EDITOR'S OPINION Jason MacLaurin SC Editor, Brief | Barrister, Francis Burt Chambers
Brief’s February edition customarily commences with hopes everyone is celebrating a great new year, and enjoyed a restful holiday season. It does so again, even though resting in one’s home is now sometimes mandatory, and January has not exactly covered itself in glory and shows that, just because something is new and seemingly replaces an out of control wild disaster, does not necessarily mean it is better (see Sammy Hagar replacing David Lee Roth as Van Halen’s front man). Brief readers treasure the rule of law and natural justice, so it is unfair to condemn 2021 this early. It is fair to say, however, that if January was going to show that 2021 was going to be so much a better host than 2020, it has already burnt the (45-minute late) entrees, isn’t allowing anyone to check up on the score in the big game, has Cher performing Ed Sheeran’s unreleased unplugged gems as mood music, and has run out of ice for the fruity lexia cask wine. There are so many unanswered questions for readers in these difficult times: what does the year have in store, and what is the next existential threat? Should I be plunging all my money into heavily shorted stock just to teach the hedge funds a lesson? And why am I watching and also recording “Holey Moley”? The warning signs for 2021 were arguably always there, in that it seems to be one year that even the Mayans didn’t predict the world would end – and they are prolific in their wild guesses, being the ancient masters of the “No? OK, best out 3, no? best out of 5, no? best out of 2867…”. The 2nd of February is a marquee day for one beloved prognosticator, the groundhog “Punxsutawney Phil” of Gobblers Knob, Pennsylvania - a figure brought to prominence in the fantastic 1993 Bill Murray film “Groundhog Day” (guess who has been spending lockdown watching old and free streaming movies)? To those unfamiliar with the traditional annual ceremony, if the groundhog emerges from its lair and sees its shadow, there will be 6 more weeks of COVID-19 lockdown winter. To those unfamiliar with the movie, it is, on its face, a 90’s rom-com, but is regarded by some as a profound meditation upon “eternal recurrence” as (very differently) viewed by Nietzsche and in Buddhism, and also upon existential will and
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self actualisation, with hat tips to Camus’ Myth of Sisyphus.1 Others simply enjoy seeing Murray and Andie McDowell finally getting together, which seems more fulfilling than, say, Hugh Grant and McDowell at the end of Four Weddings and a Funeral, though of course everyone was barracking unconditionally for Grant over Alec Baldwin with Julia Roberts in Notting Hill (the effect of the shutdown on the Editor seems to be more and more obvious). Groundhog Day is a Dutch tradition, and, early on in Pennsylvania it also had a darker side, in that the groundhog was likely eaten. According to the members of the swish 1880’s Pennsylvanian lodge at the time, groundhog tasted, rather predictably and unsurprisingly like “a combination of chicken and pork”2 (just like, it seems, any other unconventional meat one should think twice about consuming). Unfortunately, Punxsutawney Phil’s predictive strike rate is somewhat sketchy, coming in at under 40%, which is below the more impressive rate of his cross-state and much hated rival “Staten Island Chuck” but wildly above that of the Editor’s stockbroker. There has been much buzz about this Reddit/GameStop trading frenzy where ordinary folk can apparently make huge amounts of money off the hedge funds through buying obviously over-shorted stock, driving up the price and ruining the positon of the hedge funds. Or at least that seems to be what it is all about. This sort of thing is so confusing that one has to have recourse to the end of Trading Places to try to explain it all, but even that gets very confusing, and it is unclear whether Dan Ackroyd and Eddie Murphy ended up doing things as ethically questionable as the Duke brothers. Of course, a more comprehensive explanation might have been gleaned from “The Big Short” or “Wall Street” but not only did they carry a purchase or rental charge, but also didn’t have the great Denholm Eliott and Jamie Lee Curtis in them. 100 years ago an astonishing prognostication was made during a speech in Federal Parliament by Walter Marks, who predicted that Armageddon would be fought in 1934, leading to the Second Coming. The Biblical battle would be precipitated by Russia and Germany and “one other country I would rather not mention” combining to attack the British Empire 3, leading to the battle itself in
the Holy Land. Australia would have a role, predicted by the Biblical reference to the “merchants of Tarshish and their little lions”, the “little lions” being a reference to British colonies. While Marks wasn’t wrong about a World War breaking out in the 30’s, the speech at the time apparently interfered, for some reason, with his touted appointment as Secretary of the Navy. He was however appointed under-secretary to PM Billy Hughes4, who was seemingly hedging his bets, figuring if Marks did have such predictive powers, it was probably best, just in case, to have him close by. Details about what the speech related to are sketchy, though it may well have been the most spectacularly impassioned response ever to the Returned Soldiers’ Woollen Company Loan Act 1921. While the upcoming State election may not involve predictions of Armageddon, we are fortunate to have the Government and Opposition’s responses to the Society’s policy positions on a range of legal issues affecting the community and profession. And, with Parliament prorogued in December 2020, the Uniform Law application bills will have to be re-introduced at the next session of Parliament. Thomas Moorhead, Policy and Advocacy Lawyer at the Law Society, provides an insightful explanation and history of prorogation. This edition also includes Michael Douglas on “2020’s High Court Developments for the Law of Damages”, a great interview with Judge Mara Barone by the YLC, Brenda van Rensburg on the need for care with our digital footprint and steps to reduce brand damage, Information Commissioner Catherine Fletcher on Freedom of Information - from the Age of Enlightenment to the Digital Age and Beyond, and Tse Chee Loo of the Corruption and Crime Commission on the CCC’s beginnings, purpose and effectiveness. Hope you enjoy this jampacked edition! Endnotes 1 2 3 4
“Groundhog Day”, M Faust, philosophynow.org “The Original Groundhog Day Involved Eating the Groundhog” J Latson, 2/2/15, time.com "Armageddon". The Sydney Morning Herald. 4 November 1921. “Marks, Walter Moffitt (1875 - 1951)”. Australian Dictionary of Biography.
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