Vexatious Emails

From: Brett Davis To: info@shoalhavenbushwalkers.com Subject: Vexatious Emails Date sent: May 12, 2025

Hi SBW committee, I recently received an email from the SBW committee that contained the following paragraph - "The committee considered your conduct between 20th January and 9th April 2025 in sending 50 unsolicited emails to the committee. The committee judges this conduct to be prejudicial to the interests of the Club in that it amounts to a vexatious deployment of email communication to the committee either intended to cause disruption to - or with reckless disregard as to its likely impact on - the committee’s effective governance of the Club." One of the problems with a committee making up the rules as it goes along is that there is no documentation about those rules - no actual rules, no definitions, no explanations. Apparently 50 emails in 79 days is considered a vexatious deployment of email communications. Is vexatious defined by the rate of emails sent? Would one less email - 49 emails in 79 days - have been acceptable? Or 40? Or 30? Or 10? What is the maximum number of emails I can send to the committee in 79 days? 50 emails in 79 days is 1 email every 1.58 days. If I send more than one email every 1.58 days or more, does that define "vexatious"? No, that probably wouldn't work, because sending one email would mean that I have sent 1 email in 1 day, which is a much greater rate! So if it is not rate, is vexatious defined by a number? If I had combined all of my suggestions for improvements to the club into 1 email, and sent this to the club, would that have been acceptable and not vexatious? If one email in 79 days would have still have been vexatious, then perhaps it is the total number of words sent that defines vexatious. Is there a limit on the number of words per email that a club member is allowed to send, and if so, what is it? If vexatious is not defined by the rate of emails, or the number of emails, or the number of words in an email, then vexatious must be defined by content. Yet the committee has said that even if all my suggestions are good, and are acted upon by the committee, my emails are still considered vexatious, so apparently it does not depend on content either. I would like to suggest that the committee define exactly what "vexatious deployment of email communication" entails so members can avoid being accidentally expelled from the club for sending emails to the committee. Regards, Brett TOP

This page shows one of the 35 suggestions to improve the club and its procedures sent by the Shoalhaven Bushwalkers webmaster to the SBW committee in 2025. The Shoalhaven Bushwalkers webmaster would have his membership cancelled for sending in these suggestions, although the real reason was probably because of two disputes he raised with the Shoalhaven Bushwalkers committee which they seemingly did not want to deal with. The cancellation of the webmaster's membership was arguably illegal under NSW law and could lead to the club being taken to court.