Welcome Our New Commonwealth Attorney-General

The Queensland Bar has, over the years, produced many who have sought to turn their forensic skills to political advantage and to obtain high office. Senator James Drake succeeded Alfred Deakin as Commonwealth Attorney-General. Before Peter Connolly was a judge, he had one term as the member for Kurilpa in the Queensland State Parliament. The James Dean of Queensland politics, T J Ryan, became Attorney-General, then Premier, before dying in a Barcaldine hospital at the age of 45.

There are many others: Sir James Killen, John Greenwood, Cameron Dick and Matt Foley have all made their mark.

Despite the many who have conducted successful political careers, until this year, no member of our Bar had held the office of Commonwealth Attorney-General since Sir Littleton Groom KC mishandled an attempt to expel foreigners and was forced to resign in December 1925.

Our new Commonwealth Attorney-General, the Hon. Senator George Brandis QC, has taken up that role, along with the title of Minister for the Arts, following the Coalition’s victory at the polls a few months ago. Senator Brandis comes to the post after 12 years as a Senator for Queensland. He took up that post in 2001 when a casual vacancy arose and lured him away from a successful practice at the private Bar, acting in large commercial matters.

In those 12 years, the Senator has drawn attention both for his capacity to turn his skills as an experienced counsel to devastating use in parliamentary committees, and for his ability clearly to articulate political arguments in debates both in parliament and on the airwaves.

Apart from his role as the first law officer, the new Attorney takes on the significant role of overseeing the nation’s intelligence agencies. Australia is involved in some of the most technologically sophisticated intelligence gathering operations the world has ever seen. Those of us who know him well allow ourselves a wry smile at the thought of the Attorney being confronted with so much technology. This is, after all, the man who, when once told by Phillips Fox’s IT Manager that their Macs could not understand files created on his PC, was heard to yell in frustration: “Well who the *#$% is Max and why isn’t he in this meeting?!”

A less than brilliant pedigree with technology aside, the Senator brings with him to the role a deep sense of the importance of the rule of law and, because of that, a commitment to the law’s orthodoxies; things which time in practice at the Bar instil. Judges should be appointed because they are highly suited for the role, and not to achieve some political ideal. The judiciary and the executive should accord each other respect and, when the occasion arises for criticism, it should be couched in appropriately respectful terms.

As an old friend, my view will rightfully be regarded as biased, but I think that we have every reason to be confident that our colleague will make an outstanding contribution at the interface between law and politics in our nation.

Nick Ferrett