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The Office of the MARA has suspended Facebook podcast host, Monica Gruszka for a period of 3 years. Ms Gruszka and her associate, Mark Northam, an immigration lawyer previously hosted "The Migration Show" podcast.
The page on the OMARA website is below:
The decision record is below:
Ms-Gruszka---Redacted-Decision.pdf
The Daily Telegraph has published the following news article titled "Migration podcast host suspended over Code of Conduct breaches"
Ms Gruszka has previously been associated with Migration Law Training, in particular a Capstone Preparation program, as per the image below:
I noticed that on one of the FB forums there are many expressions of sympathy by people who either have no idea what happened or who clearly have not read the decision letter.
Maybe the decision letter could provide material for a future CPD on how NOT to run a migration agency.
What makes this case so bizarre for me is that the person was a respected and trusted RMA being a popular migration podcaster and apparently a teacher of the capstone subject. Yet she appeared to have led a double life. We can all get things wrong and make mistakes but according to the judgement she so completely departed from the principals of the profession.
Speaking of summarising cases involving practitioners how about we ask for Sergio to do a summary of a disciplinary decision against migration alliance's public officer and interim secretary: https://portal.olsc.nsw.gov.au/dasearchbn/daresultdetail/?id=1d59a7df-b633-eb11-bf74-000d3ad1941e
Or how about we ask for Sergio to do a summary of a federal court decision ordering the law firm of migration alliance's public officer and interim secretary to pay legal costs for telling a client a case had 100% chance of success when in reality there were no reasonable prospects of success at all: http://www.austlii.edu.au/cgi-bin/viewdoc/au/cases/cth/FCA/2020/558.html
I would have thought we would have more solidarity with other agents than the commentary indicates. Let he or she who is without sin (in a very difficult and poorly regulated industry) cast the first stone.
She's not an agent so we don't need to have solidarity with her. Ain't no way I am having solidarity with a person who does that to our good profession.
I don't agree with Nick Houston. This is an area that is very delicate-there is no room for mistakes when you are dealing with a person's futue- if they can stay in Australia or be sent home. You should be on your game 100%. Clearly Monica made a lot of mistakes. She was ill-informed and hid behind the smoke and mirrors of a podcast host and being an educator. As someone who has dealt with her professionally, I feel that she dropped the ball about a year ago. She was initially good-attentove and said all the right things. Then...... nothing
Oohps, Not surprising, the way she was behaving, laughing, mocking and behaving quite childishly on her podcasts, I was actually wondering ....
Well may be she is better geared for another profession, albeit I feel some empathy for her, as I believed that she was not mature enough for our esteemed profession.