THE BAR ASSOCIATION OF QUEENSLAND
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Issue 98: December 2024
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The script that is currently used by many movers is out-of-date and risks making representations that the mover cannot verify.

1. “Recommendation”

Movers, working from some long-standing script, say that the person holds “the board’s recommendation”. 

This echoes the language of Rule 15 of the Supreme Court (Admission) Rules 2004.

But the actual certificate in Form 22 does not use the word “recommends”, nor a synonym.

On an unconditional certificate, it says that the person:

… has complied with the [rules] as she is required to comply with in order to be admitted to the Legal Profession and that she is a fit and proper person to be admitted.

While that is useful, it is not a positive statement – a recommendation – as per Rule 15.

So I don’t say anything of a “recommendation”, given what is before me in black-and-white from the Board.

2. “Complied in all respects”

A second thing commonly said by movers is that the person “has complied in all respects with the rules relating to admission”.

For some years, it has been impossible for the mover to verify this independently. 

Rule 6 refers to academic qualifications attained by the satisfactory completion “of a tertiary course approved by the Chief Justice and the board”, which is the common way of obtaining the primary degree as a basis for admission. There is no easy way of discovering any such list. Perhaps it is available on request.

The practical legal training requirements are defined in a similar way in Rule 7. 

The admission guidelines promulgated under Rule 9AA take you to pedagogical requirements that no person moving an admission, except perhaps an academic with a lot of time on her hands, could ever verify.

Any verification would need to be by reference to the course material taught in a particular year at a particular institution, when courses within a degree program were taken by a particular candidate. 

3. What to say?

This imposes something of a quandary for the mover.

When it comes time to say something about compliance with the rules, you should be making some submission.

For some time I have simply adopted a formula inspired by the Northern Territory Full Court in Re Mallett (1989) 95 FLR 63, pages 65.9-66.1.

I say:

The certificate of the board evidences her compliance with the rules.

I know that this does not follow the usual script in Queensland.

But it is principled, accurate, and does not involve me making representations that I cannot verify other than by reference to the certificate anyway. 

I have never been challenged on this.

4. Where are the barristers on admissions?

A final thought – in the first group of admittees recently, being admittees with high First Class Honours and other awards, I was one of only three barristers moving admissions. 

A barrister will confront this issue occasionally in their career, but there is a paucity of judicial treatment of the issue.

A scenario – and, in my view, the proper response in the circumstances – is that which follows. It is drawn from a matter in which I appeared recently in the Federal Court of Australia, leading junior counsel. 

The scenario is this: 

27.  A barrister must take all necessary steps to correct any misleading statement made by the barrister to a court as soon as possible after the barrister becomes aware that the statement was misleading.

In the above scenario, Logan J, in Deputy Commissioner of Taxation v Raptis (No 2) [2023] FCA 1683, wrote (emphasis added):

16    These reasons for judgment supplement those given earlier today in respect of the making of a variation to freezing orders… Upon returning to chambers, Mr Marks of King’s Counsel and Ms Mendelson of counsel, who had appeared for all respondents – save the third respondent – became aware of an exchange which had occurred yesterday as between the third respondent and, in effect, those acting on behalf of other respondents. …

17    That letter makes reference to the proposed consent order and to a request made of the third respondent to agree to consent to that order. It does, however, contain a proviso as to that consent … Counsel for the other respondents, having indicated that there  hadn’t been communication from the third respondent before lunch, quite properly – upon it coming to their attention on returning to chambers that there had, in fact, been an exchange – requested that the case be relisted as a matter of urgency, so as to fulfill an ethical obligation in terms of a representation earlier made to the Court.

18    I am quite satisfied that the statement earlier made was inadvertent and, indeed, the product of the urgency which had attended the listing of the case before me.

As it transpired on this occasion, the order made earlier that day – on the new fact discovered, namely the letter’s existence at the time – was confirmed. But anticipating outcome that is not what counsel is tasked to assess under rule 27;  likely impact of the true facts on is not the touchstone for action.

