The Queensland chief justice, Tim Carmody, has been accused of dodging serious allegations in his first detailed response to a colleague’s criticism of his performance.
Carmody has written to legal bodies saying he would not “be bullied out of office” after a supreme court judge, Alan Wilson, criticised his leadership of the courts in a farewell ceremony speech last week.
As well as criticising Carmody’s work rate and legal ability, Wilson accused the chief justice of attempting to interfere with the process around a potential legal challenge to a crucial state election result.
Wilson said Carmody’s fellow judges had “unanimously” condemned his attempt to contest the automatic rostering of a judge “in the teeth of a possible contest” about Labor’s victory in the seat of Ferny Grove.
He said Carmody’s attempt to then speak to that judge in private, about what he said in a memorandum were “unresolved concerns”, was “rightly resisted” by the judge.
Wilson said the judges had also been united in their condemnation of his “shocking” sacking of the respected senior judge administrator John Byrne after a dispute over work schedules.
In a letter to the Queensland bar association and the state’s law society, Carmody said the suggestion he acted inappropriately in regards to the potential election dispute was “a gross and offensive slur on my professional integrity”.
Carmody said the practice of appointing judges to the court of disputed returns 12 months in advance was “convenient in most situations in most years but … must yield to the circumstances of the day”.
He said this practice would “not always” achieve its primary purpose of ensuring “the appearance of neutrality”.
“Before automatically following a practice or convention, I felt obliged by the words of the legislation to exercise my independent judgment … and ensure there was no impediment to hear any such disputed return,” Carmody said.
Carmody said Wilson’s criticism was “inappropriate” and followed “a coordinated and orchestrated campaign by senior or prominent members of the legal community to destabilise my discharge of the office of chief justice”.
“I have no intention of breaking my oath and vacating the office of chief justice.”
The vice president of the Queensland council for civil liberties, Terry O’Gorman, said Carmody had failed to properly address the substance of Wilson’s allegations regarding the court of disputed returns matter, or Byrne’s sacking, which he subsequently reversed.
O’Gorman called on Carmody to release all communication between him and his fellow supreme court judges in relation to both matters.
“it is not good enough for the chief justice to duck the issue by distributing to the legal profession which is full of self justification and rhetoric,” O’Gorman said.
O’Gorman also disputed Carmody’s statement that Wilson’s criticism amounted to “a character assessment”.
“It was a pointed and very serious allegation against the conduct of the chief justice to which the chief justice must respond, and must respond immediately and fully by releasing all correspondence on these issues.”
