Fuller & Anor v Lawrence [2024] HCATrans 62 (10 September 2024)

Last Updated: 11 September 2024

[2024] HCATrans 062

IN THE HIGH COURT OF AUSTRALIA

Office of the Registry
Brisbane No B24 of 2024

B e t w e e n -

BIANCA FULLER

First Appellant

CHIEF EXECUTIVE OF QUEENSLAND CORRECTIVE SERVICES

Second Appellant

and

MARK LAWRENCE

Respondent

GAGELER CJ
GORDON J
EDELMAN J
GLEESON J
BEECH‑JONES J

TRANSCRIPT OF PROCEEDINGS

AT HOBART ON TUESDAY, 10 SEPTEMBER 2024, AT 10.00 AM

Copyright in the High Court of Australia
MR A.D. SCOTT, KC: May the Court please, I appear with MR P.K. O’HIGGINS, KC on behalf of the appellants. (instructed by Crown Law (Qld))

MR M. BLACK: May it please the Court, I appear with MS R.H. BERRY for the respondent. (instructed by Suncoast Community Legal Service)

GAGELER CJ: Thank you, Mr Black. Mr Scott.

MR SCOTT: Thank you, your Honours. As all of your Honours will appreciate, the question in this appeal concerns the application of the second limb of the test identified by the plurality in Griffith University v Tang. For your Honours’ reference, that test appears at volume 3 of the authorities bundles, page 440, and there appears at page 130 of the Commonwealth Law Report paragraph 89, where the plurality identified the two qualities that must exist for a decision to be a decision made under an enactment within the meaning of the Judicial Review Act 1991 (Qld) so as to give it the character of a decision to which that Act applies, and amenable to an application for statutory order of review under that Act. The second limb, which appears there in that paragraph, is that:

the decision must itself confer, alter or otherwise affect legal rights or obligations –

The decision in question in this case to which this question relates is the direction given by the corrective services officer. Your Honours can find that if you wish in the appellants’ book of further materials at page 28.

Your Honours will see if you have it there an instrument purporting to be a reasonable direction given to the respondent dated November 2022, and the words conveying the direction appear just below the middle of the page under the words “you are hereby directed”. Whilst the terms of the direction are relatively inelegantly drafted, it is common ground that what it required was that the respondent not have in‑person contact with the person named in it.

GAGELER CJ: Do you accept that the making of that direction was a decision reviewable for jurisdictional error?

MR SCOTT: Yes, your Honour, we do, because of course it would be – the obligation to comply with the direction depends upon it being within the meaning of the supervision order, and if it is outside the ambit of the supervision order, then it is outside the ambit of the Act.

BEECH-JONES J: But it is also outside, contrary to section 16C.

MR SCOTT: Yes, your Honour.

BEECH-JONES J: So, you accept that it would be reviewable by a court – not by the court that made the supervision order, but in a separate proceeding seeking to quash it.

MR SCOTT: That is where we take issue, as your Honours will appreciate from our submissions. Our fundamental argument is an order quashing the direction would be of no effect because the legal consequences come entirely from the supervision order and not from the decision itself.

GLEESON J: But you do say that a declaration could be sought as to the validity of the direction?

MR SCOTT: Yes, your Honour.

GLEESON J: So, you are not saying that there is no matter as to that question.

MR SCOTT: That is right. The matter would be about the ambit of the order and whether or not the direction is within the meaning – or the ambit of the order.

BEECH-JONES J: Just on what you said a minute ago, immediately before this direction, if the respondent had in‑person contact with the person named, they would not be committing an offence under – is it 44A of the Act?

MR SCOTT: Yes, your Honour.

BEECH-JONES J: But afterwards, they would be.

MR SCOTT: Yes.

BEECH-JONES J: Why could that direction having that effect not be quashed by, effectively, certiorari?

MR SCOTT: Well, perhaps if I could take your Honour to the ‑ ‑ ‑

BEECH-JONES J: I do not want to take you off your argument – sorry.