Rather, counsel is  required to identify whether or not misleading conduct has ensued, such as to trigger the obligation prescribed by rule 27. The misleading statement previously made need be ventilated with the court, leaving it to the court to adjudicate – upon submissions made – any impact apropos of the order previously made, or if decision is reserved then the decision to be made.

In my view, the above exemplifies how counsel must respond if misrepresentation to the court is discovered: without regard to likely impact, promptly, on notice to the opposing lawyers or litigant and with complete candour.

Author (original text): John MulganEditor of this edition (2021): Peter WhitefordPublisher: Te Herenga Waka University Press[2]Reviewer: David Marks

Mount Ruapehu is majestic and snow-capped. Silent and godlike, her bulk looms as you arrive in Ohakune.

But travelling the road from Waiouru, you cross a bridge, and come upon the Tangiwai Memorial.

Ruapehu is active. She is dangerous.

The Wellington-Auckland express fell at a rail bridge washed away by a lahar moments before. 151 lives were lost that Christmas Eve, 70 years ago.

Ruapehu.

She, Taranaki, her husband, and Tongariro, her seducer, are more than mountains.

This was plain as we drove into Ohakune in January.

By chance we overnighted there.

We stayed at a trampers’ lodge. We ate at the Powderkeg.

At 1:13am, sirens woke the village. I thought we had bought it.

Ruapehu, lost in darkness and cloud, still loomed, haunting.

Sirens are how the village turns out its volunteer fire brigade.

But we were strangers in a strange land. We did not know that, at 1:13am in the shadow of Ruapehu.

Ruapehu is always there during the climatic incidents of John Mulgan’s only novel, Man Alone.

The ‘great New Zealand novel’, Man Alone, is a canvass on which thousands have projected their thoughts.

Having sampled this literary output, I wondered if we were all reading the same book.

Contrary to one paper I read, the novel is no apology for ideology. Whatever the actions of the hungry and desperate characters depicted, the main protagonist is driven by pragmatism, not ideology, even in the end. He keeps moving, remaking himself.

More substantially, does Mulgan project part of the Maori legend of the three volcanoes on to the lives of these common folk? It is all up for grabs.

Canvass or mirror? No analogy explains how Mulgan’s sparse prose about plain-spoken folk captivates a nation.

Great art reflects more than the light that falls.

Spare, Mulgan’s prose is unstoppable.

You cannot put this down. The Ancient Mariner has begun his tale. Is there redemption?

Mulgan’s protagonist encounters ordinary people, and works hard at simple work. He can milk, strain a fence, clear a yard, and make a road.

This sounds unpromising material.

Yet, the protagonist stands above and outside. Perhaps, he is indestructible. He is flawed like all of us. He accepts this and still moves forward.

Why is there no movie? Once were Warriors & Whale Rider also hold standing as great New Zealand novels, filmed.

It would take the best director in the moody French tradition to render Man Alone’s interior monologue a film.

Time slows between the two World Wars.

Occasional references, to time that has passed, surprise. Mulgan has to remind us that time has passed, in the drear and mud of hard work.

The economic calamity between the Wars drives men and women to despair. Sometimes they err.

There are no excuses. At least – there are no excuses that stick or are worth tuppence.

Actions have consequences. Consequences follow regardless of time and space.

Mulgan’s protagonist is driven up the slopes of Ruapehu, across the Rangipo Desert, and into starvation in the wilderness further East.

In January we drove up the Desert Road, built after Man Alone was published. A stranger does not drive this stretch of ‘State Highway 1’ without local advice. We found a lonely stretch, with a lone traffic cop tolling the careless. You know you are entering upon danger. The road is guarded by gates as you leave Waiouru. They close in Winter, for the ice and snow.

Mulgan takes us there, before this civilising road. There is tussock and a lonely coach track. And then bush on the other side.

There is some redemption in the wilderness, for our Everyman protagonist.

But consequences dog him regardless of apparent escape.

-oOo-

I started reading an older edition. Don’t.

