Queensland Bar’s Involvement in South Pacific Education

Part 1 – Commercial Litigation Workshop- Legal Training Institute PNG

Over the last decade the Queensland Bar has been involved in offering training to lawyers and law graduates from different pacific countries. The most successful and long running of this engagement has been the Commercial Litigation Advocacy Intensive Workshop in Port Moresby at the Legal Training Institute (the equivalent of a practical legal training school) (LTI).

This workshop was the culmination of an idea that began in August 2012 in a conversation between the then Chief Justice of Papua New Guinea, Sir Salamo Injia, and Justice John Logan of the Federal Court of Australia. Justice Logan has sat on Papua New Guinea’s appeal court, the Supreme Court of Papua New Guinea (PNG) since 2011, as has another Federal Court judge, Justice Berna Collier. Sir Salamo has long been a strong promoter of legal professional reform and education. He asked Justice Logan if he could procure a Queensland Silk experienced in modern commercial litigation to address the LTI on that subject. John Bond QC (as his Honour then was) proved to be a ready volunteer for this task. He and Justice Logan visited the LTI in September 2012 and delivered lectures about modern commercial litigation practice over the course of a day. While they were there, Sir Salamo asked them to canvas interest at the Queensland Bar in expanding this into a commercial litigation workshop at the LTI, presented by volunteers. This idea was explored further in 2012 in a series of later conversations between Sir Salamo, Justice Logan and Roger Traves QC, the then President of the Bar Association, and in a presentation John Bond QC and Justice Logan made after their return from PNG to a specially convened and well attended meeting of the Bar Association. There was overwhelming interest. In the result, Queensland Bar Association put together a group of eight to deliver the first workshop in September 2013.

That initial group, led by John Bond QC, consisted of Justice Logan, Justice James Douglas, John Griffin QC, Ken Barlow QC (as his Honour then was), Mal Varitimos (later QC), Joseph Crowley and Susan Anderson.

The group put together a comprehensive workshop program and related workbook, specially designed to be relevant to aspects of commercial litigation practice in PNG and approved by Sir Salamo. The topics covered during the workshop included applying for an interlocutory injunction, an application for administrative review, pleadings, discovery, ethics, trial preparation, appeals and related aspects of court advocacy.

For the years 2013, 2014, 2015, 2016, 2017, 2018, and 2019, the workshop was delivered “in country”. In 2020, the workshop did not proceed due to COVID. However, Andrew Crowe QC, Justice Logan and Mal Varitimos QC delivered some online lectures to the LTI students. In 2021 the full workshop was run online for the LTI students. The workshop returned to “in country” delivery in 2022 and 2023. Andrew Crowe QC, who had joined the volunteer training team in 2014, assumed the leadership of the team in 2015, following the appointment of John Bond QC to the Queensland Supreme Court.

From its inception, the workshop has been supported by Australian aid funding. It is delivered solely by volunteers who donate their time without financial reward. Judicial presenters use personal leave or time out of court otherwise available (at the opportunity cost of having to spend longer time in chambers working on reserved judgements). Aid funding solely covers travel, accommodation and incidental expenses. Following Sir Salamo’s retirement in 2018, the workshop’s conduct has been fully approved and supported by the present Chief Justice of PNG, Sir Gibbs Salika.

The average number of students taught at each workshop is around 100.  Thus, over the years more than 1000 PNG lawyers have completed this workshop. That is a high proportion of the practising profession and all of its younger cohort.

During the years 2013 to 2018, the final day of the workshop was a criminal law day. That inclusion was designed to expose students to aspects of modern criminal law case analysis, an additional need identified by Sir Salamo in consultation with Justice Logan. A silk was flown in from Brisbane especially for this. These included Peter Callaghan SC (as his Honour then was), Soraya Ryan QC (as her Honour then was), John Allen QC (as his Honour then was) and Saul Holt QC. Criminal law and practice education has since become the subject of specialist CPD presentations to the profession in PNG.

Many judges and barristers have participated in teaching at the workshop over the years. Apart from those already mentioned, these include Judge Michael Burnett AM, Judge Richard Jones,  Judge Bernard Porter KC (both before and after his appointment as a judge), Ken Fleming KC, Richard Perry KC, Erin Longbottom KC, Mark Steele KC, Holly Blatman KC, Sally Robb KC, Karen Carmody, Andrew Skoien, Joseph Crowley, Liam Dollar, Fiona Lubett, Brent Reading, Jane Menzies, Max Walker, Sarida Derrington and Genevieve Yates. Justice Logan, Mal Varitimos KC and Joseph Crowley have taught at each workshop to date.

The success of the Commercial Litigation Workshop has led to the Association being asked to provide training not just in PNG but in other South Pacific nations. In turn, this has led to other South Pacific law and justice engagements. These will be detailed in a future edition of Hearsay.