Justinian

“I don’t comment on my personal emotions in relation to these matters.”

“Integrity is not just a characteristic of our company, it is a selling point.”

“From time to time during the last five years I felt as if I were confined to an oubliette. There were occasions on which I thought the task of completing this case might be sempiternal. Fortunately, I have not yet been called upon to confront the infinite and, better still, a nepenthe beckons. Part of the nepenthe (which may even bear that name) is likely to involve a yeast-based substance. It will most certainly involve a complete avoidance of making decisions and writing judgments.

For the moment, in the words of Ovid (with an embellishment from the old Latin Mass): Iamque opus exegi, Deo gratias.”

“Well, she is a direct person, and I’ve often said to people that you don’t usually go to bed at night wondering what Belinda thinks about something.”

“I’m not Snow White.”

“I didn’t do things out of political expediency in the main – perhaps I might have once or twice.”

“The government has full confidence in Commissioner Keelty.”

“I would hope to be remembered for having put in place the building blocks for Australia’s future.”

“I hate seeing someone being bullied, and as strange as it might sound with Tony, I felt specially early on he was being bullied.”

“One thing you can never say about the High Court is that the people vote according to the political colour of the parties that appoint them.”

“Now nappies have got that Velcro stuff. It’s not as hazardous an operation … they used to have big silver pins.”

“Paying them this money, it was more to say, ‘We’re sorry they were so unhappy’.”

“We probably did more work than we got paid for in the end, but it was something we were quite proud of doing, to help these people.”

“At this, I looked out of the window. My garden looks like an English garden in an English village in an English county. I believe that I am a senior member of an independent profession upholding the rule of law in a liberal democracy. I think this is England.

This being so, I venture to suggest that the Bar Standards Board should begin to appreciate that we rank-and-file barristers will not take too kindly to being threatened with new policies that are inherently absurd and/or not based on evidence…

Frankly, if anyone tries to ‘spot check’ me, I shall not answer the door. And this is before I recite the text of Article 8 [right to privacy] of the European Convention on Human Rights.”

“Asked if there are areas where the legal profession should be reformed, Hughes responds, after a long pause: ‘I haven’t applied my mind to questions of law reform for a long time. Did you have any in mind’?”

“My learned friend has spoken with a forked tongue. And I don’t say this offensively.”

“Shadow attorney general George Brandis, one of the finest institutional minds on either side of politics, is understood to believe that of those candidates likely to appear on a Labor shortlist [for CJ of the High Court], Spigelman is the most appropriate candidate based on seniority and judicial excellence.

”[Attorney General] McClelland’s choice is now clear.”

“People are hypnotised by his mind.”

“Then I hit the curb when I parked it, and the mechanic said it was going to cost $8,000 to fix. Then it was another $10,000 to register and insure – $18,000 all up. I thought, ‘Stuff it’. I drove it for eight weeks, until the rego ran out, and then got rid of it. Too much of a spiv’s car for me.”

“I gave a commitment to my electorate and I have no plans to move.

“The question is: ‘Do you say never?’ If somebody came along and said to me, ‘You can be the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees’, given my experience and background and interest, it might be something I would consider.”

“There are some, like legal expertise and decision-making skills, which go without saying. But others, for example, interpersonal skills and tact, would exclude some of the most distinguished judges Australia has ever had.”

“I believe no Australian prime minister has done more for Aboriginal people, in practical terms, than John Howard.”

“It has become commonplace for the judges and professional bodies from Australian jurisdictions outside New South Wales to complain about the amount of work, particularly commercial work, which could have gone to their firms and been litigated in their couirts but which is, in fact, attracted to Sydney firms, counsel and courts.

“That issue was recently described by one of those senior judges from another state at a judges conference as the problem of the ‘Sydney vortex’. As the philosopher once said: ‘Its not my problem’.”

“The culture of parties of the Left, which is historically a culture which promotes aggressive cultural change, has not been a culture which values the rule of law in the way conservative parties do.”