Narrator:
Today there are over 270 women in active practice at the Victorian Bar.
Chief Justice Marilyn Warren:
My life as a barrister was really the best time of my professional life, it was just marvellous. I really enjoyed the camaraderie of the Bar, I enjoyed the very hard work that is involved, but it was quite exhilarating to not know generally from one day or one week to the next as to what your next case would be, what would be happening, the constant variety, the different exchanges; one day you were putting an argument for, the next day you were putting an argument against.
Michelle Wallace:
In return, I’d like to try and encourage more women to come to the Bar.
Lynnette Schiftan:
I think you’ve got to have a lot of passion in your heart. If you’ve got that, you really can do anything.
Judge Susan Cohen:
I think the Bar offers wonderful opportunities, and if they enjoy advocacy, it is the place to be.
Kris Hanscombe:
You can have a very good, very satisfying, very rewarding life, which you can shape as you want to shape it.
Lynnette Schiftan:
I think that the law is sufficiently flexible to allow you to do anything you can imagine.
Judge Fran Hogan:
It can be done. I really want to send the message out to any women thinking about coming to the Bar, or those in their early days, that it is a wonderful job and it’s a very fulfilling job, and it is hard, it is challenging, there are times where emotionally or financially you might wonder whether it’s worthwhile persevering, but it is.
Judge Rachel Lewitan:
It’s important that women pursue a career at the Bar.
Felicity Hampel:
I’ve loved the Bar, being a barrister, it’s just been a fantastic career for me.
Allayne Kiddle:
I wouldn’t stop any girls going to the Bar, I had a wonderful time when I was at the Bar.
Michelle Wallace:
This is where I belong, and this is where I want my career to be.
Lynnette Schiftan:
The Bar can be the most exciting, challenging, experience for you your life.
Chief Justice Marilyn Warren:
It’s a very marvellous life and I would urge any young person thinking about a career in the law to think very seriously about going to the Bar.
Vicky Lambropolous:
You can become the top of your profession in a profession where there used to be mainly men.
Lynnette Schiftan:
You can live, eat, sleep and breathe it, it’s just the most wonderful thing.
Felicity Hampel:
It’s given me opportunities to do things that I didn’t dream as a child or as a young woman (that) I would have been able to do.
Vicky Lambropolous:
Just keep on dreaming that it can happen.
Lynnette Schiftan:
You have to go for it.
Jennifer Batrouney:
I came to the Bar and I made it. And I would say to those women “You can make it too.”
(Montage of women judges, barristers preparing for court.)
Concluding written quote:
“Never doubt that a small group of thoughtful, committed individuals can change the world. Indeed, it is the only thing that ever has.” Margaret Mead, 1901 - 1978
Written and Produced by Fiona McLeod SC
Edited and Directed by Sarah McLeod
A Twin Lizards Production
© 2003
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