South Australian briefs opt for royal plumage … Fail, pass, fail, appeal, sue … The Herbert Smith Freehills candidate’s unhappy time qualifying for a right of audience in the higher courts of the UK … Latest word from Bridie … Qld solicitor general turns people green … Jobs galore … Bottom pinching assault sorted … Theodora reports
The Department of Premier and Cabinet announced the new baubles on April 26 after Vickie Chapman, the adorable attorney general, persuaded the government to go along with the bar’s fairy wish to reinstate queens counsel.
This was over the protests and objections of the Supreme Court judges and the chief justice Chris Kourakis, in particular. They have withdrawn from the process, that with a wave of the wand, turned SCs into QCs in accordance with the Yarraside model.
Some of the background to this unfortunate standoff is here:
The governor in council has appointed the following SA SCs as QCs. The first batch since the anachronism was abolished in 2007 …
We’re sure they all feel a lot better about themselves now that their brilliance has been properly recognised and insecurities banished.
Adelaide barrister Stephen McDonald also Tweeted that another 15 SCs did not apply for the brocaded knickers …
Complete list of SCs who did not (yet) apply to be QCs:
Ian Robertson
Hugh Abbott
Martin Frayne
Greg Mead
Adam Kimber
Sandi McDonald
Chris Bleby
Mark Norman
Claire O’Connor
Ian Press
John Rau
Emily Telfer
Mike Wait
John Rau
Dom Petraccaro https://t.co/CiCaeojmc5— Stephen McDonald (@steve_mcdee) April 26, 2019
Apparently the second John Rau should be Alan Lindsay.
McDonald also identified seven serving judicial officers who cannot apply until they step down from the bench …
And those who presumably cannot apply until they retire, being serving judicial officers:
Simon Stretton
David Berman
Paul Muscat
Liesl Chapman
Geraldine Davison
Sam Doyle
Sophie David— Stephen McDonald (@steve_mcdee) April 26, 2019
Why does Theodora get the idea that this country is not only sliding backwards but will never grow up?
The Solicitors Regulation Authority in the UK was hived-off from the Law Society during the Tony Blair years. It is, in effect, the Bureau de Spank, but it does other things like authorise organisations to handle training and assessment and it supervises 125,000 solicitors.
Solicitors can apply to the SRA to be granted rights of audience in the High Court or above once they passed an authorised assessment.
In 2010, about six or seven assessment providers were authorised, mainly law schools or universities. Curiously they were each authorised to provide different assessments.
The then chairman of the SRA was Charles Plant, a former senior litigation partner at Herbert Smith.
Although the circumstances were not connected, Herbert Smith was also authorised to assess their own lawyers for higher rights of audience.
Deveral Capps, a barrister and academic, was made head of programmes and chaired the assessment board.
Herbert Smith merged with Freehills on October 1, 2012. In 2018, one of the firm’s candidates in London failed by a substantial margin. The candidate had been trumpeted as a tribute to HSF’s diversity awareness.
Late in the day the candidate appealed the result. Caught between a rock and a hard place, the firm’s partners chose to pass the candidate.
Capps insisted the candidate had not passed and reported it to the SRA, which insisted that the original failure result should stand.
It’s not clear what happened – whether the SRA intervened or HSF spat the dummy but the upshot was that HSF lost its licence of nine years to assess higher rights candidates
The aggrieved candidate is believed to be taking action against the SRA.
A backlog of the firm’s candidates who were midstream in their studies will be assessed by the University of Law whose higher rights department is headed by Ms Frances Pryor, a former Hebert Smith partner.
There have been fewer more exciting moments in the election campaign, so far, than “devastatingly experienced” barrister, board director, educator and social commentator Bridie Nolan bursting on the scene in the seat of Warringah, first to assist the Mad Monk and later to distance herself from the assistance.
Bridie, of course, is married to David Cameron, the former husband of Zali Steggall, the independent giving Tony Abbott a good run for his rosary beads.
Together they contributed comments to the Daily Smellograph, the newspaper handling Abbott’s marketing, along the lines that Steggall is “opportunistic” and “lacking the temperament of a leader”.
Bridie Tweeted that Zali should withdraw from the election now, “before you embarrass your family further”.
The only ones embarrassed were Cameron and Nolan, who subsequently withdrew the comments and deleted the tweets.
It was all a mix-up and they now want everyone to get behind Zali’s campaign, suggesting that the Tele made it all up.
Since then, your correspondent has been hanging on every word Bridie offers to a world thirsty for her thoughts.
One from LinkedIn deserves to be shared.
A gent called Cullen P. Haynes, a mortgage broker, commented on April 20 that after he dropped his wife at Sydney Airport he doubled back and drove past the arrivals gate where he thought of a “harrowing scene from #LoveActually of real footage of families reuniting; the happiness and pure joy displayed …”
Weird, I know, but this is social media.
Bridie had time to respond, writing:
Unlike the Telegraph, you can’t make this up.
Banana Benders are celebrating the arrival of a new solicitor general to replace to wildly popular Pete Dunning.
The new man in the job is Sandy Thompson QC, former president of the local bar ‘n’ grill.
He has appeared in courts all over the land, and the Privy Council at 1 Horse Guards Rd. Currently he’s working for the state in the 2011 floods class action.
It’s a five year term, whereas in NSW the solicitor general has a 10 year term and the current office holder has been in the saddle for over 21 years. Michael Sexton SC has two more years to go before he’s statutorily senile.
The bar ‘n’ grill added that Dunners has “carried out the demanding role of solicitor general with equanimity and distinction”.
It is a demanding role because the office holder in Queensland retains the right to private practice – making other SGs green with envy.
Not only is the lord chief justiceship in the Kingdom of Tonga up for grabs, with a call for expressions of interest currently underway, but the NSW Law Society is looking for a full-time journalist to work in its publications department.
For both jobs a legal background or interest in the law is “highly desirable”.
There’s even a Law Soc vid to entice you to sign on …
The WA Supreme Court has stepped-in and cleaned-up up a lingering uncertainty about pinching someone on the bottom, a reflex action with which many lawyers are familiar.
Justice Jennifer Smith has found that the buttocks pinch is not necessarily an indecent assault.
Andrew Ramsden, a WA copper, and and unnamed young lady, a member of the public, both played in a police wheelchair basketball charity tournament in South Hedland.
During the post-game photo, the copper reached across and pinched her on the bum. Ramsden was charged with indecent assault under the WA Criminal Code, with a penalty of up to five years porridge.
In the troubling case Justice Smith had to work out whether the assault gave rise to a sexual connotation and offended prevailing community standards.
She said that some parts of the body are inherently indecent to touch and HH went on to disclose that these areas included the penis, vagina, anus and breasts – but not the buttocks.
Here we had a quick pinch without sexual motivation. If Ramsden had used a “full cupped hand” on the complainant’s buttocks that would have been indecent.
The judge accepted that bottom-pinching would not be regarded by the community as offending community standards, regardless of the #MeToo movement.
A few judges and various crusty adornments of the profession breathed a sign of relief.