MR SCOTT: Your Honour has identified the critical issue. I accept that is the critical issue, and I need to address that. So, in order to do that, can I start with the terms of the supervision order, which also appears in the book of further materials, commencing on page 16. Your Honours should have there a supervision order made by the Supreme Court of Queensland dated 16 April 2020. Can I just identify a couple of features of it. The first is, if your Honours go to about the middle of the page, the words:

THE COURT ORDERS THAT Mark Richard Lawrence be released from prison and must follow the rules in this supervision order for –

a period ending on 16 April 2040. The relevant requirement of the supervision order is on the next page, under the heading “Supervision”, paragraph 6. In fact, this paragraph 6 actually embodies about three of the mandatory requirements required under section 16(1) of the Dangerous Prisoners Act.

GORDON J: Could I just ask, are you going to take us to the relevant provisions of the Act and marry it up to this order at some point?

MR SCOTT: Yes, your Honour.

GORDON J: Thank you.

MR SCOTT: I was intending to do that. In fact, it might assist if your Honours have the Act in front of you as I do this. The Act appears in volume 1 of the authorities book, commencing at page 10. At page 28 of the authorities book is section 16 of the Act. If your Honours have that, paragraph 4 relates to section 16(1)(a) of the Act; paragraph 5, section 16(1)(b); paragraph 6 is a combination of a number of the mandatory requirements. So, the first sentence, that:

A Corrective Services officer will supervise you until this order is finished.

relates to the requirement under section 16(1)(d). Below that, subparagraphs (a) through to (c), that is where the prisoner is allowed to live and the other things in those subparagraphs, they relate to the requirement provided by section 16(1)(daa). Subparagraphs (d) and (e) are the requirements relevant to this direction; they are required by section 16(1)(db).

Then, if your Honours go over to page 21, paragraph 31 relates to the requirement provided by section 16(1)(e). Paragraphs 32 and 33, those requirements relate to the requirement provided by section 16(1)(da). Paragraph 27, that is the requirement required by section 16(1)(f).

GORDON J: Thank you very much.

MR SCOTT: Thank you, your Honour. If I could go back to paragraph 6, what that requires of the prisoner relevantly to the direction is that the prisoner:

must obey any reasonable direction –

given to the prisoner of particular kinds – and as I said earlier, the relevant kinds are those provided by subparagraphs (d) and (e). Immediately below subparagraph (e), there is a definition of a “reasonable direction” which, we would submit, conforms with the ordinary meaning of the phrase “reasonable direction” – that is, it is an instruction about what the prisoner:

must do, or . . . must not do, that is reasonable in that situation.

To take up your Honour’s point earlier about whether or not a quashing order would address, for example, a non‑compliance with section 16C, the difficulty, we submit, with such a quashing order is that the legal consequence of this requirement is defined to operate by reference to an Act, which is the instruction, and a quashing order cannot reverse or rewrite history and reverse the historical fact of that instruction having been given, nor could it remove the objective circumstance that it is or is not reasonable in the situation.

GAGELER CJ: Can I just ask about what is common ground here. For the purpose of the appeal to this Court, I think you accept that the source of power for a corrective services officer to make a direction is section 16(1)(db) of the Act.

MR SCOTT: Yes, your Honour.

GAGELER CJ: And you accept that section 16C sets out a condition precedent to the exercise of that power.

MR SCOTT: Yes. But can I address directly, your Honour, what is the effect of section 16C on the respondent’s obligations on our case. That is, it is a constraint upon the power of the Supreme Court of Queensland to require a prisoner to comply with a direction. That is, it cannot require the prisoner to comply with a direction if the requirement is inconsistent with section 16C.

GAGELER CJ: Is the power conferred by section 16(1)(db) conditioned by a requirement of procedural fairness?

MR SCOTT: Your Honour, that is an interesting question. Arguably not, when the provisions are considered, which depended upon the reasonableness of the direction. On one view, if the direction is given and it is reasonable in the relevant sense, regardless of whether or not procedural fairness is afforded, then the effect of the Supreme Court order is to require complainant with the direction.

GAGELER CJ: You accept that you need to have a valid direction under section 16(1)(db) in order to engage with the supervision order?

MR SCOTT: Yes, your Honour. But validity, we would submit, in this sense means a direction that is required by the order within its terms.

GAGELER CJ: I am talking about the statute. You accept that the statute is the source of the power to make the direction?

MR SCOTT: Yes, your Honour. I accept that it is the source of the power to make the direction, but the force of the obligation to comply with it comes from the order.

BEECH‑JONES J: In answer to the question you just gave, are you saying that, even if another court determined that a particular direction was contrary to section 16C, you say the person would still be in breach of order 6?

