Prof Dale Stephens
Professor Dale Stephens CSM is a Captain in the Royal Australian Navy Reserve who spent over 20 years as a permanent officer in the Royal Australian Navy before taking up his appointment at Adelaide Law School. Dale Stephens has occupied numerous staff officer positions throughout his career in the Australian Defence Force (ADF), including Fleet Legal Officer, Command Legal Officer (Naval Training Command), Chief Legal Officer Strategic Operations Command, Director of Operational and International Law, Deputy Director of the Asia-Pacific Centre for Military Law, Director Navy Legal and Director of the Military Law Centre. He has deployed twice to East Timor (INTERFET & UNTAET) and twice to Iraq (Baghdad) in senior legal officer positions and has provided extensive advice to Government at the strategic level. He is the recipient of the Conspicuous Service Medal and the (US) Bronze Star as well as ADF and UN commendations for his service. During his time in the ADF, Dr Stephens was involved in providing legal advice regarding numerous operational, disciplinary and administrative law issues, including fisheries, customs and immigration matters within Australia’s maritime zones, combined operations with other military forces, UN Peace Operations, drafting Rules of Engagement, implementation of international treaties including the International Criminal Court Convention as well as numerous weapons reviews. In the early 2000’s Professor Stephens was part of the Australian delegation to UNESCO negotiating the Underwater Cultural Heritage Convention. In the mid 2000’s he taught at the U.S. Naval War College located in Newport, Rhode Island as a faculty member of the International Law Department. In 2010 was seconded to the Department of the Prime Minister and Cabinet as a senior advisor on Afghanistan. In more recent years he has taught National Security Law as well as a number of military law subjects at the ANU College of Law. Dr Stephens is Director of The University of Adelaide Research Unit on Military Law and Ethics (RUMLAE) and is a Fellow of the Australian Acadeny of Law. He is Director of the Adelaide Military Law Program and a member of the Ploughshares/McGill University/ George Washington University ‘Space Security Index’ Consortium. He was awarded his Doctorate from Harvard Law School in 2014.
The Last Post: Welcome to The Last Post, Professor Dale Stephens, and thank you very much for sparing us your time. Dale Stephens: No worries, Greg. No worries at all. TLP: Dale, you’re Director of Uni Adelaide’s research unit on military law and ethics. For those that don’t know of the work that you’re doing, could you just explain to us what that entails? DS: Sure. So we are a research unit within the law school of the University of Adelaide and our focus is to look at the manner in which the law operates in respect of military operations principally, but also looking at things like research into the veterans community and particularly in terms of incarceration and connections with military service. We’re also, the word RUMLAE, which is our title research unit on military law and ethics, the E in RUMLAE does stand for something. And so part of our research is looking at the way ethical choices are made in terms of operations and contrasting that with the laws, so looking at the relationship between law and ethical choices that are made by commanders in the execution of military operations. TLP: And, of course, it entails a lot there. And, I guess, first up with the veterans and the rate of incarceration, et cetera, through their military service or effect, what have you found there? DS: So we’ve got Kellie Toole who is a senior lecturer at the university and a former criminal lawyer. Her research is principally focused on looking at, and Elaine Waddell, sorry, is a co-researcher, looking at the rate of incarceration of ADF members or ex-ADF members and trying to work out whether there are any connections between prison and their service. And the study is only a couple of years old so it’s only preliminary findings at the moment. But there does seem to be an over-representation compared to the general population of the ADF in civilian prison. And the goal is to try and work out whether there is a connection. So Kellie’s research is still ongoing, but the preliminary findings that she’s got, which are yet to be further interrogated, are that military service actually, from what we gather, is that the individuals who come to the ADF, they find a lot of comradery, they find a sense of belonging, they are instilled with a sense of discipline when they’re in the ADF. And then when
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they leave, that discipline, that sense of camaraderie seems to evaporate. If they’re broken people when they come into the ADF, the ADF puts a lid on some of that social pressure, I guess. And when they leave the ADF, that lid’s taken off and they do silly things and they can end up in jail. So this is the study that that Kellie is doing at the moment, but it’s only preliminary. We’ve only looked at statistics in South Australia. We’re trying to expand that research into other states and we’re looking particularly at New South Wales, which has a much higher, a broader sample rate, I guess, of ADF members, and so that will be, I think, the moment where we’ll be able to validate the preliminary findings that we’re finding here in South Australia. TLP: That promises to be interesting and potentially of great value to veterans and the wider community. We get, obviously, the more numbers attached to New South Wales, which will give it broader acceptability, I guess, within the confines of what you’re studying. DS: That’s right. That’s right. So I think we need to just see if what we find here is replicated in other states. And if it is, then I think we can start making some conclusions about how the ADF and the Department of Veterans Affairs might want to deal with this issue and hopefully try and encourage some policy changes that might protect, if you like, and care for our ex-members in a manner that at least stops them going to jail if that’s the finding, if that’s the conclusion. TLP: Yes, that’s right. I was thinking the same thing myself. And, obviously, if this leads to an impacting on governments and those responsible to change laws and attitudes towards veterans, it will be for the betterment of the community. What do you see being wrong with that at the moment? DS: Well, I think at the moment, it’s not that... I think for the Department of Defence, once the member leaves the ADF and becomes a veteran, there seems to be a bureaucratic firewall and it’s no longer a responsibility of the ADF, it now belongs to Department of Veterans Affairs or other social care departments. I think that creating that link, accepting that when you’re an ADF member, when you leave the ADF, that there are things that the ADF can do while that member is in service or at least be on the lookout for
