Born at the Right Time Read online

  In December 1994, Mary was offered and accepted a lectureship in the Faculty of Law of the University of Sydney. She began lecturing in January 1995, and she took to academia like a duck to water. Mary had an enormous rapport with her students. I think that female students in particular found her inspiring, for she was married to a person with a disability, had three children and yet taught and researched at a high level. We became a two-income family.

  More importantly, we were both holding down significant academic jobs at one of Australia’s most prestigious law schools. A new chapter in our lives was about to begin.

  14

  A Professor in Sydney

  The seven years between January 1995 and the beginning of 2002 were ones of growth for me, for Mary and of course for the children. Much of the time was spent teaching and researching, organising children in and out of school and just getting on with life.

  As a person who had longed for children and who had almost given up any expectation of having them, ferrying children to and from school, or to swimming lessons, had once seemed far out of my reach. As had participating in barbecues and dinner parties, in family birthday parties and Christmas gatherings. When I think back, I am still amazed that full family life really did come to me. There were times during these seven years when such ordinary family-centred events became truly magical.

  One of our major activities was Saturday morning school sport. The boys initially played cricket and rugby, but Mary and I didn’t want them to play rugby once they became teenagers. Gerard switched to soccer, which he played competitively until the end of his final school year. While Daniel also played some soccer, Kate played in netball teams from the age of eight. In fact, she continues to enjoy basketball and indoor soccer as a young adult. I found it great fun to be among the dads standing on the sidelines, whether at the football pitch or the netball court, where all dads were equal. Some of those wintry Saturday mornings were a little cold, so we dads and mums often had coffee while encouraging our children and this got me warm and energised.

  I can still remember the feel of the wind on my face, the shouts of our children and the squelch of the turf as we stood near the sidelines. From time to time, one of the dads would describe to me what was happening. Some were very good describers and I tended to call upon them when I wanted to understand the position of the game, be it rugby, soccer or netball. I was accepted as just another dad as we discussed the progress of our daughters and sons.

  Sometimes accidental events alter the course of lives, and this is what occurred in late 1996. Our second son, Daniel, had always loved music, and when he was four years old we bought him his first piano. During his first year at school his teachers, appreciating his musicality and beautiful singing voice, invited him to sing a solo rendition of Howard Blake’s ‘Walking in the Air’. In the audience was Lyn Williams, the founder and director of the Sydney Children’s Choir and mother of Daniel’s classmate, Carla. She asked if Daniel could come along and audition for the choir. In the end both Daniel and his sister auditioned, and both were admitted. This meant that, as well as Saturday sport, we had choir on Saturday afternoons and on occasion after school as well. Daniel and Kate progressed through the junior choirs and both later made it into the senior Sydney Children’s Choir. Then they took another step by singing in Gondwana Voices, where children come together to sing from all around Australia.

  For me it is always a huge privilege to teach law to students. I found my teaching to be exhilarating, especially at the postgraduate level. I became involved with the Master of Labour Law and Relations degree program. During these seven years, I participated in four labour law and safety inquiries for three state governments. Perhaps I was in the right place at the right time. It may be that I was sought out because my approach to labour law matters was moderate: there is often a state of trench warfare between those who side with employees and those who side with employers, but in many respects I was able to walk a line down the middle.

  In March 1995, the Carr Labor government was elected in New South Wales. The new Attorney-General and Minister for Industrial Relations was Jeff Shaw QC, the senior lawyer who had moved my admission to legal practice. The government wished to enact a new labour law statute to replace the ill-fated Industrial Relations Act 1991, which had sought to partially deregulate New South Wales labour law but had proven rather cumbersome. Minister Shaw established an industrial relations review taskforce, to which I was appointed. We received submissions and undertook detailed legal work, which led to the drafting and the eventual passage of the Industrial Relations Act 1996.

  Jeff Shaw was the ablest Minister for Industrial Relations with whom I have ever worked, and I believe he was the most gifted federal or state Minister of Labour over the past thirty years. His grasp of the law was both practical and detailed, and I learned a great deal from our discussions. Sadly, Jeff passed away at too young an age.

  In 1996, an inquiry into workplace occupational health and safety commenced. Minister Shaw asked me to head a Panel of Review, made up of both employer association and trade union representatives, together with several experts. We were charged with the task of writing a brief for the New South Wales Law and Justice Committee on the current legislation. One purpose of this Panel of Review was to ascertain the degree of consensus for change between employers and employees.

  In early 1997, we reported back to Minister Shaw, and the Law and Justice Committee accepted the bulk of our recommendations. Eventually, Minister Shaw steered through the Parliament the Occupational Health and Safety Act 2000 (NSW). Around this time, Blake Dawson Waldron, the large law firm that sponsored my professorship, made an offer for me to work for them as a special counsel for three days a week over the next three years. This left me two days a week at the Law School. The Dean said he would hold my full-time position open for me, which meant that, at the end of the three-year period, I could decide whether or not to go back to the Law School as a full-time professor.