MR SCOTT: No, your Honour, because if the order is made in accordance with the Act, then it will only require compliance with a direction in a way that is consistent with section 16C. So, the reason why the prisoner will not be obliged to comply with the direction, and could get a declaration that the requirement of the order does not require compliance with the direction is because it is not within the ambit of the order.

BEECH‑JONES J: Because that is to be read as a valid direction?

MR SCOTT: Yes.

BEECH‑JONES J: All right.

MR SCOTT: I am conscious, your Honour, that “validity” can be an ambiguous term in administrative law, so I would submit that the question is whether or not it is a direction within the meaning of the order, which would only require a direction to be complied with if it complies with section 16C.

EDELMAN J: If it does not comply with 16C, it is null and void. How is that any different from any other administrative act to which certiorari is directed?

MR SCOTT: Well, the difference is that it is not from the force of the direction itself that there is any obligation to comply, it is from the force of the order, because it is the order that requires ‑ ‑ ‑

EDELMAN J: One could say that with every piece of delegated legislation, the delegated legislation gets its force from a primary statute.

MR SCOTT: I suppose that is right, your Honour, but there is no provision of the Dangerous Prisoners Act that imposes a consequence directly for noncompliance with a direction. The force of the obligation, we submit, is from the provisions that make contravention of a requirement of the order. It gives rise to legal consequences by reference to that event.

BEECH‑JONES J: And with contravening the order, if you contravene it, are you liable to punishment for contempt?

MR SCOTT: Probably not, because on one view, the scheme of the Act is comprehensive in terms of providing for the consequences of noncompliance, such as section 44A, the offence provision, and then also the provisions that are triggered in the event of an actual or prospective contravention, starting with section 20.

BEECH‑JONES J: So, the Act is what gives the order force.

MR SCOTT: Yes, that is true. But the way we frame it, your Honours, is simply this: if there is a quashing order which – of course, quashing orders are available at common law by way of certiorari or under the Judicial Review Act under section 30. The first type of order that can be granted by the Supreme Court is:

an order quashing or setting aside the decision –

What that does is it removes the legal consequence of the decision. In other words, the decision must, itself, have force apart from the supervision order, and our fundamental argument is, on the face of the order ‑ ‑ ‑

EDELMAN J: I think that is fundamentally contrary to notions that a quashing order operates on something which, almost by definition, had no force. The quashing order does not quash in futuro, the quashing order is recognising that the particular administrative or executive act never had any force from the start.

MR SCOTT: Yes, your Honour.

GAGELER CJ: And, independently of a quashing order, if there is noncompliance, for example, with section 16C, the validity of the direction can be collaterally challenged in any proceeding where it arises, can it not?

MR SCOTT: Unquestionably. Yes, your Honour. Our case rests on the proposition that it could be collaterally challenged, as your Honour Chief Justice Gageler has identified, and it could also be attacked by way of a declaration. But the matter in ‑ ‑ ‑

GAGELER CJ: But not certiorari?

MR SCOTT: Not certiorari.

GAGELER CJ: Why?

MR SCOTT: Well, based on the proposition – which may not be right, as it turns out – that, as we apprehend the principles relating to certiorari to operate, they are – perhaps if I can identify the authority that I am referring to.

GAGELER CJ: I think your opponent refers to Wingfoot.

EDELMAN J: There is an interesting jurisprudential puzzle as to what a quashing order really is quashing if something had no force and effect right from the start. But it seems that that has always been the law, that once the quashing order is recognised, it is not suggested that the act was valid right up until the point in time of the quashing order.

MR SCOTT: Yes, your Honour, I appreciate that. The distinction I am seeking to draw is between the historical fact of a direction having been given, which a quashing order does not remove, and the legal effect or the legal consequence of the decision. Our argument simply is that the legal consequence of the decision comes from the Supreme Court order which stands regardless of an order quashing the decision.

BEECH-JONES J: One legal consequence of the decision comes from the combination of the order and 43AA. If there was no 43AA and all you had was a court order, then you might be in the area of saying, well, it is all within the province of the court that made the original order. But 43AA is a statutory provision that means the direction had a legal force above and beyond the mere fact of a court order, did it not?

MR SCOTT: Well, perhaps if I go to 43AA. The section appears at page 51 of the authorities book, volume 1. The act or omission that is defined by that section in subsection (1) is a contravention of the order. So, the question in a proceeding alleging an offence against that section, we would submit, remains a proceeding involving the question of the ambit of the order.

