Lounge Lizards

If you plough your way to the end of the appendices of the latest Federal Court annual report (page 209) you’ll find a little mention of the touchy subject of judges and their memberships of the Qantas Chairman’s Lounge and Virgin’s Beyond Lounge.

At the May 2025 judges’ conference, it was resolved to disclose the number of judges who are confirmed members of these invitation-only salons – “in the interests of further transparency”.

It turns out 59 of their Hons are signed on, out of a total of 61 FCA judges – two are missing all the fun, and the free drinks.

The “transparency” only goes so far, as no judge is identified as a member, and the PR muffins at the court won’t disclose whether the memberships are free of charge.

Our information is that entry is a grace and favour gift for their Hons.

Not that we can say the Federal Court is doing any favours in return for this charitable donation – see Transport Workers’ Union of Australia v Qantas Airways Limited per Lee J.

The official explanation for snaffling the corporate largess is that judges are frequently on the wing and they need agreeable spaces “to continue with their court preparation … in confidential settings”.

Here they can confidentially schmooze with the likes of Alan Jones, lobbyists, captains of industry and the politicians who clog their court.

The sans-culottes are at a healthy distance.

The story got a big nudge in September 2023 from Sam Maiden in Canberra. There it was revealed that the courts “will establish a public register for judges to disclose membership of the Qantas Chairman’s Club”.

Our court reporter, Courtney Docket, got a distinct indication of prickliness about this issue. We asked the FCA spinners three times for information about the airport lounges. Eventually, we were told what was already on the public record in the 2024-2025 annual report.

“The court will not be commenting further.”

Transparency, hard at work.

From Gang Gang in Canberra

There is more lakeside drama at the Toy Town Law Society.

The council of the ACT Law Society wants members to approve an amended society constitution – in fact, it looks like a completely new constitution.

It needs two-thirds of the rank ‘n’ file to agree to the amendments, and then it goes to the Attorney General for her thumbprint.

The irrepressible solicitor Chris Donohue has prepared a critique of the proposed changes, which he characterises as giving the bureaucrats greater say over the affairs of the society. This is in the context of some interpersonal conflicts between members of the secretariat and the council.

Here are some of the main problematic points Donohue has identified.

•  It will be possible for three members of the council to delegate any part or all of the powers of councillors to the CEO;

•  Weakening of the provisions that reserve for the council decisions about the rights of members;

•  The size of the council will be shrunk from 15 to 9;

•  The council will not include the immediate past-president, the second vice-president and the treasurer. All abolished;

•  Disentitling factors for people nominating for the council include anyone who has been removed from the council in the last five years;

•  Council has the right to remove any councillor without reasons, so once removed they cannot stand again for five years;

•  The new constitution is too vague and loose at the edges, giving a select few greater authority to rule the roost.

An extra spicy, new element has emerged – the proposed payment of (potentially) all councillors.

In March, we had a story about the removal of Chris Donohue from council, after 14 years and a stint as president.

Apparently, he kept councillors late for their dinner while there was much jawboning about a survey of the society’s governance and proposed changes to the constitution.

See Donoghue’s critique of constitutional change

On Thursday, November 27, the constitution was amended at the AGM. Here’s the outcome.

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All this so soon after the disastrous pummelling the society got in ACAT for its handling of the Archie Tsirimokos case.

The society pursued a dishonesty charge against the long-standing solicitor. This was the “cornerstone” of its case.

The solicitor accepted three of the charges relating to the failure to deliver diligent legal advice and a breach concerning conflict of interest.

As to a fourth charge, Tsirimokos made admissions as to carelessness, but submitted that it did not amount to dishonesty, which called for his suspension.

Senior ACAT Member Doc. Neville, in a door-stopping 127 pages of reasons, was critical of the lengthy hiatus between the earlier three charges in 2022 and the fourth charge added in 2024.

The society also sent the respondent two sets of its reasons to be relied on for its case. Neville found:

“The fumbling of the reasons to be relied upon not only poses some questions about the efficacy and much else in this regard, but perhaps also, it raises a real question whether the Council (or delegated officer) was actually functus officio once the first Statement of Reasons was signed, and therefore the second statement was nugatory or voidable.”

Tsirimokos was criticised by the society for his delay in responding to the charge of dishonesty.

Doc. Neville said:

“To state the obvious: it is rather difficult to respond to a charge approximately two years before it was formulated and notified to the respondent.”

There was a finding of professional misconduct for the fourth charge, but at the lower level, which does not mean the practitioner is branded as unfit and improper. It amounted to a $10,000 fine and a stint at the re-education camp.

The society’s president, Vic Sundar, sent out a lengthy response, declaring that there have been “operational changes” in the expansion of the regulatory services team and there would be no appeal.

Sea legs

After the triumph of her defamation defence in the Dr Munjed Al Muderis case, journalist Charlotte Grieve has stayed hot on the orthopod’s tail.

This month, she reported that the good doctor has set up shop in Florida at the Paley Institute, a corporate orthopaedic services factory and subsidiary of the Wall Street-listed healthcare behemoth, Tenet.

The Paley Institute is the world’s largest medical tourism outfit handling bone surgery.

Al Muderis says he wants to bring the Paley model to Sydney.

Four days later, the CBD column at the SMAGE was onto the delightful story that Munjed had been pulled over and booked last month by the West Palm Beach coppers for speeding in his brand-spanking new Porsche – doing 110km/h in a 60km/h zone.

He was also unable to produce a Florida driver’s licence, even though he had been there since September.

Instead, he waved at the officers an Australian boating licence.

He is reported to have paid $US233.25 for the license fine but, true to form, he is appealing against the speeding ticket and demanding a jury.

Munjed should also appeal the unlicensed driving offence, based on the authority established by Albert Haddock in A.P Herbert’s Misleading Cases.

It was demonstrated that road drivers who believe they are navigating a boat have right of way over a car.

The law of the road has to give way to the law of the sea.

It’s worth a try at the County Court of the 19th Judicial Circuit, Martin County, where most things are possible.

Burke’s Backyard

Justice Craig Dowling from the Feds has taken a swing at ART Member Anna Burke.

On appeal in Burns v Comcare, Dowling J found a collection of fatal errors by the tribunal:

“The reasons do not meet the requirements expressed in Wonson v Comcare [2020] FCAFC 76; 276 FCR 613. They do not:

(a)  sufficiently enable Ms Burns to understand why she was unsuccessful;

(b)  adequately disclose the Tribunal’s path or process of reasoning to enable a court to assess whether it has made an error of law; and

(c)  explain in clear or unambiguous language why the applicant’s acceptance of a settlement in 2018 meant that her application for review had no reasonable prospects of success.”

We had the unhappy duty last month to report that Anna, a former Speaker of the House of Reps, had derailed her decision in Hilbert and Linfox Australia by extramural Google research, the results of which she pasted into her reasons.

See: You’re passing another Fox

We also caught Ms Burke in action on November 11 in Canberra, where she was a panel member in a discussion, under the baton of Justice Michael Lee, with other former parliamentary office holders, grappling with the topic: “Could the Dismissal happen again?”

Lee J is a board member of the Whitlam Institute.