Charles FRANCIS AM RFD QC interview 4/11/2003

At that time we had elaborate landlord and tenant provisions and this arose from the war and you couldn’t put a serviceman tenant out of your property unless there was bad behaviour or something of that nature. One of the main grounds of getting possession was the hardship to the landlord by being refused possession was greater than the hardship to the tenant by being excluded from possession.

Some tenants were able to hold on for many years. Ex-servicemen who had requisite service were described as “protected persons” and they had a number of benefits in the Landlord and Tenant Act.

The person whom I represented in that case was a Dutch airman, and he contended that he was a protected person under our legislation. We appeared before a magistrate who was very well known – Tom Hammond – and we appeared before him on a very cold day. My opponent was Alex Sacks and he was short and darkish with dark hair and, contrary to what was proper, he wore a big overcoat in court while he was addressing the magistrate.

At that time, you were only permitted to wear an overcoat in court if it was a cold day, and if you got the permission of the magistrate to wear a coat. It was a fairly cold day, but he didn’t seek the permission and he stood there rather to Mr Hammond’s annoyance, and he kept referring to my client as a “refugee”.

My client bridled at that because he came from what was then the Dutch-East Indies and he had served in the Dutch Air Force. The term “refugee” tendered to be a term of abuse at that time, and each time he was called a “refugee”, he indicated slight irritation, and after Mr Sacks had done this a third time, Mr Hammond intervened and said “Mr Sacks, please don’t use that term ‘refugee’, it makes me think of short dark people in large overcoats”. (Laughter) Which was the way quite a lot of refugees dressed at that time.

The interesting thing also about Alec Sacks, he was a solicitor who did his own appearances.

He did a lot of his own work in the Magistrates’ Court.

And apparently it was more common then, than it is now.

Yes, it was quite common. Of course at that time, there were a lot of suburban magistrates’ courts. His practice was in St Kilda and there was a St Kilda court but not very far from that was the Prahran Court, (and) there was the South Melbourne Court, so it was quite convenient for solicitors subject to what work they had to do, to go and appear for their clients in those courts. There were a number of solicitors in those suburbs particularly, who did a lot of their own work and Alec Sacks was one of those.

At that time too, and this is in the post-war period, solicitors weren’t getting a lot of work.

There was not as much solicitors’ work at that time. Not so much in the inner suburbs and they probably thought they would do better doing court work and often if a solicitor does a case and briefs counsel, he may lose the client. Whereas if he does the work for the client and does well, he has a better chance at holding on to the client.

Conducted for the Bar Oral History project by Juliette Brodsky in the Neil McPhee Room, Owen Dixon Chambers and filmed by Stewart Carter (People Pictures)