Forum Report - brief

You probably should ask non-organizers how it went, but from our end we were quite happy. One reporter estimated the crowd at about 200 - from the stage the 338 seat theatre looked filled, with an even sprinkling of empty seats, so 2/3rds seems a safe, if conservative bet.

Thanks to Peter Desbaratt's moderating we finished ON TIME which has to be viewed as a victory.

And more importantly the speakers — Andrew McIntosh, Juliet O'Neil, Ken Peters and Stevie Cameron — were by turns charming, engaging and alarming - and only very rarely succumbed to the temptation to delve into the minutae of their own cases.

Personally I think we didn't have enough diversity of opinion and if I were to do it again I'd get an investigative reporter (or two) up there who HASN'T been tromped on by the State to see how different their take is on these issues.

But never mind me, the audience appeared very engaged, lined up at the mike five deep with the questions, and gave a prolonged round of applause for the panel at the end.

And dozens hung around the stage afterwards, arguing the issue and swapping stories.

I'm working on getting a copy of the audio recording and a transcript, which I'll post here when it's done.