Peter Whiteford has lovingly restored Mulgan’s text, and I should think the VUP edition will become the scholarly edition, and the edition favoured by us common readers.

Mulgan did not live to see the success and acclaim of this novel. Published in England in 1939, the novel risked loss. The plates were destroyed in war. Mulgan died by his own hand in Cairo in 1945, after distinguished service behind the lines in hostile Greece. He was not there to press his novel’s cause in the peace.

When the gravity of this potential loss was later appreciated, Mulgan’s words were inexplicably altered by new, well-meaning publishers.

Whiteford has now restored Mulgan’s intent, as close as can be divined.

But every great work needs its back-story, its mystery, and perhaps some tragedy.

So, here.

I came upon this novel because of the recent VUP book by Gounelas and Parkin-Gounelas, John Mulgan and the Greek Left: A Regrettably Intimate Acquaintance (2023).

But that is another story.

(David is an Australian barrister who keeps close tabs on affairs in New Zealand.)

[1] ISBN 9781776564156

[2] Formerly Victoria University Press

Editor: Anne KennedyPublisher: Auckland University Press 2023Reviewer: David W Marks KC*

  1. This is not simply another anthology of New Zealand verse.
  2. The editor, Anne Kennedy, is serious in her intention that you be able to memorise – nay recite – its memorable contents.
  3. Many notable authors are represented, and even a few old standards.
  4. Thus, there is an extract from “Home Thoughts”, by that pivotal, South Island figure, Denis Glover. Dismissing thoughts of England, Glover wrote:

I think of what may yet be seenin Johnsonville or Geraldine.

  1. He thus immortalised two South Island hamlets. The sentiment is also seen in Australian poetry, as we slipped the colonial apron-strings. Thus, Dorothea Mackellar’s “My Country” poses the same question, in Australia.
  2. Naturally, Kennedy also gives us Glover’s best known: “Magpies”, which every schoolchild can recite in New Zealand. But more than half of Kennedy’s selections are new to me, even if the names of the poets are often familiar. There is a surprise at every turned page.
  3. Anna Jackson’s “The Treehouse” is a smoothly-crafted, 14-line song of passion, originally from her 2003 collection Cattullus for Children.
  4. The name of Jackson’s 2003 collection gave the clue, since this poem is finely-crafted to be read to children, but to have a wholly different significance for adults:

… as if we lie awake

In a treehouse, shining a torchinto the forest around us,

losing the beamin the dark.

  1. There are poems in te reo Māori, usually also rendered in English. Individual te reo words have bled into standard New Zealand English seamlessly, but translation remains necessary.
  2. But the master Māori poet, Hone Tuwhare’s “Nocturne” was composed in English, his second language. That English version is given, with a translation into te reo by Selwyn Muru.
  3. One way of reading this anthology is as a way of re-imagining how such a book might now be compiled in Australia. Are we at the point where Oodgeroo Noonuccal (Kath Walker) might be translated into Moondjan? The parallels of a “settler” society, and the consequences of “settlement”, cannot be ignored, though.
  4. The quality of the poetry, selected for its memorability, shines through.
  5. It is always possible to argue with what is not included in an anthology. I have pasted Elizabeth Morton’s “Storyteller” and Charles Brasch’s “Winter Anemones” in the back of this collection. That is everyone’s solution, instead of arguing the toss on selection.
  6. This is a good, informative and modern collection of New Zealand verse, taking in favourites, and introducing newer poets.
  7. The editor, Anne Kennedy, is a noted poet and novelist. Her first novel, The Last Days of the National Costume, a story set in the dog-days of the Mercury Power electricity outage in Auckland in 1998, was good enough to cause a difference between friends (one hates it, one loves it). Her latest collection of poems is The Sea Walks into a Wall, 2021.

*David is an Australian who keeps a close eye on our cousins across The Ditch.

In this item, David Marks KC delivers some useful tips for those delivering a lecture at a legal conference – whether experienced or inexperienced in the task, at a practical level.

