John Batt
I would have said that in the commercial bar – although they also did constitutional work, the leaders were probably Dr Coppel and Maurice Ashkanasy.
Juliette Brodsky
Between whom there was no love lost, I understand?
John Batt
There was no love lost. Add Gregory Gowans and then on the common law side (Sir Reginald) Smithers, and in land matters and some trusts, Lou Voumard. Voumard told me that he considered the best lawyers were – barristers (Dick) Eggleston and Tom Smith, who was by then on the bench. I think I mentioned Smithers and of course Starke in crime and civil juries.
James Merralls
Cliff Menhennitt had a big constitutional practice at that time too, because he had a very close association with Ansett. I think he’d been a director or was a director.
JD Phillips
Cliff Menhennitt had a bit of wise advice for the junior, I remember. He had a very easy chair in his chambers. He said every barrister needs an easy chair in which to just sit back and think before you go into court. He was dead right.
Juliette Brodsky
Absolutely. A lot of …
Bill Ormiston
There were a group of common law silks, I think we didn’t see a great deal of them. I had one brief as junior to Bill Crockett for example, Peter Murphy …
James Merralls
Don Campbell.
Bill Ormiston
Tony Murray, they were all exceptionally good and they all went in due course on to the Supreme Court in the late 60s and early 70s.
James Merralls
Except Campbell.
Bill Ormiston
Except Campbell, yes.
James Merralls
Campbell had polio as a child, and used a stick -
JD Phillips
With great effect in front of juries. When the other side would make a point-
James Merralls
He had a caliper.
JD Phillips
He had a stick, too, didn’t he?
Clive Tadgell
He was a jury advocate.
JD Phillips
When a point was being made against him, he’d drop his stick on the floor, distracting everyone.
John Batt
He was a character. I recall once in the lift in Owen Dixon Chambers - he was on the second floor, so it was a short lift ride. Somebody said, “How did you go, Don, in the jury case?” “Oh, we won,” he said, and just as he got out, the doors were closing and somebody else in the lift said, “Yes, but he went in for 90% contributory negligence”. (Laughter)
Clive Tadgell
He used to do an occasional appeal. Do you remember the story that is told about (Sir Owen) Dixon coming out of a court and saying he’d “had a very unhygienic afternoon with Mr Campbell spitting at us” – he used to gesticulate and spit all over the place, that was Dixon’s summary of it.
Juliette Brodsky
Justice Starke, there’s already been quite a few colourful recollections of him on the oral history but it’s been suggested, I think he himself thought he wasn’t a particularly good lawyer. Would any of you have any views about that?
Bill Ormiston
He was a much better lawyer than he made out himself. If you interested him – and I had a technical matter, I think it was about private international law and value of money and he listened and he wrote a very good but succinct judgement on the subject.
JD Phillips
Very astute.
Bill Ormiston
But he didn’t really want to get involved in that too much, I think, and he preferred the common law type of action with which he was familiar.
JD Phillips
He didn’t have much time for the equity pedantry type of thing.
Bill Ormiston
No, but he would listen, and if he thought that the case had some substance and it was … then he understood and worked it out and did it quite well, but he was not naturally interested in the subtleties.
Clive Tadgell
He used to work very hard as a judge. He used to come in and spend all of Sunday in chambers years ago.
John Batt
He came in very early but left straight after court to go home.
Bill Ormiston
And he was very nice to a lot of barristers who were not common law barristers – he was very nice to me, he was nice to (Stephen) Charles and a number of us.
James Merralls
He was a good friend of mine because I have always been interested in horse racing and so was he, so I knew him at Flemington quite well.
Clive Tadgell
I had chambers on the 8th floor when I first went to Owen Dixon Chambers, just a couple of paces from his and we were friendly and he was very kind to me.
JD Phillips
Your chambers suffered somewhat when they put the three floors on.
Clive Tadgell
Yes, that’s right, I was on the 8th floor and the 9th floor was the cafeteria and what have you and they decided to put floors up to 13 and they took the roof off. It rained one morning, a Sunday morning, and my library was very badly affected. I remember particularly I was looking up on the following Monday morning the law from Halsbury on Landlord and Tenant, so I could sue the Bar Council or something and that volume Landlord and Tenant was absolutely illegible, and they bought me another one. (Laughter)
Juliette Brodsky
Actually on the subject of Owen Dixon Chambers, I believe when it was first proposed, it met with quite strong opposition in some quarters – Eugene Gorman opposed it?
JD Phillips
It was built by six, I understood, six individuals themselves.
Clive Tadgell
Yes, one we haven’t mentioned is Gillard. Gillard was really responsible for it, I think.
JD Phillips
Ashkanasy, Gillard, Smithers …
John Batt
And Minogue.
JD Phillips
Minogue.
