The role political opinions may or may not play in sacking a consultant to a major law shop … Insubordination and being rude about a client … Close connection to expressing a political opinion … Fair Work Act … Acceptable to communicate views to anyone but the media … Martinet … Motivations … Stephen Murray reports 

Hilary term … Another judgment from retired ACT judge Hilary Penfold … Preposterous delay of nearly six years creates more problems for the litigants … Overburdened judgment writing style … Reproduction of vast tracks of submissions … Unclear reasoning … Lavish dinner proposed by Artemus Jones 

Lawyer spankings resume after jurisdictional collapse … NCAT picks-up disciplinary cases where it left off … Helpful legislative amendments to the rescue … Wollongong solicitor ignored missives from the Law Society … Compliance required before trading ticket reissued … Poverty … Despair … Janek Drevikovsky reports 

Pell v The Queen … Cardinal’s High Court appeal … Written submissions weighed by Alan Zheng … Pell says the jury’s verdict was unreasonable … Factual inconsistencies … Alibi evidence … Parting of the robes … Onus and standard of proof … Crown says the threshold for overturning a jury verdict is high … Limited role for appeal judges 

The whacky world of “Sovereign Citizens” … Conspiracy theorists and God’s chosen few join forces to challenge authority … Principles and precedents defenestrated as the Constitution and the common law get a psychedelic varnish … Judges in the “trustee position” … Alan Zheng investigates   

Human rights … Sex discrimination … Full Feds find a fresh instance of poor quality workmanship at the Circus Court … Judge brings administration of justice into disrepute … Six year delay leads to the wrong reasons … Start again according to law … Ginger Snatch reports 

Fees stoush reaches Vic Appeals … Abolition of the Chorley exception applies to law firms acting for themselves in litigation … Herbert Smith Freehills not entitled to recover costs in dispute over failed float of petrol distributor … Hi-ho Silver … Argument rejected that employed solicitors working for partners should be able to recover fees … Solicitors on the record acting in their own cause … Not even Bret Walker could save the day … Stephen Murray reports  

Theodora and Miss Ginger Snatch put their heads together and recall the highs and lows of 2019 … Lawyers and the law … Reliving the stories that tickled our fancy … Entertaining judges … Law shops in the frame … Silken ones … Courts in the act … Bureau de Spank … And heaps more