  At Blake Dawson Waldron I was surprised how open and friendly everybody was, and how there was really no concern about my blindness. It turned out I wasn’t the only blind lawyer at the firm. Ivan Cribb, who was blind, had been employed as a senior associate for many years. I did have a lot of specialised labour law knowledge of course, but I had never before practised in this field. Under the direction of the firm’s three Sydney-based labour law partners I wrote legal advices, met with clients, and presented papers at external and internal seminars. I also appeared with colleagues in matters before the New South Wales and federal industrial relations commissions.

  While I was only employed for three days a week at the firm, I actually spent most of the week there. After all, I could prepare lectures anywhere and it was easier to work mainly from one office. This also meant that I spent most weekends working on university preparation and writing academic papers.

  After Mary had taught for three years, she was granted six months’ sabbatical leave in the first half of 1998. She travelled to the United States for a month to undertake immigration law work while I stayed at home with the children. Mary’s mum, Jacq, came up and stayed with us, which was an enormous help. In the second half of 1998, the then Chief Justice of the Federal Court of Australia launched Mary’s first solo-authored book, Immigration and Refugee Law in Australia. In 1998, the Beattie Labor government was elected in Queensland. The Minister for Industrial Relations decided to establish a taskforce to review the relevant Queensland legislation, and I was asked to be on the taskforce. The state’s labour laws reflected Queensland’s demographics and geography. Its labour legislation had separate laws governing several industries, so I had, for example, to familiarise myself with the ups and downs of the Queensland sugar industry. Our work eventually led to the enactment of the Queensland Industrial Relations Act 1999.

  In late 1999, the Kennett government in Victoria was defeated and the Bracks Labor government came to power. It was decided something had to be done about the peculi
ar and complex labour law situation in that state, which was partly under federal jurisdiction. A taskforce to review the labour laws was established, and I was approached to be the independent Chair of this taskforce. This kept me rather busy from early May 2000, just after I ended my time working for Blake Dawson Waldron and resumed being a professor full-time, through to the end of August 2000. The taskforce held town hall meetings both in Melbourne and in rural Victoria.

  We put up a Fair Employment Bill to the Victorian parliament. It got through the lower house, but failed to pass the upper house. Eventually, in about 2004, the Victorian and federal governments reached an agreement to end what was a very complicated situation.

  While working on this taskforce, I was teaching twice weekly a class in evidence and labour law. I would fly down to Melbourne on Wednesday evening, do my taskforce work on Thursday and Friday and then fly home on the Friday evening. On some busy weeks, however, I would fly down to Melbourne on Monday evening, fly back to Sydney on the Tuesday evening, and then fly back down on the Wednesday evening and come home exhausted on Friday night.

  Professor Richard Mitchell from the University of Melbourne Law School was the main person behind the establishment in 1988 of the Australian Journal of Labour Law. In mid-2000 he suggested that he and I work together to form an Australian Labour Law Association (ALLA) that could be affiliated with the International Society for Labour and Social Security Law. As I was well known in both Victoria and New South Wales, he thought that it would make sense for me to be the President and for him to serve as Vice-President.

  Through the efforts of a number of dedicated labour lawyers, ALLA was founded in 2001. I served as President for the next eight years. Our inaugural conference was held at the University of Melbourne Law School. In 2002 Richard and I travelled to Stockholm and successfully sought affiliation with the International Society.

  In September 2000, just after my Victorian taskforce work had been completed, Sydney hosted the Olympic Games. The senior Sydney Children’s Choir sang at the opening. As Daniel was a member of this choir, he participated in that marvellous and unforgettable opening ceremony, watched from the stands by his proud mum.

  In mid-May 2002, a colleague who was a member of our Faculty’s Deanship selection committee came to see me. She explained that the committee had short-listed several possible candidates for the next Dean of the University of Sydney Law School, and it wished me to apply and be short-listed along with the others.

  I was quite surprised, because I hadn’t thought of anything higher up the ladder than where I was. However, I appreciated that if the committee was asking me to become a candidate, my chances might be reasonably good. Mary and I discussed this development and we agreed that I had nothing to lose by putting my name forward.

  My interview for the Deanship took place on Friday, 31 May on the main campus, which was in another part of Sydney. My interview was set for around midday. It was very short and, before I knew it, I was hustled from the room. I remember thinking, ‘Well, at least I got to the interview stage.’ I went straight home to our house and met Mary there for lunch. I must have been a little disappointed by the brevity of the interview because I walked into the kitchen and poured myself a scotch, which was an almost unheard of thing for me to do at lunchtime.

  I was very surprised when on the following Monday, the Vice-Chancellor telephoned me at the Law School to offer me the job and ask if he could put my name up to the University Senate that evening. As Mary and I had previously discussed all of this, I said yes. My voice was quavering. I intimated that I was a little surprised, because my interview had been brief. The Vice-Chancellor responded that lawyers really do talk a lot, and that he and his colleagues had simply wanted to go to lunch.