BEECH-JONES J: But, in this case, the ambit of the order would be only operating on a valid direction, would it not?

MR SCOTT: Well, the one thing we could say in response to that, your Honour, is if that is right, the existence of an obligation imposed by a final order of the Supreme Court of Queensland is contingent upon the subsequent exercise of administrative power, which would seem inconsistent, we would submit, with the finality of the order, because the obligation that is created by the order is contingent.

GLEESON J: “Relevant order” is defined to mean:

the supervision order or interim supervision order –

MR SCOTT: Yes, your Honour, thank you. Can I just take your Honours to a couple of other features of the Act to support this point which we make. The ultimate point is that we submit a quashing order could not operate inconsistently with the effect of a supervision order or take away the effect of a requirement that the prisoner comply with the direction. The first of those provisions is section 15 of the Act, which appears at page 27 of the authorities bundle. The simple point we make about that is it makes clear that the order has effect from either the date it is made or the prisoner’s release day for the duration of the period stated in the order.

The next provision I wish to take the Court to is section 19 of the Act, which provides for a grant of jurisdiction to amend a supervision order. Relevantly, here is subsection (4), which prohibits an amendment that would take away one of the mandatory requirements, including the relevant requirement that we are discussing.

BEECH-JONES J: I am not sure I understand this. A quashing order that quashed a direction would not affect the terms of the supervision order, it would just quash a direction made under one of the orders?

MR SCOTT: Yes. This presupposes our point that the quashing order is inconsistent with the supervision order on the basis that the supervision order is not subject to a subsequent exercise of administrative power in terms of the existence of the obligations that it provides for.

GAGELER CJ: If section 16(1)(db) is the source of power for a corrective services officer to make a lawful direction, then the supervision order itself, as governed by section 16(1), can only be referring to a direction that meets the requirements of section 16(1)(db) and section 16C. Correct? It is not freestanding.

MR SCOTT: I beg your pardon, your Honour?

GAGELER CJ: The power to make the supervision order is not freestanding, it is a power to make an order that permits a direction lawfully given by a corrective services officer to have certain effect.

MR SCOTT: Yes, your Honour, you are right. I do not want to unnecessarily and unhelpfully repeat what I have said. Our point is simply that the effect of that direction does not depend on the authority granted to the corrective services officer, it depends on the supervision order, which is a final order of the court which imposes the obligation on the prisoner to comply with the direction. To the extent that there are criteria, such as section 16C, that the Act provides that a direction must comply with, those have relevance to the prisoner’s rights and obligations because of the effect of the order. Your Honour, I do not think I can take that any further.

EDELMAN J: I think in one of your earlier answers, before I interrupted you, you were about to go to Wingfoot. Was that to support this proposition?

MR SCOTT: Yes, your Honour.

EDELMAN J: If you wish to go to it, you can go to it at any stage that suits you. I think that is sitting there in the background.

MR SCOTT: Yes, your Honour. Can I do that? Wingfoot, your Honours, appears at volume 4 of the authorities book, page 910 – sorry, the start of the case begins at page 898, but the proposition that I rely upon is at page 910 of the authorities book.

GORDON J: What paragraph is that, please?

MR SCOTT: Paragraph 25, your Honour.

GORDON J: Thank you.

MR SCOTT: What we rely particularly on is the first sentence of that paragraph, which is that:

The function of an order in the nature of certiorari is to remove the legal consequences or purported legal consequences of an exercise or purported exercise of power.

Our fundamental point is that the legal consequences do not, in any sense, come from the direction, they come from the final order of a Chapter III court.

GORDON J: Can I just ask one aspect about that. I had understood, in your submissions at paragraph 30, that you accepted that the direction itself changed rights.

MR SCOTT: We accepted that, following the direction, there was an impact on the respondent’s liberty, but our fundamental case is that that is by force of the supervision order, not the direction.

GORDON J: That is my point. My point is that I had understood that you had accepted that the direction itself changed rights, and if that is right, then it did have legal consequences, and I found those two arguments to at least have some tension between them. Is your answer to that, no, the supervision order is the source of the effect of them and, in effect, the direction is just the consequence of the exercise of that power? Is that the way it is put?

MR SCOTT: That is our case, your Honour.

GORDON J: Thank you very much.

