Editor’s Opinion

Jason MacLaurin SC, Editor, Brief | Barrister, Francis Burt Chambers

Christmas is just around the corner and this last edition of Brief for 2021 is a bumper (or, as is a currently preferred status, boosted) edition. Readers should feel free to read it near others and take it on holidays in WA, or possibly even to Tasmania.

10 December was International Human Rights Day, and this edition features the first of a special two-part Human Rights feature. Brief thanks Greg McIntyre SC (former President of the Law Society) for his erudite and insightful Foreword, which introduces the contributing authors and their articles, and provides thought-provoking comments on issues ventilated by them. The next (February 2022) edition will have Part 2 of this Human Rights feature, so please feel free, empowered and at liberty (puns partially intended) to give Brief any feedback you have about this edition. The Editor is particularly grateful for Greg’s Foreword, as it supplants that part of the Editorial otherwise addressing in detail the Human Rights feature, liberating more space here for the usual cavalcade of tortured segues (occurring ad nauseam), non sequiturs, the unnecessary use of latin, and split infinitives. So the Editor is very happy to share his annual remuneration as Editor with Greg, which is apparently two tickets to the new James Bond movie that everyone seems to know the ending to (though there will be no spoilers here as the screenwriters having done a capital job of spoiling the ending all by themselves). We are grateful for a fascinating interview with The Honourable Malcolm McCusker AC QC by Martin Bennett and Thaw Thaw Htin upon the occasion of, and reflecting upon, his 60th year in the law. On the theme of international days, International Anti-Corruption Day was on 9 December, and we have the CCC’s Matt McKeone provide a closer look at public sector corruption, a global problem WA is not immune from, and thank Foreign Affairs for permission to republish their insightful (though disconcerting) article on “The Rise of Global Strategic Corruption”. 3 December was the International Day of People with Disabilities, and we have an important and interesting article by Disability Discrimination Commissioner, Dr Ben Gauntlett. We also have Justice Hall with a reminder of a gem in our midst: the David Malcolm Justice Centre law library, whose dedicated staff provide a fantastic – and free – service to the profession. As the legal profession eagerly awaits progression of the Uniform Law Konrad de Kerloy has an article on perhaps the ultimate lump of coal in any lawyer’s stocking, “Personal Costs Orders Against Legal Practitioners under the Uniform Law”. It is fitting that we end 2021 with a Human Rights edition given the everpresent impact of the reactions to COVID, which have involved incidents of isolation and the restriction of movement and other freedoms. Notably, something that West Australians have long considered an entrenched human right - a Perth test match where one can get sunstroke, taunt and/or then join the Barmy Army and [*tortured segue alert!*] end up looking like John Grant exiting the Bundanyabba Hotel in the 1971 film of Kenneth Cook’s novel “Wake in Fright”, will once again not be enjoyed. The holiday period lends itself to old movie watching, and it would be remiss to not mention an extraordinary era of Australian movies kicked off in 1971 by two often overlooked classics “Wake in Fright” and Nicholas Roeg’s “Walkabout”, which resulted in the Australian flag being flown for the first time at the Cannes Film Festival 50 years ago. In looking back at some significant Australian cinema, we note also the recent passing away of the great and inspirational David Gulpilil Dalaithngu, whose great talent was initially recognised by Roeg, who cast him in “Walkabout”, and who went on, in addition to many other endeavours and achievements, to star in films such as “Storm Boy,” “The Last Wave”, “Crocodile Dundee I and II”, and “Australia”. Some Australian films of half a century ago seem relevant to the present, as they frequently deal with themes of isolation, different forms of spirituality, and from where we derive our sense of right and wrong, good and bad, and what is and should be lawful and unlawful. Wake in Fright is an (often harrowing) examination of an isolated society, the rules and behaviours established therein, and the potential for the breakdown of a supposedly “good” individual in extreme circumstances. The protagonist, John Grant, is an English born bonded schoolteacher (“indentured servitude” as he quips with the local, morally ambiguous, policeman played by the great Australian actor and pioneer of the Australian film industry, Chips Rafferty) in outback SA. Grant is just trying to get back, during school holidays, to Sydney to see his girlfriend, but becomes trapped in Bundanyabba (“the Yabba” aka “the greatest place on Earth”) and is unable to make it out to Sydney, for a host of existentially challenging reasons, unassociated with being unvaxxed. The film has many lessons, perhaps the most obvious being don’t try to keep up drinking with someone like Chips Rafferty1, and don’t trifle with the supposedly “simple” game of “two up”2 . While acolytes of God Gough Whitlam attribute the explosion in great Australian cinema to Whitlam — who undoubtedly played a major part including by his legendary cameo with Dame Edna Everage/Barry Humphries at the end of Bruce Beresford’s 1972 “The Adventures of Barry McKenzie”3 — it was under Prime Minister John Gorton (who had gone to school with Errol Flynn) that the initiatives and funding for Australian cinema were commenced. So, as all students of rigorous, factbased, and non-conspiratorial Australian history would appreciate, Australian cinema accordingly owes much to Harold Holt for hopping into that Chinese submarine in 1967.

