Networked Knowledge - Media Report

[This edited version of the report has been prepared by Dr Robert N Moles]

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Article: Australian law on miscarriages of justice
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On 5 November 2007 Natasha Robinson of The Australian reported “A-G defends his judicial choices”.

She said that Victorian Attorney-General Rob Hulls has defended his record on judicial appointments, insisting judges are able to set aside their personal views and "administer the law with dispassion". Mr Hulls made the comments after two Supreme Court appointments - that of a former ex-union official and a human rights activist - ignited controversy over the Labor Government's string of left-leaning judicial appointments. Former ACTU assistant secretary Iain Ross was recently appointed to the Victorian County Court, and criminal barrister and prominent human rights advocate Lex Lasry QC was made a Supreme Court judge.

The appointments followed the elevation to the magistracy in July of Fiona Hayes, who worked as a senior legal adviser and then chief of staff to the Attorney-General between 2000 and 2005. Mr Hulls has also appointed three former presidents of the civil liberties group Liberty Victoria as judges or magistrates. Mr Hulls said claims that he had remade the state's bench in his own image were unsubstantiated. He said his 220 appointments to the judiciary and magistracy since 1999 "genuinely reflect a diverse range of views and approaches to justice". "We are all shaped to an extent by our backgrounds, our experience and our personal views, whatever those views may be," Mr Hulls said. "The challenge for every judge, however, is to bring those experiences to bear with reflection, and then administer the law with dispassion and impartiality."

Justice Lasry, at a ceremony to mark his appointment to the bench last week, said that though his views on topics such as capital punishment and terrorism were well-known, he would strive to be independent in his judicial career. As a barrister, Mr Lasry represented hanged drug trafficker Van Tuong Nguyen and two members of the Bali Nine, who have been sentenced to death in Indonesia. He also represented terror suspect Jack Thomas and regularly launched attacks on the Howard Government's anti-terror laws. The appointments of Justice Lasry and Judge Ross have prompted a string of conservative columnists to claim that Mr Hulls - who is in the hard-Left camp of the state Labor Party - has created an activist bench. "When vague and unfounded attacks are made on judges ... it reflects upon the entire judiciary and cannot be allowed to go through to the keeper," Mr Hulls said.

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