The case has thrown a spotlight on the little-known Transport Appeals Board, which has ignored the findings of the Supreme Court and can just as easily ignore the findings of the Court of Appeal. ''It's a merry-go-round,'' Mr Morton said. There's just no end to it. ''Even if I win again they can still go back to the [Transport Appeals Board] where you can't get any of your costs back.'' With Sydney Ferries due to be sold this year, no one will take responsibility for the saga that began long before the present crop of senior managers took control. The Minister for Transport, David Campbell, and the acting chief executive of Sydney Ferries, David Callahan, will not say who decided to appeal or why, or even if they will agree to re-employ Mr Morton or mediate his case if they lose again. Sydney Ferries, which loses about $1 million a week, has already spent more than $1 million on the case, and the appeal costs are likely to near $250,000.

Mr Morton had 13 years of unblemished service with Sydney Ferries before he was sacked in 2004 after an altercation with Tyson Best, an engineer on the ferry Lady Northcott. A magistrate dismissed the assault charges against Mr Morton, and in 2005 he appealed to the Transport Appeals Board, chaired by the former Labor MP George Thompson, to get his job back. The board rejected evidence that Mr Best was the aggressor with a history of violence and a pattern of unpredictable behaviour and upheld Mr Morton's sacking. Because of the cost, few transport employees appeal against the boards' decisions, but Mr Morton was determined to clear his name and took his case to the Supreme Court, where Justice Peter Berman found overwhelmingly in his favour. ''I am satisfied that the [board] decision was one which was so devoid of plausible justification that no reasonable tribunal could have reached it,'' he said.

It was the first appeal upheld against the board for years, but it meant nothing because it did not bind the board. To get his job back, Mr Morton had no option but to run another case in the board. It was heard by a former official with the metal workers union and the then board chairman, [the late] John Parkin, who rejected the Supreme Court's ruling and upheld the sacking even though Mr Best was not available to give evidence. It was then, Mr Morton says, that he realised he was in a vicious legal circle with spiralling legal costs because his win in the Supreme Court meant nothing. His only option to clear his name was to return to the Supreme Court. Last August Justice Stephen Rothman found overwhelmingly for Mr Morton, pointing out that ''the tribunal, Sydney Ferries and Mr Morton were bound by the determination of issues of the Supreme Court in the earlier proceedings''. "To the extent that the assault or harassment is relied upon, there is no finding of fact upon which one could base a dismissal,'' Justice Rothman said

No one in government will explain how appealing complies with the Government's model litigants policy, which requires all agencies to act ''with complete propriety, fairly and in accordance with the highest professional standards'' when litigating. It forbids appeals ''unless the state or an agency believes that it has reasonable prospects for success.'' The only comment a Sydney Ferries spokeswoman would make was: ''This appeal is about seeking finality to the proceedings''.