Swearing in Ceremony of The Honourable Joseph Charles Campbell QC
THE SUPREME COURT
OF NEW SOUTH WALES
BANCO COURT
SPIGELMAN CJ
AND THE JUDGES OF
THE SUPREME COURT
Friday 26 October 2001
SWEARING IN CEREMONY OF
THE HONOURABLE JOSEPH CHARLES CAMPBELL QC
AS A JUDGE OF THE SUPREME COURT OF NEW SOUTH WALES
1 CAMPBELL J: Chief Justice, I have the honour to announce that I have been appointed a Judge of this Court. I present to you my Commission.2 SPIGELMAN CJ: Thank you, Justice Campbell. Please remain seated while the Commission is being read. Principal Registrar, would you please read the Commission.
(Commission read)
3 Justice Campbell, I invite you to rise and take the oaths. First the oath of allegiance and then the judicial oath.
(Oaths of Office taken)
4 Principal Registrar, I hand you the oaths so they may be placed amongst the Court’s archives. Sheriff, I hand to you the Bible so that you may have the customary inscription placed in it in order that it may then be presented to Justice Campbell as a memento of the occasion.5 Justice Campbell, on behalf of the Court and on my own behalf I welcome you as a Judge of the Court and congratulate you on your appointment. We will hear presently of some of your achievements, leading qualities, competence in your service as barrister of this Court. I look forward to many years of service with you as a Judge of this Court.
6 THE HONOURABLE R J DEBUS MP, ATTORNEY GENERAL OF NEW SOUTH WALES: As Attorney General and on behalf of the New South Wales Bar it is my great pleasure to extend my congratulations to you on your appointment as a Judge of the Supreme Court of New South Wales.7 You have come a long way since your days at Tamworth High School, and your years of study at the University of Sydney, where you excelled in the humanities and the law, obtaining an honours degree in both disciplines.8 Upon leaving university you began your legal career in 1974 at the firm of Allen, Allen & Hemsley. Your time as a solicitor was short but distinguished and a year later you were admitted to the Bar, reading with Richard Conti, now a Judge of the Federal Court. You took Silk in 1988.9 Your Honour quickly established a reputation as a talented and versatile advocate. Your skills were recognised not only by your peers, but also by a distinguished Court of Appeal bench comprising their Honours Hutley, Glass and Samuels.10 Your skills as a barrister came to the attention of the Court of Appeal in one of your earliest cases, which concerned an appeal from a decision awarding the princely sum of two thousand dollars to a hairdresser whose shop had been flooded after some less than perfect renovations. Your Honour was forced to contend with an appeal court bench that found the decision in the Court below was based on an incorrect construction of the contract.11 In concluding his judgment, his Honour Justice Hutley, wrote:
"I would like to say how much the court appreciated the argument presented by Mr Campbell, a very junior member of the Bar, who was faced with what is a most difficult situation for an advocate, suddenly having to deal with the case on an entirely different basis from that which he was originally presented with and came prepared to handle. We hope to see him again in the court."
12 His Honour Mr Justice Hutley was, I might say, my own lecturer in Succession at the University of Sydney, and I, along with several generations of law students can testify that his Honour was the least forgiving, the most stringent examiner in the Faculty.13 His Honour Mr Justice Glass echoed the sentiments of Mr Justice Hutley saying that he agreed in the reasons for judgment, the order for costs and the accolade to Mr Campbell.14 I am assured, your Honour, that such comments were not restricted to this one performance and have continued throughout your career, though most, I understand, have been uttered privately rather than in authorised law reports.15 While spending your early years honing those skills which brought enviable praise from the Bench, you also found time to lecture part-time in equity at Sydney University for several years.16 This teaching experience was clearly to your liking, as you later returned to your alma mater in the role of Challis lecturer in bankruptcy. Fortunately, it has not only been students who have benefited from your considerable knowledge and experience. You have been a member of the Council of Law Reporting from 1994 to the present and, since the beginning of this year, have occupied the role of chairperson of the Council.17 Your interest in the development of the law has also seen you contribute to the Commercial Law Association and the Company Law Discussion group.18 During your career at the Bar, you have maintained a varied practice which has seen you appear before the Supreme Court, the Federal Court and the High Court on matters concerning administrative law; banking, finance and securities; commercial law; corporations law; insolvency, bankruptcy and liquidation law; intellectual property law; trade practices and competition law; and, of course, trusts, equity, wills, probate and family provision law.19 Such a broad range of experience and skills will no doubt ensure your Honour's career on the bench is as successful and fulfilling as your career at the Bar has been, and I offer you my best wishes and that of the profession on your well deserved elevation to the bench.