Gorton might have been an unlikely patron for the arts, though it seems he did share Chip Rafferty’s passion for some things as can be gleaned from a few legendary stories. Veteran journalist Laurie Oakes recounted that Gorton once boarded a VIP jet after a boozy dinner, fell asleep, and then was woken by the noise of the engines and was sick on himself. Gorton, a WWII fighter pilot in Malaya and New Guinea, apparently sought to cover for this by asking the stewardess if she was surprised that an old fighter pilot like him would still get air sick, to which the stewardess replied, yes, she was surprised, particularly as the plane had not yet taken off.4 Another notable Gorton performance was when he went to see Liza Minnelli perform at Melbourne’s Chequers Nightclub, where he occasionally nodded off, but did stir to yell out a request: “Sing ‘Over the Rainbow’”. When he was discreetly informed that this was of course Ms Minnelli’s mother, Judy Garland’s, song Gorton reputedly nodded (and then nodded off to sleep) and a few songs later awoke to shout out: “Sing ‘Over the Rainbow’” . Gorton apparently made up for his faux pas by charming Ms Minnelli backstage and Minnelli could not have held too much of a grudge against Australians, as she subsequently married “The Boy from Oz” Peter Allen. It is not known however whether Gorton was invited to see her in the premiere of Cabaret (1972) a highlight of which is of course the song “Money” she performs with Joel Grey, as it may have caused great confusion had Gorton belted out the words “New car, caviar, four star daydream, Think I’ll buy me a football team.” Gorton got something back over Whitlam in that he had a cameo in a Bruce Beresford film, playing himself in the 1978 film version of David Williamson’s 1971 play “Don’s Party”, which revolves around Gorton’s defeat of Whitlam in the 1969 election. “On the Beach” (1959) is a US film set in Australia, with a depressingly apocalyptic theme but with some resonance with the times of COVID, It starred Gregory Peck and Ava Gardiner and was set in Melbourne, being the last refuge of humanity after a nuclear war has rendered uninhabitable all of the northern hemisphere – the problem being of course that the radiation (much like whatever comes after Omicron) is slowly seeping its way to Australia to kill everybody. In the original, the cause of the nuclear war is not made clear. However, in a 2000 Bryan Brown and Rachael Ward remake, the nuclear war is attributed to a conflict between China and the United States stemming from China’s attempted invasion of Taiwan. We must forgive the filmmakers at the time for such a wildly fanciful and frankly inconceivable catalyst (they may as well have set the cause of the nuclear war as the Melbourne Football Club in our lifetime controversially winning a Grand Final at a world-class stadium in Perth, Western Australia). One controversy arising from the filming of the 1959 ‘On the Beach’ and an early example of “fake news,” was the attribution to Ava Gardner of the comment, “I’m here [Melbourne] to make a film about the end of the world ... and this seems to be exactly the right place for it”. West Australians are quite used to this sort of sledge though its attribution to Gardner turns out to have been a fabrication; the Sydney Morning Herald journalist, Neil Gillett, admitting that he made it up (though Ava Gardner later slyly and obliquely suggested she may well have said it). Gillett later expressed his regret, and a feeling perhaps not unknown to the legal profession, and maybe the judiciary especially, being that having worked for 30 years “I have only once written anything worth repeating, and it has been attributed to someone else.”6 Another Australian film with an apocalyptic feel but an intriguing exploration into the spirituality of indigenous culture is “The Last Wave” (1977 - directed by Peter Weir). The film starts off with freak rain storms in Sydney, foreboding premonitions and warnings, and a death in a remote area resulting in a Sydney tax lawyer (played by Richard Chamberlain) being briefed by Legal Aid to defend the accused. This film contains another great performance by David Gulpilil Dalaithngu. To say more would require a spoiler alert, though it can be said that some critics questioned one element of the plot: being the oddity of a corporate tax lawyer taking a Legal Aid brief in an area in which they did not specialise. Or, it may have been a very unkind observation about the likelihood of a corporate tax lawyer taking a legal aid brief. No doubt corporate tax lawyers can watch the film and let Brief know if they feel they have been unfairly slighted, or honoured, by the film’s pretext. As noted, this booster edition contains many other items, including many of our regular (and much appreciated) contributions. Our Young Lawyers’ Committee have had a busy few months, and not just with billing and angling for pay rises. We have the wrap up from the Young Lawyers Black Tie Ball, the results of an COVID-19 Impact survey, and the much appreciated Aunt Prudence Juris with her customarily humorous advice for new lawyers, including top tips for working with self-represented litigants. Finally, I wish to sincerely thank my fellow Brief Editorial Committee members for giving up their time, expertise and knowledge so generously. Brief is also indebted to Madeleine McErlain, the Society’s Manager of Corporate Communications, whose tireless work makes Brief possible, our proof-readers, Ingrid Briggs, Sonia Chee and Cassandre Hubert for their invaluable help, our graphic designer Des McKenzie and all the Law Society staff who do internal pre-publication reviews or otherwise work behind the scenes in the production of Brief. Brief wishes all a happy festive season and a great New Year, hopefully a good break and rest, and encourages any readers who find inspiration to write to Brief about anything at all before our next (February) Edition to please do so.

End Notes

1 Chips Rafferty, during the filming of Wake in Fright’s raucous Yabba bar scenes, told the director he would not drink the no or low alcohol beer being used for the scene, and that he would only drink “real p***”. 2 Donald Pleasance (the most internationally famous of the actors in it, among other reasons, for his appearance in the Bond Film “You Only Live Twice” gives a terrifyingly menacing performance - his portrayal of ‘Doc’ being a quite feasible depiction of what might happen if Ernst

Stavro Blofeld had completely let himself go and become an alcoholic doctor in outback South Australia. 3 A film which may have cemented in English-people’s eyes everything they always thought about Australians, and vice versa. 4 “Plenty of odd moments onboard the PM’s RAAF VIP flights”, L Oakes, Herald Sun, 11/4/2009. 5 Untold story of Canberra’s first coup: the political assassination of PM John Gorton – Part 2, Alex Mitchell, 19/1/2019, www.cometherevolution.com.au 6 Ava Gardner’s famous quote that never was, Laurie

Barber, 8/5/2017, www.maitlandmercury.com.au