MR SCOTT: No worries. It is perhaps also of assistance to go to the Australian Education Union Case, which is at volume 3 of the authorities book, and commences at page 214. I may be stating the obvious, your Honours, and I apologise if I am, but we particularly rely upon the principle that appears on page 237 of the authorities book, paragraph 46.

GORDON J: What is the proposition you want us to take from 46?

MR SCOTT: There is a distinction between a decision which has itself legal consequences that renders it amenable to a quashing order and the historical fact of that decision having occurred. It is here, we submit, that a quashing order will not remove the historical fact that a direction has been given or that it is or is not reasonable in the sense provided by the supervision order, which includes that it must comply with section 16C.

GORDON J: Thank you.

MR SCOTT: Thank you, your Honour. That is why we say a quashing order would be of no effect. Your Honours, in a sense, I have actually covered all the ground that I had intended to cover.

GAGELER CJ: Yes. In relation to the passage in Tang that you found your argument on, do you read the second requirement for a decision under an enactment, when it refers to that:

the decision must itself confer, alter or otherwise affect legal rights –

you say it must alone, do you? You read “itself” as meaning “alone”?

MR SCOTT: Not quite, your Honour. Having reflected on what – and I take it what your Honour is referring to is that passage in Justice Morrison’s judgment, critiquing our approach to the word “itself”, we have to accept that an effect on rights might be by force of a combination of more than one exercise of power. A good example of that is, of course, the decision in Australian Broadcasting Tribunal v Bond, where the particular finding that the person was a fit and proper person was a condition precedent to a substantive exercise of power. We have to accept that that is all true, but what we submit the word “itself” means is that the decision must itself have some effect on rights in the sense that it provides, in some sense, or to some extent, for the legal consequences that flow.

GAGELER CJ: Is it a “but for” test?

MR SCOTT: I beg your pardon.

GAGELER CJ: Is it a “but for” test?

MR SCOTT: Well, perhaps not if one accepts that it can be a combination of more than one exercise of power. The best answer we can give is to consider what would happen if a quashing order were made and if the quashing order would not remove the legal consequence of the decision, for example for the reasons that we articulate and submit, then it does not itself have the relevant effect.

GAGELER CJ: Sorry, could you say that again?

MR SCOTT: If a quashing order does not remove the legal consequence of the decision for the reasons we articulate, then it would not itself have the relevant effect on rights. Does that answer your Honour’s question?

GORDON J: Can I ask two aspects about that second limb which is in your outline at paragraphs 8, 9 and 10. Are we to read paragraph 8 as amending what you say in your submissions at paragraph 23 about “itself, and only itself”? I just want to make sure I understand your answer to the Chief Justice.

MR SCOTT: I will just bring that up, your Honour.

GORDON J: Certainly.

MR SCOTT: Paragraph 8 of our primary submissions, your Honour?

GORDON J: Paragraph 8 of your outline does not use the language “itself, and only itself” that you had used in your written submissions at paragraph 23. I just want to make sure that I understand that we are now to read the submission you have put in the way you have answered the Chief Justice.

GAGELER CJ: In other words, you have modified your position from that as stated in your written submissions.

MR SCOTT: Yes, I think that is right, your Honour.

GORDON J: Thank you. The second question is in relation to paragraph 10 of your outline. Is what you just put to Chief Justice Gageler in a sense that that is that outline of argument at paragraph 10 – about the intersection about the second limb itself, the source of the power and the rights of review?

MR SCOTT: Yes, your Honour.

GORDON J: Thank you.

MR SCOTT: Is there anything I can assist your Honours with?

GAGELER CJ: No. Thank you, Mr Scott. Mr Black.

MR BLACK: Your Honours, the respondent’s case in a nutshell is that we begin with what seems to be common ground in relation to two points. First, the instruction contained in the direction did have an impact on the respondent’s rights, and second ‑ ‑ ‑

EDELMAN J: Purported to have an impact on the respondent’s rights.

MR BLACK: Yes, at least purported to do so – and second that the direction was a decision authorised by the relevant Act. From there, the main proposition that we put is that what makes that instruction in the direction one with which the respondent must comply is its legal character as a direction within the meaning of section 16(1)(db) and section 16C of the Act, because that is the type of direction that supervision order is referring to.

