Philip OPAS QC interview 4/8/2003

What kind of practice did he (Roy Schilling) run?

He was a one-man practice. At the time I was there, there was a managing law clerk, a typist-secretary-receptionist, and there was me.

And what did you do – articles?

No, I wasn’t doing articles - I was employed as a law clerk, and I was sent off delivering letters and briefs around the city because in those days, they didn’t post letters to solicitors in the city – they delivered them by hand. I of course was the messenger.

I was sent into court to “instruct” counsel – it was an interesting thing to do, because I had to take notes of the evidence being given because we didn’t have transcripts in those days and the barrister who was cross-examining couldn’t take notes while he was on his feet.

He relied on the notes I took to make his final address either to a jury, a judge or a magistrate as the case may be. In the course of that, I was interested in what I was doing: I wrote very fast and legibly, so he could read my writing. I’d go off to the library to fetch books he wanted to refer to and eventually I became informed.

While I was doing all this, I was qualifying to go to university – I matriculated by correspondence. It wasn’t easy because my hours were 8.30 to 5.15 on a weekday, and from 8.15 to midday on a Saturday.

Roy Schilling described you as a young man in a hurry!

Well, he was very friendly to me, and a wonderful mentor – I learned anything I know about the law from Roy. He had a general practice, and a lot of it was criminal, and he would send me out to Pentridge on a tram because I couldn’t drive. I think during the six years or more I worked for him, I must have spent six months in prison..!

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)