Case the room a minimum of 20 minutes beforehand

The sound guy

At the lectern

PowerPoints

Oral presentation is all

Deliver

Time

Paper written by David Marks KC, and co-presented with Rebecca Rose of Bankside Chambers, Auckland, at the 2023 BAQ Annual Conference held at the W Brisbane Hotel on 3-4 March 2023.

Technique in Trust Litigation – A Worked Scenario

Most chambers in Brisbane are 10 minute’s walk to the State Library of Queensland (SLQ).

Up North, you can use the electronic services, and order physical books delivered via your municipal library.

If you are a professional or student in Queensland, you should register, get your card number, and start using it. (See end for links.)

And join the National Library of Australia (NLA). The electronic services are different. The services are different. For example, NLA will scan you a chapter cheaply. You need both memberships.

I’m also an interstate member of SA and Victorian State libraries. (See “Bolt-hole”, below.)

Why join?

Borrow stuff the Council library does not hold

I’m currently reading a book that our (large & excellent) municipal library does not own. I’ve borrowed from the SLQ.

Yes, you can borrow from SLQ.

Not everything. And note that some State libraries, eg SLSA, don’t lend. So ask.

But I’m on a Hugh Trevor-Roper binge at the moment. 

Most of this historian’s more academic stuff is for loan at SLQ. Most is of no interest to the municipal library (with its different mandate).

Really surprising databases

During a recent trial, I needed a scientific journal paper about avian health.

It was available through an NLA subscription service, free.

Note it wasn’t a subscription service SLQ offered.

SLQ was actually my first port of call, as it has excellent access to these academic databases.

NLA was the only ready source for that journal.

You need membership of both SLQ & NLA to provide this kind of cover.

Strong service

Years ago, an expert witness disappeared. We had heard he had died, but it had evidently taken a toll on the next of kin who weren’t responding. I needed to check for a death/funeral notice in the (late, lamented) Bundaberg News-Mail.

I rang SLQ. The September bundle of papers was retrieved from archive to SLQ within the hour.

We ran our application to rely on a new expert witness based principally on that funeral notice.

More recently, when the Pandemic was but new, I got instructions from out-of-state to advise about privileges & immunities of an obscure international entity. 

This is important but finicky stuff. That’s why I fight to keep this stuff at the Queensland Bar.

But how to service such instructions, during a Pandemic?

The Supreme Court of Queensland Library (SCLQLD) and the NLA remained open to remote requests for most of the Pandemic. Their service was truly exceptional. These 2 great institutions just powered on, in ways that made colleagues in New Zealand and England marvel.

Most of the material I needed was available via SCLQLD requests.

But this was a truly obscure corner of public international law, given the kind of entity involved.

I wanted background to the history & treaties. A lot of public international law is grounded in custom, sometimes centuries old. You need to know your history.

I asked NLA for a chapter of a book they held.

The scanned chapter turned up the next day, for $18.

(Service standard at NLA is longer. But they had no walk-ins, since the front door was locked at that point of the Pandemic!)

Accuracy and authority of sources

One example.

Why rely on web searches for basic general knowledge?

Barristers practise across a lot of industries and topics.

For important, basic knowledge about an industry or theme – I have my SLQ access to Britannica bookmarked.

Bolt-hole

I am interstate enough for this topic to matter.

Between meetings, the State libraries are quiet bolt-holes, for silent work with good wifi.

A library membership greases the wheel.

I’m a member of SLV and SLSA. (In Sydney, I use my NSWBA interstate membership, and retreat to the excellent NSWBA library in the sub-basement in Phillip Street. But come fully charged, and do ask for help with the wifi.)

Which to join? How?

Obviously, join SLQ and NLA. If you live interstate, join your State’s library.

But first, dust off your municipal library card, or join now. The municipal libraries are fundamental, since they are your gateway, up North, to getting a physical loan from SLQ. The collections are good, just different, and you can indulge your recreational reading pleasurably.

Now, the point of my pitch —

SLQ and NLA application pages are linked. I’ve made the case.