Your Honours have already been taken to the supervision order. What we say about is simply that when it refers to a “reasonable direction”, it must be understood as referring to a direction that has been lawfully or validly given within 16 and 16C of the Act. Section 16C, in particular – if I could take the Court back to that provision, it is in the joint book of authorities at page 31 – contains an important condition or threshold for the exercise of this power, because a corrective services officer may give a direction mentioned in section 16(1)(db) only if the reasonable belief described in this provision is formed.

That reasonable belief is about the direction being necessary for a stated purpose. So, the legislature has adopted a particular threshold, and when that threshold is met and the direction is given, we say it is more than just a mere historical fact, we say it is an administrative act that has a legal character, a legal effect; it becomes a direction that was authorised by this Act.

EDELMAN J: The jurisdictional fact of reasonable belief in section 16C is separate from the jurisdictional fact of a reasonable direction in 16(1)(db), is it?

MR BLACK: Yes.

GORDON J: Is another way of putting that that a supervision order must contain a requirement that the prisoner comply with the reasonable direction? In other words, it is a prerequisite for the supervision order itself – itself requires this element to be there – and then one has the exercise of the power in circumstances when it is “necessary”.

MR BLACK: Yes. So, we say – I am repeating myself, but when the corrective services officer gives the direction, that direction is picked up by the supervision order only if it is validly given through the threshold in the Act. That is the legal consequence that could be quashed, we say, by a writ of certiorari, and that is the legal consequence, we say, that the direction itself has.

EDELMAN J: I realise all the authorities in this Court talk about the quashing of legal consequences, but one difficulty is that if the administrative act was void because it did not comply with a jurisdictional fact or some other reason, what legal consequence is there, and what actually is there that is being quashed?

MR BLACK: Your Honour, I did try to explore this, and the best that I can put is the language that is in the passage in Wingfoot that my learned friend took the Court to.

EDELMAN J: Well, that has a bit both ways. It talks about quashing the effect or purported effect.

MR BLACK: Yes, and that seems to be – at least, what has been assumed in the various authorities – that if a decision has a purported legal effect, so here as direction that purports to be validly given under the relevant provisions of the Act that, even if it was not validly given, that purported legal effect is what the order quashes and communicates to the world, so to speak, that this was not a valid decision. It is that link between what the order requires and what the Act governs that establishes, in my submission, that this is a decision under enactment within that second criterion in Tang, and that is that the direction is effective or is, as I said earlier, picked up by the supervision order, not by way of its description as an objectively reasonable direction alone, but by way of its satisfying those legal tests in 16(1)(db) and 16C.

Your Honours, that is really the nub of the respondent’s argument. We have addressed in some detail Griffith University v Tang in the written submissions but, given the way that the argument has developed, I was not intending to revisit any of that unless there were particular elements of that which might assist. Ultimately, we say this is a straightforward case of really construing what does the order operate on, and if it operates only on valid decisions under the Act, then in my submission, that is the sufficient link in terms of the decision affecting the respondent’s rights for Tang’s purposes.

GAGELER CJ: Thank you, Mr Black.

MR BLACK: Thank you, your Honours.

GAGELER CJ: Mr Scott, do you have anything in reply?

MR SCOTT: Your Honours, I just have two points in reply. Firstly, to address the question your Honour Justice Edelman asked my learned friend about how to reconcile the authorities about certiorari quashing legal consequences if the premise of the order is that there is no effect. There is a particular dimension to your Honour’s question as it applies to the Judicial Review Act (Qld), and that is – and I apologise, section 20, which contains the grounds of judicial review under the Judicial Review Act, is not before your Honours, but what would be noticed is that that section does not necessarily require the demonstration of jurisdictional error in order for grounds of judicial review for a statutory order of review application to be established. So, that might be relevant to your Honour’s question.

The only other point I wish to make is with respect to the question that was asked about whether or not section 16C provides a different
jurisdictional fact. That is, the state of mind, the belief of the corrective services officer to the requirement in section 16 for the direction to be reasonable. The way we construe section 16C is that does not actually provide for a different jurisdictional fact. In fact, what it does is defines what is a reasonable direction. That is, a direction is reasonable if it meets the qualities described in section 16C.

Those are our submissions in reply, your Honours.

GAGELER CJ: Thank you very much, Mr Scott. The Court will consider its decision in this matter and will adjourn until 10.00 am tomorrow.

AT 10.47 AM THE MATTER WAS ADJOURNED