20 MR N K MEAGHER, PRESIDENT, LAW SOCIETY OF NEW SOUTH WALES: May it please the court. On behalf of the solicitors of New South Wales it is my great pleasure to congratulate your Honour on your appointment as a judge of the Supreme Court of New South Wales.21 The Attorney-General and I have obviously been reading very much the same script, particularly of your life and achievements. Your Honour was born in Sydney and moved to Tamworth where your mother's family lived. After completing your Leaving Certificate at Tamworth High School in 1965, at the early age of 16 years, your Honour commenced an Arts degree at Sydney University where you attended St Andrews College.22 You graduated with an honours degree in philosophy but, I am told, you found that lacking in fulfilment and chose to pursue studies in law at Sydney University, completing, as we have heard, a degree with first class honours.23 Your outstanding academic achievements were to be subsequently, as we have heard, applied as a part-time lecturer in equity between 1974 and 1978 and between 1983 and 1986 when you were the Challis lecturer in bankruptcy.24 Your Honour worked on the solicitors' side of the law, as we have heard, for a very, very short time at Allen Allen & Hemsley where you were articled and were privileged to have the late Justice John Lehane as your master solicitor.25 As we have heard, your Honour was called to the bar in June 1975, having been so persuaded by your wife's cousin, now Justice Conti, with whom you read.26 In November 1988 you became Queen's Counsel. Your former colleagues at the bar have noted and said you had unbelievable thoroughness in terms of your preparation in relation to cases.27 Those who have been your juniors have reported that they have stood in awe of your extraordinary attention to detail and your being a vast repository of knowledge and advice, especially in equity and contract. Others have remarked upon your impeccable integrity, both professionally and personally.28 Your appointment to the Equity Division of the Supreme Court will be much welcomed for your personal qualities, broad experience and expertise.29 I am told that your Honour is a great fan of opera and concerts and a lover of all music, but in particular delights in the performances of your three talented sons, for whom you have had occasion to commission a piece to celebrate your wife's birthday.30 You have also been known to be a very ardent traveller and were reportedly fascinated by recent trips to China, Ireland and, just after the announcement of your appointment, an extensive tour of eastern Europe.31 Your Honour, on behalf of the solicitors of New South Wales I congratulate you on your appointment and wish you many satisfying years on the bench.
32 CAMPBELL J: Chief Justice, other judges, Mr Attorney, other members of the legal profession, ladies and gentlemen. Any occasion like this which marks a major turning point in one's life, provides an occasion for looking back. And working out, on doing so, that there are many people who have played a part in my taking up of this appointment today. On an occasion like this it is neither possible, nor appropriate, to deal anything like adequately with my relationship with any of them, but there are some debts which I should acknowledge in an incomplete way.33 The first of those are members of my family. The first of those are my parents. My father died when I was five, and all I can remember of him is disconnected fragments. But I am confident that from him I got not only some useful genetic material but also the benefit that a close relationship between parents can provide, even to someone who is too young to really understand what is going on.34 My mother was the most important single influence on my growing up, and she did literally everything that she could for me. I owe her a lot. She encouraged me, no doubt unrealistically, to believe that I could achieve anything I wanted to, and when it was time for me to leave home at the age of sixteen to go to university she encouraged that, too. She is now aged 89 and living in a nursing home. I know she would be very proud to be here today, but unfortunately it would be just too much for her to come.35 I also owe a lot to my brothers. Particularly during the time that I was growing up, my brother Richard was a constant source of encouragement and someone who I tried to emulate. It was largely from him that I acquired the prejudice that intellectual activities are worth taking seriously. From the time I came to Sydney my elder brother David in effect provided an alternative home for me and also provided ongoing friendship. I wish I could emulate the generosity and enthusiasm which he has always displayed.36 Over the years I have also had the benefit of a wide extended family in the form of my mother's five sisters and brother and their various offspring.37 Then there are my parents-in-law, Pat and Mary Conti. They have provided continual support from the time more than thirty years ago, when they agreed to the fairly foolhardy proposition that a law student with no money, no contacts and fairly speculative prospects marry their daughter. They and Jenny's sisters, Liz and Janet, have really provided me with a second family to belong to.38 Then there is my wife, Jenny. For over thirty years she has been, and still is, my constant companion and closest friend. Over the time that I have been a barrister she has continually provided me with qualified support. That she had an income from her work that we could live on was part of the reason why I went to the bar. There have been many times when I have been absent in body or mind, and she has kept the household running regardless. She has put up with the restless nights that are involved when cases prove troublesome. Without her support I simply could not have had the legal career that I have had. But she was also always ready to say enough is enough and there is more to life than this. I am grateful for the support and I am grateful for the qualifications.39 Finally, there are our sons James, Robert and David. It has been a continual interest and pleasure over the last twenty-four years to live with them as they have grown up and matured. It continues to be a great interest and pleasure now they are adult to have them home from time to time, enjoy their company and hear about their lives, so different to ours. The whole process of parenting has been a tremendous benefit to me.40 Any lawyer draws continually on his or her education. For me, Tamworth High School provided a good education and a very broad range of extracurricular activities. I had many skilled and dedicated teachers there. In particular I would mention Ford Spry, who is now deceased, who over a period of four years provided regular classes in maths for a group of people that he was training to do the maths honours course, and Brian Neil who introduced me to English literature over a period of five years.41 And it was in Tamworth that I had the first experience of coming across lawyers, not in their work but in what they did, where there were local solicitors who judged the