What if you are reading this interstate? State library digital rights seem to be linked to State of residence. If you’re reading this interstate, join your own State library for digital rights.

As Molly Meldrum would say – “Do yourself a favour.” Join your State and National libraries today.

Author: Matthew WrightPublisher: Oratia BooksDetails: 2020, ISBN 978-0-947506-72-8

“Your mana is high”.

The te reo Maori word “mana” entered New Zealand English, early.

It is a useful word. It has no direct equivalent in English.

It conveys “prestige, authority, control, power, influence, status, spiritual power, charisma”: online Maori Dictionary.

So how do you induce a retired, New Zealand Great War hero, resident in London for two decades, to take the command of New Zealand’s forces in 1939?

Former PM, Coates, wrote to Bernard Freyberg, and assured him that “your mana is high”. (p94)

Surely, it was.

Freyberg had served in the Great War with distinction. After WWII, he went on to serve as New Zealand Governor-General. He was raised to a peerage.

But he is also the centre of controversy. Much has been written of his role in two matters, in WWII: Crete and Monte Cassino. This warrants the author, Matthew Wright’s, continued attention, presenting an alternative view.

More about that in a moment. The present book is not a war history. Matthew Wright, has already written that: Freyberg’s War, Penguin, 2005. 

This new book is a “character biography”.

It, necessarily, must touch on matters that formed Freyberg and matters that affect his reputation.

But Matthew Wright does so in a way that explains and, to some extent, defends the character and reputation of the subject.

In every sense, Freyberg was remarkable. 

From humble beginnings in Wellington and apprenticed to a dentist out of school, Freyberg was, nevertheless, destined for great things.  His swimming prowess gave early signal.

The account of his life as a young man showed that he was adept at dealing with bureaucracies (whether they be associated with dental registration or the military). 

Arriving circuitously in London near the commencement of the Great War, he desired to make himself useful:

Freyberg decided to first introduce himself to Churchill.  He managed that by accosting the First Lord in Horse Guards Parade, while Churchill was on his way from the Admiralty to Downing Street.  (Page 35)

Somehow, this young man made a lasting impression on Churchill.

Though there were bumps over the years, on both sides, the relationship endured two world wars.

Sent with the Royal Naval Division to the Dardanelles, Freyberg earned the DSO during a six hour operation, overnight 24-25 April 1915.

The circumstances bespeak extraordinary self-assuredness and bravery. 

I wonder if it is the only DSO also to have merited a civil award for heroism from a national swimming association? (Page 48)

But the Great War ground onward.

Wounded at Gallipoli, then posted to France, he was in command of the Hood Battalion during the encounter for which he was awarded the Victoria Cross, at Beaucourt-Hamel. 

In part, the citation read that he had “inspired all with his own contempt of danger”; noted that he had fought despite wounds; and had “refused to leave the line until he had issued final instructions”.  (Page 59) 

The account of this battle leaves no doubt as to the heroism of the man. 

Back in London recuperating for a few months, he circulated with the most remarkable people, an eclectic circle, including JM Barrie, the playwright. There is speculation that Barrie fulfilled a role as mentor to Freyberg whose relationship with his own father had been difficult.

In her astonishing war diaries, Lady Cynthia Asquith recalls:

He seems to have so many qualities – lack of humour, chafing ambition, and a kind of admirable ruthlessness and positive self-reliance.  He knows when to quarrel with a superior and when to get rid of an inferior … There is a sort of directness, bluntness and inter-personal finesse, an absence of inverted commas, and what Severn calls “approbativeness” about him which is very refreshing. (Page 63)

As I read it, much of Freyberg’s relationship with Asquith was not known to his family till publication of her diaries in 1968. It fills out not just the family history but a wider aspect of society during the war. (page 70) 

After the Great War, Freyberg remained in the military, until forced out for medical reasons in 1937. (page 87) But nothing would stand in his way, in serving again in the coming conflict.

I should only make brief mention of two critical encounters in WWII. 

