representative that I was no longer coping.
The response was more silence.
And the consequences of that silence would continue to unfold…
As the institutionalised wage theft continued…
Source: contemporaneous record of events - Document 315.
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