Former Teacher Calls for Justice After Career Dead-Ended

Media release – Muria Roberts, 9 March 2025

Former Tasmanian Teacher Calls for Justice After Uninvestigated Allegations Destroy Career

Former Tasmanian teacher Muria Roberts is calling on Premier Jeremy Rockliff and Minister for Education Jo Palmer to investigate the systematic destruction of her teaching career, which she says was based on uninvestigated and unsubstantiated allegations.

After experiencing workplace mobbing at the Department for Education, Children and Young People (DECYP), Ms Roberts was pressured into resigning. She later discovered that DECYP HR had placed her name on a secret register—effectively blacklisting her from employment in education. This action was taken without an investigation and without any opportunity to appeal.

Despite Ms. Roberts’ full cooperation with the process, DECYP:

• Refused to investigate the allegations against her.

• Declared her a “risk to children” without investigation and based on retaliatory false allegations after she asked management for support, permanently damaging her professional reputation.

• Followed guidance from the Tasmanian Integrity Commission (letter dated 5th September 2023) to blacklist her—despite the fact that no proper investigation was ever conducted. Her name was secretly placed on a register without informing her or giving her a Right of Response to the action. This prevents her from securing any government or government associated roles—and caused her the loss of her cybersecurity teaching position at TasTAFE which she had acquired after she had worked hard to rebuild her life.

Ms Roberts has since fought unsuccessfully to clear her name at multiple levels, including the Fair Work Commission and the Teacher Registration Board (TRB), but has been blocked at every turn due to internal DECYP documents that were never disclosed to her. Her reports to WorkSafe have been shut down despite the concrete evidence of mobbing, ie. a DECYP psychiatrists report confirming workplace injury.

“The Tasmanian Government claims to govern with heart, but where is their heart when my career, my livelihood, and my future have been so cruelly taken away?” said Ms Roberts. “I am trapped in a no-man’s land, unable to appeal because no investigation was ever carried out.”

Ms Roberts is calling on Premier Rockliff and Minister Palmer to intervene and launch an independent investigation into her case.

To highlight the injustice, Ms Roberts and her daughter will stand outside the Tasmanian Parliament every day next week, demanding that Minister Palmer meet with her and acknowledge the systemic failure that led to her being unfairly blacklisted.

She is urging the media, legal professionals and workplace justice advocates to take notice and support her call for fairness and transparency.