He was in command of the defence of Crete.  This is where much controversy ensues, and I will not solve it here.  But if anyone is interested in knowing the possible answers to criticisms made of the defence of Crete under his command, they will find those answers in Matthew Wright’s book.  There is a critical difference between Beevor and Wright as to whether Freyberg misread a cable which was based on Ultra intelligence. Wright’s analysis is worthy of consideration.

Likewise, criticism of the handling of the attack on Cassino in Italy, including the devastating error in the destruction of a monastery, finds a formidable defender in Matthew Wright.

Freyberg returned to New Zealand after WWII as Governor-General.  There is a brief account of his time in that role and, more briefly, an account of his return then to England where he was made Baron and sat in the House of Lords.

He died in 1963, aged 74, ultimately, as the result of a war wound. (page 179)

This is a remarkable life, largely unknown in Australia except amongst those familiar with the two WWII battles I have briefly mentioned.  There is much more to the man than those two important encounters, which Matthew Wrights brings out in this lively biography.

Napier was rebuilt after the calamity of 1931.

Opposite the Masonic Hotel, where we have stayed, is an arch, inscribed with words the town adopted for its rebuilding:

All goes if courage goes.

I have puzzled over those words. I now know the origin.

They are JM Barrie, in 1922, delivering his address on being appointed Rector of St Andrews University and on the occasion of Freyberg being made DLitt (Hon). (pages 81-82)

Barrie is referring to Freyberg’s diversionary action in the Dardanelles in 1915 — a freezing swim, from an unlit tender, to a hostile shore, along an enemy beach and then, by compass bearing alone, back to the invisible tender.

Like so much in New Zealand — schools, baths, streets, buildings — the Napier arch commemorates Freyberg.

Author: Julia EbnerPublisher: Bloomsbury, 2020

This wise and brave account by a young woman, of her undercover meetings with extremists, crosses boundaries.

The necessity to deceive, to gain access, for the purpose of exposing the subject matter, evidently weighed with her and her publisher: 

“Does that make me a hypocrite?  Possibly.  But I am convinced that to counter extremists online, we need to understand their drivers, expose their tactics and predict their next steps.”  (Page 284)

This was not only a moral dilemma.

Blagging your way into a planning meeting with extremists, in person, with a blonde wig, false name, and rehearsed cover story as your disguise, must have required more than usual bravery.

The wheels almost come off during some real-life meetings. 

Ebner has put herself in real danger. She is quite conscious of it. In a recent interview, she said she is doing no more “in person” research. (Auckland Writers’ Festival, webinar,19 July 2020)

The arc of this book, a well-designed series of connected essays, takes us through recruitment and socialisation, demonstrates the manipulation of the online world and mainstream media through communication, and then takes us further.

Ebner demonstrates the unexpected connections that radicals have formed around the world, perhaps on the basis that “my enemy’s enemy is my friend”. 

She explains how conspiracy theories are propagated, sowing discord, and leading readers toward unrelated extremist views. 

Darker and darker. 

Under the heading “Mobilisation” we witness the online plotting of the Charlottesville riot. Extremists are image conscious. Fat extremists are told to stay home.  Those attending are told to look like ordinary Joes, right down to what hats to wear. 

This is no disorganised rabble. This is dangerous, mobilised, malign.

I thought the most dangerous thing recounted by Ebner is her attendance at a music festival. She meets random people in the line, in the bars and in the merchandise tent. 

By this stage, Ebner (ever present in these narratives) signals her lack of connection with the unpleasant and dangerous people she encounters.  Such honesty must signal that there is only so much she can understand and thus convey.  But this book is a very fair attempt!

Under the heading “Attack”, Ebner deals with the endless war by hackers, of various persuasions. Here, her mastery of making the technical accessible to average readers comes to the fore.

As she brought her work on this book to completion, a massacre occurred in the Pacific region. 

This terrible event exemplified so much she had written in prior chapters, including gamification, connections with others online in a dark world, the trolls who commented and encouraged, and those who repost endlessly in a war with take-down robots.

Finally, this earth-shattering event, in our near-neighbour’s peaceful suburbs, forced change on large social media platforms.