interschool debating competitions there.42 St Andrews College is a place which has a very special place in my affections. I lived there for five and a bit very happy years. Most of that time was taken up trying on different ideas for size, reading widely, learning more about theatre, music, the college wine cellar, and also just taking part in the long discussions that students have. I still have good friends from that time, some of whom who are here today.43 I should also mention here a special debt I have to Sir Adrian Solomons. He was a Tamworth solicitor who was also a member of the New South Wales Legislative Council. A Commonwealth scholarship had financed me through an Arts honours degree, and at the end of the Arts degree I had a very borderline case for an extension of that scholarship to be able to cover a law degree. Sir Adrian helped me, without any fee, to get through the bureaucratic maze and get an extension of the scholarship. Without that help I would not be here today.44 At Sydney University I cannot recall a single bad lecturer, and there were many who were very stimulating lecturers. The stimulating ones included, as they then were, Colin Phegan, Bill Gummow, John Lehane, Bob Austin, Roger Giles (now of this court), and Eugene Kamenka.45 You heard that I was articled to John Lehane. For the first six months of my practice at the law I sat at a desk in a corner of his room. I cannot think of a better way of starting the practice of law. It gave me the chance to watch someone, who had complete mastery of the principles of the law and vast knowledge of how business actually operates, going quietly and efficiently about providing practical answers to the real problems that people came with to him. I am very sorry that he is not here today.46 Richard Conti is another man to whom I owe a very special debt of gratitude. As you heard, he encouraged me to come to the bar. He eased my way onto the 11th floor. He took me as his pupil and provided the help that comes with that relationship, and over the whole of my time as a barrister he has always been there as both a source of inspiration and help.47 I spent twenty-six years at the bar and have been very fortunate that I have been able to do so. Work at the bar provides continual opportunities to meet people from all walks of life and to have a window into their lives. It lets you know about how all sorts of social institutions work. You can get tutorials from experts in the widest varieties of fields of expertise. I found it fascinating the way work at the bar covers such a broad range of inquiry - and by that I mean not just that any part of human activity is potentially the subject of a law suit, but as well the topics that you need to deal with, including the history that explains how a particular principle came to be, and the theory or justification as to why a particular principle is either a sensible idea or perhaps not such a sensible idea.48 Now, the way in which the litigation system operates is one which is in one sense at one remove from the daily life of the community. In one sense it is about the daily life of the community rather than being itself part of that life. And, furthermore, it is usually about part of the daily life of the community in the past rather than now. But it still is of importance. It is concerned with those activities of the daily life of the community which have led to a dispute - and the task of litigation is to put an end to the dispute so the litigants can get on with their lives and get on with their business. As it does that, the legal system is in many ways a very cooperative enterprise. It is a system in which each individual involved has a role to play in achieving the vital end of resolving disputes in the community and resolving them in a way which is principled, uses fair processes and is in accordance with the laws that the representatives of the community have themselves chosen.49 The way it operates over time is like a river that is made up of lots of different parts. The system is always there, even though the individual parts that make it up - the individual people - move on and themselves change.50 As an individual in the law I have gone through that same process of changing roles. As a junior I was often led. I had the privilege of being led by a very large number of excellent barristers. I cannot name them all. It would be unfair to name just some. Many of them later became judges of this court or other courts. Some of them did not. From them I picked up much about what the law is about, the practical skills of litigation, and what the boundaries are that you practically ought not go beyond.51 And when later in my time at the bar I worked with juniors there were many really smart, really hard-working men and women who not only helped with the work of the case at hand but who taught me a lot. Throughout the whole time there have been instructing solicitors with their indispensable role in the process. And of course barristers are in a never ending dialogue with the judges. Over twenty-six years of carrying on that dialogue with the judges, I know I have benefited greatly from the discussions, the probing, the questioning, as the judges try in the course of a case to get the right answer.52 Another part of the system, and a very important part of the legal system for keeping it working, is the barristers who are not involved in a particular case. I have had tremendous friendship and support from other barristers on the floors that I have belonged to. Even though you might not often do it, it is comforting to know that there are barristers with whom you can toss a problem around if you need to. It is comforting to have colleagues to have a conversation with about things other than the case which is consuming you at the time.53 There are people who are outside the legal profession who also make their contribution. I must acknowledge the enormous assistance I have received over the years from the clerks and secretaries and other support staff a barrister could not function without. And I must mention particularly here Paul Daley, who was my clerk for most of the time I was a barrister. I could always rely on him to make sure that the daily arrangements of practising ran smoothly, and his motto that "nothing's a problem" was one that he always carried out.54 Today, with this ceremony, I move into a different stretch of this same river that I have been part of for over a quarter of a century. Since my appointment was announced some people have said to me, "But how can it happen that you are a barrister one day and judge the next?" Part of the answer is in one sense, I have had a quarter of a century's training for this. Another part is that I confidently expect that I will be helped by counsel and solicitors in cases that are before me.55 Even so, I have no illusions that it will be easy. It is a great privilege to be offered the opportunity of joining in the work that the judges collectively do in their part of the legal process. It will be a great challenge to try to do that job properly.
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