James Merralls
And Jim Tait. Jim Tait got the finance.
JD Phillips
Yes and then having built it, the Bar then took it.
Clive Tadgell
The finance being 750,000 pounds, I think.
JD Phillips
It was built for 15 years too, the lifts were “15-year lifts” which caused us some enjoyment after 15 years.
Clive Tadgell
Yes, but they’d already been used for about 10 by the time they were installed, I think, so they didn’t last.
John Batt
I was a director for some years of Barristers’ Chambers and they were a perennial problem. It was under the chairmanship of Sir James Tait who used to speak of things that were slight anachronisms – he used to speak of the police courts, when we were already with the stipendiary magistrates.
JD Phillips
That’s where I heard the saying that if you get into the lift, you should always have a pack of cards.
Bill Ormiston
One learned to go up and down the stairs at great speed. I was on the 6th floor virtually all my time – coming up wasn’t quite so important because that was after court, but to descend, if only one lift out of the four was working …
John Batt
I was prosecuting a case against John Hanlon. It actually went for about 4 retrials until his client was acquitted of raping his niece. But Hanlon wasn’t around one day when the court was due to start, he’d been held up in the lift, the lift had jammed. He arrived about 20 minutes late.
Juliette Brodsky
I believe there were, during this time there were a couple of barristers, Maxwell Bradshaw and Russell Barton who decided they would have not a bar of Owen Dixon Chambers and refused to move even when an English company bought their building apparently. I was reading a story that one of them - I think it was Maxwell Bradshaw - was looking out at some grimy view and said, “I like this view and I intend to stay”.
John Batt
Yes, a Prudential director is reputed to have said to him, “What do you like about this building?” And looking out into the little lane through the dirty window, he said “The view”. Well, they increased their offer …
Bill Ormiston
Was he in …
John Batt
Brougham Chambers.
Bill Ormiston
Yes, he was in a different set of chambers, wasn’t he, it was small?
James Merralls
Yes, chambers opposite the back of Selborne (Chambers). I’ve forgotten the name of the building.
Bill Ormiston
He said he held out for so long that BHP – I’m not sure that it was BHP but it was some company - were so desperate to get him out that they paid him enough for him to live on for the rest of his life.
James Merralls
They paid the two of them a huge amount.
Bill Ormiston
He did a lot of work in court.
JD Phillips
He was a charities expert.
Bill Ormiston
He didn’t charge very much for it.
James Merralls
Then he went across and he had shared chambers with Lou Voumard; his room was opposite Lou Voumard’s in Equity (Chambers).
Bill Ormiston
I think he competed on our side of the law with – well, I don’t think we saw a huge amount of Hartog Berkeley, but the two of them were known for the brevity of their submissions, they could be up and down in 5 minutes and if you weren’t aware of this, you could be taken by surprise.
JD Phillips
He seemed to have a retainer for the Attorney General in charities cases.
James Merralls
He always advised the Attorney General in charity. He wrote a little book on practice in charities.
John Batt
I was in fact in a case called re: Byrne before Mr Justice Menhennitt who was a close friend of Max Bradshaw, and during that case, which I think was in 1964, Bradshaw’s wife, considerably younger than he was, gave birth to a child and I remember Menhennitt in some way congratulating him from the bench during the case. I’d like to just add one other thing about Max Bradshaw, related to Jim’s story of the brief being brought by Richard Newton out of the vegetable tray. Max told me once that there were cy pres scheme cases and, say, pedigree enquiries which, when things were quiet, used to be revivified every couple of years, just to do a bit of work.
James Merralls
Bill had something to do with Max Bradshaw, literally as a client in a famous case.
Bill Ormiston
Yes, well, it was quite interesting, because John (Phillips) was ostensibly my junior although – well he was foolish enough to take silk a couple of years later than I did … And we also had Hartley Hansen and Ken Hayne was the fourth junior, so quite a lot of “judicial” weight behind the continuing Presbyterian Church, as it was called.
JD Phillips
The Schools Case.
Bill Ormiston
But we were very worried, because it was about charitable trusts and the like, and we were very worried that Max Bradshaw being an expert on the subject would sort of intervene and interpose and try and tell us this, that and the other. Well, he was marvellous as a customer, he would come in for conferences, would be barely there for 20 minutes, told us precisely what he wanted and what he thought was fair which was never outrageous. The only problem was that it was hard to get anything out of him about the law of charities. I said, “Well you know, Max, you know a lot about charities, what about this point?” “Oh,” he said, “I think there may be some case about it. I’ll have a look in my little black book”. But he never did. But he was extremely succinct and I’d expected him to be a complete pest and he wasn’t.
JD Phillips
He had a good sense of humour and a wonderful laugh – a unique laugh.
Juliette Brodsky
Can you give us an imitation?
JD Phillips
No! (Laughter)
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