This brief chapter brings this part of her account together, a culmination of terrible people and ideologies.

I feared that her next section entitled “Is the future dark?” might become preachy. 

It is actually written in the most engaging and practical way. 

Ebner is strategic. You must look some years out, and anticipate what might happen, if you are to try to take effective action now.

Thus, she draws together expert opinion about the future, and then prescribes concrete action, to avert a darker future.

I learnt a lot from reading this book. We hear about attempts to manipulate elections and politics, and we hear about mad rumours on the internet. I now understand something of the purposes and methods behind this activity.

Why is this such an important book?

I leave to one side the excellent quality of the writing, and the intimate reflections about Ebner’s encounters with extraordinarily dangerous people. 

These are important elements in making the subject matter accessible to the general reader. But they are not the clue to why the book is so important.

An objective of both State and non-State actors is to cause chaos and discord in democracies, by planting divisive stories. These are picked up online and through the mainstream media. It is not accidental to whom this happens. All this has been understood for some time.

It is the mechanics of this, and what drives the armies of keyboard warriors and trolls, that is fascinating.  And is the key.

Ebner does not see the solution to this as being wholly technological. There must be a social aspect to any solution.

Hence, she is interested in the social lives of these armies of people.

To do that, she joins meetings with a range of dreadful people, to try to gauge the attraction, and learn the practical methods employed to manipulate the online world and (ultimately) mainstream media and elections.

She drew the line at participating in the criminal (reporting concrete threats and crime to police). 

The way she has done the research has given us access to the very words being spoken by those online, or in live meetings. 

And we see in detail how appalling people set out each day to destroy democracy, with hate, lies and fear.

One criticism of the book, which I saw, was that Ebner squibbed some discussions, or did not go to the next meeting in a series to which she had access. 

This cannot be a criticism. Ebner was sedulous not to break any law (for example carrying genuine identification papers for the police, even when otherwise operating under a false name). Sometimes, pure disgust or the danger of the situation prevented further engagement.

This is such an important book. This young author writes well and has done a brave thing for the benefit of civil society.

Authors:     Colbran, Spender, Douglas & JacksonPublisher:  Lexis Nexis Butterworths

This is a mammoth book, with Australia-wide coverage. But when initially thumbing through this teaching book, I admit I wondered about its use in practice. But I was trying to use the book in the wrong way.  I think I have found the right way to use it.

Recently, I had to familiarise myself in a general way, and quickly, with an entire topic. Wanting to provide more than the usual platitudes, I turned to Chapter 11 on Class Actions, and found detailed treatment with critical material, which rounded out my understanding of this area.

More recently, needing to refresh quickly before a hearing, I turned up the section about trial of a separate issue. I was taken straight into a leading Queensland Full Court case, including citation to other Full Court authority interstate.

Although I have not had occasion yet to test all propositions stated in this Goliath of a book, it does appear to have involved extensive interrogation of each jurisdiction’s legislation and rules, down to relevant practice statements in some cases.

This book will have two challenges on the shelf.  In some senses, it is too general to assist in some of the matters that confront the Bar. But that is simply a question of knowing how to use the book. I think it works well as a general way of breaking the back of an entire area and, in particular, finding critical material to enable me to challenge existing shibboleths.

How does it sit with the practitioner product, Zuckerman on Australian Civil Procedure? Well, Zuckerman also necessarily deals with matters at a certain level of abstraction, given Australia’s bent for having rules suiting the local conditions in each State, and then three superior Federal Courts of Record with their own rules. That is not the fault of the editors. What one finds in Zuckerman is a fairly compressed treatment but that, sometimes, suits the busy practitioner. 

I think Colbran et al suits more the teaching market but will be handy to have on the shelf, somewhere in chambers, for just the kind of task I eventually asked of it – to learn something at a higher and broader level about an entire area, really quickly, including material critical in that area.

Colbran et al is in its seventh edition and is thus obviously a successful text.  The authors include some well-known to the Queensland profession, with a publication track record that also bodes well.