  I immediately found Mary, and we hugged one another. She went home on the train to cook dinner for the children while I got ready to take my 6 p.m. postgraduate class in workplace safety law. I must say that I was in a bit of a dither and found it hard to concentrate, but the class went pretty well. I took a cab home, where I chatted to the children and then phoned Mary’s parents and Lois. I felt pretty much the same as I had when the Dean had offered me a professorship at the University of Sydney. I don’t think I slept much that night.

  It is unusual for persons with disabilities to become leaders of significant public sector or private sector institutions. After all, until relatively recently we have not had opportunities for education and advancement. However, the University of Sydney School of Law, which is one of Australia’s oldest law schools, was open to promoting persons with disabilities to its Deanship. The first Dean of Law with disabilities was the late Professor David Benjafield, who was born in 1919 and passed away in 1980. At the age of fifteen, David contracted poliomyelitis, which confined him to a wheelchair for the rest of his life.

  On 1 July 2002, I found myself the second person with disabilities to be the Dean of the University of Sydney Law School. I held this position for just over five years. I believe I am correct in writing that this Deanship meant that I was the first totally blind person to be appointed to such a position in any faculty in any Australian or New Zealand university.

  I continued to teach during the five years of my Deanship because I love teaching, and also because I regard teaching as central to the academic profession. In fact, undertaking lectures and the writing of labour law articles kept me sober and sane during my decanal years.

  The graduation ceremony for students represents the culmination of their hard work as they come up to the stage of the Great Hall at the University of Sydney to receive their degree or diploma. It is the custom that the Deans of the various faculties stand at a lectern and read out the names of the graduating students as they go up to the Chancellor or Vice-Chancellor to receive their degree or diploma. It was suggested to me that, if it would be easier, I could delegate this task to one of the Pro-Deans. However, I wanted to read out the names from braille, and Mary strongly backed me up. The names came on a list from the people organising the graduations, so I simply brailled out the entire list.

  I clearly remember my first graduation ceremony in November 2002. There I was in my robes with the spring air wafting through the Great Hall. I had practised reading out the list of names to Mary the night before, and Florence Ma, who was the Faculty Manager, had coached me on the pronunciation of Asian names. I think I went pretty well, though some of the Sri Lankan and Thai names were a bit of a challenge. It was important to me to show that a blind person could use braille to fully participate as a Dean at these important public ceremonies.

  The JAWS—Job Access With Speech—computer reading program is a sophisticated application that allows me to do virtually anything that a sighted computer user can do, from reading to sending emails and obtaining material from the internet.

  I guess that 75 per cent of my decanal correspondence was via email. Using JAWS, it could all be read back to me via synthetic speech. My good memory, which I had built up over the first fifty years of my life, also stood me in good stead because I could remember most of the email and postal correspondence that came across my desk.

  Even with adaptive technology, I still found reading Excel spreadsheets quite difficult. On many occasions Florence Ma meticulously went over every balance sheet with me, stopping every now and then to be sure that I understood every figure and its relationship to the spreadsheet tables. The person in charge of faculty finances, Tony Cousins, also patiently instructed me in the financial ways of the University of Sydney.

  On occasion, some colleagues would play what I called ‘email trench warfare’ against me. Sometimes these emails were demanding and impolite. People would write things in emails that they would never say face to face. I imagined colleagues sitting at their desks and pretending they were at gun emplacements as they composed their email missiles. I soon learned a number of coping mechanisms.

  First, unless the matter was urgent, I tried not to respond to a carping email for at least twenty-fo
ur hours. I found that if I immediately responded, it was a bit like volleying a tennis ball at the net—within a few seconds, another impolite email would come bouncing back to me.

  Second, even where an officious email made me somewhat vexed, I always wrote scrupulously polite emails in response. My rule of thumb was, ‘Would my email embarrass me or my family if it was printed on the front page of the Sydney Morning Herald?’

  Third, I usually did not respond to emails that were not addressed to me, but which had been simply cc-ed to me. Finally, where possible, I either phoned colleagues or saw them in their office.

  I remember asking a colleague to meet to discuss a matter. The colleague said that he preferred emails so he could copy in other academics and my intransigence could be seen by the entire group. I explained that, after we had met, he could summarise our meeting in an email and copy this summary to his friends. We met and settled the matter in three minutes of calm conversation.

  The Deans of Law and of Medicine of the University of Sydney hold significant positions with high public profiles. However, the reality is that while the Dean is the head of the university faculty, their power is rather limited. For example, I only possessed the power to direct staff to teach certain subjects. If it was necessary to discipline or to terminate a member of staff, that was a matter for senior staff located in the university’s central administration. While I had responsibility for the budget of the Faculty, there was little room to manoeuvre because I had to conform to the directives and policies of the Vice-Chancellor and of their senior delegates.