Farewell Richard Ponting

The forthcoming retirement of the great Richard Ponting makes one remember the departures of the legends of my era, men like Ronald Oxenham, Albert Ernst Victor Hartkopf, Pud Thurlow, Affie Harwood Jarvis and his bitter enemy, Black Jack Blackham the Prince of Wicketkeepers. All great men and great servants to the game and I will be thinking of all of them as I watch Richard take guard for the final time.

Of those legends of days gone by, Blackham was, in many respects the most like Ponting. A magnificent fielder and a captain of a surprisingly nervous disposition, he led Australia to many crushing defeats against the old enemy, giving Ponting the inspiration to do the same many years later. He was also one of the last great cricketers to sport a thick bushranger beard throughout his career, a legacy from his early work as a bank clerk, where beardedness was seen as a private reassurance to customers in those straightened financial times. I had hoped Ponting was going to revive this lost art of grooming when he debuted in Perth with a carefully cultivated goatee beard, a promising start indeed, but over the years the bristles faded from view. A tragedy and probably the only disappointing aspect of Ponting’s legacy.

Another of my favourite cricketers of the days of yore is, of course, Ted a'Beckett. a’Beckett, like me was both a celebrated all-round sportsman and a man of the law. Ted certainly had my measure inside the pickets (although I troubled him more than a few times with my delicately flighted googlies), but on the boards of the district court I towelled him up so often he once told me he’d rather be facing that moustachioed demon Fred Spofforth than copping another Whitelocke broadside before a disapproving judiciary. That was all part of the game back then, soften them up with ad hominem verbal short balls then york them with some obscure and persuasive inswinging Canadian jurisprudence. Great memories!!

But memories, like those cricketing legends past, have faded into the pages of Wisden and soon will the deeds of the great R.T. Ponting. Farewell Richard, to me you will always be that incredible wunderkind, blessed with footwork and a hunger I have not seen in a Tasmanian since Alexander Pearce.

Book Extract: From Chaloner Chute to Sir Loveban Lislebone Long: A History of 16th and 17th Century Lawmen with Riotous Names

Sir Orlando Bridgeman (1606 –1674) 1st Baronet SL, English common law jurist, socialite, civil works advocate, crime fighter, lawyer, and beloved politician who sat in the House of Commons from 1640 to 1642.

Orlando Bridgeman (born Orlando Jones) was born shortly after the turn of the century into a wealthy family of highly regarded socialites and philanthropists. Tragically, as a child he witnessed his parents, John , Bishop of Chester, and Elizabeth , daughter of Reverend William Helyar, murdered at the hands of local brigands. Orlando narrowly escaped their gruesome fate by posing as an elderly female papist, before ultimately taking shelter under a bridge over the nearby River Douglas for 47 days and nights. Initially fearing the bridge, like a Bangladeshi batsman facing Shaoib Akhtar, he ultimately drew strength from his fear, then used his power over fear and his knowledge of bridges and their mysterious ways to his advantage. Re-emerging into society, he renamed himself Bridgeman, and dedicated his life to fighting for the causes his parents had so proudly supported.

Bridgeman fought many battles for the public good, most notably as a staunch Royalist in the English Civil War, his views a great source of comfort to myself, John, Tony and the other monarchist leaders during the dark days of Australia’s republican referendum period.

In April 1640, Bridgeman was elected Member of Parliament for Wigan in the Short Parliament. Despite widespread respect for his work as a wealthy vigilante, then, as now, the election in Wigan was dominated by concerns around Rugby League. Thankfully, Bridgeman’s platform, which was based around a desire to reduce teams from 45 players a side to the more exciting 38 a side format, was well received by an electorate starved of exciting football. Bridgeman spent time as an administrator of the Wigan Gentleman's Rugby League Football and Sandwich Commission before he was embroiled in a scandal over player payments exceeding the salary cap, which ultimately made his position untenable and led to an ignominious second rugby league life as a side-line commentator.

In 1642 he formed the “Ye Olde Justice League” with Lord Strange at Chester against the parliamentary forces of evil. “Lord Strange and Bridgeman” was later serialised into a popular comic strip in which they did battle against not only parliamentarians, but also characters many claim to be the earliest incarnations of Magneto and Dr Freeze. In time he received many honours, being knighted in 1643, acting as Custos Rotulorum of Cheshire, appointed Serjeant-at-Law, Lord Chief Baron of the Exchequer and Lord Keeper of the Great Seal. In the late 1980s he had a popular US basketball team named after him.
Aside from his more celebrated work as a crime fighter, Bridgeman was highly regarded in his time for his participation in the trial of the Regicides of King Charles I in 1660, a trial marked by the courage of those involved as they stood up for what was right by flip flopping back to the victors in a hysterical, grasping and unseemly attempt at self preservation. Bridgeman also devised complex legal instruments for the conveyance of land, instruments which have sadly fallen into disuse and which all of us who have waded through the simplistic nightmare that is Torrens System lament to this day.

Sadly, Bridgeman is credited with creating the Rule Against Perpetuities. The Rule Against Perpetuities is rightly considered a disaster, the first in a long line of intrusions by equitable concerns of "public policy" into contract law. When did it become against the public interest to draft contracts that ensure the remoteness of vesting? Beats me. At least he had the decency to take into account a period of gestation to cover a posthumous birth.

That one blemish aside, Bridgeman is rightly regarded as a great lawman of the 17th century and the only legal superhero who took his name from a vital piece of civic infrastructure.

Eden-Monaro Decides: An Open Letter to the People of Eden-Monaro

Citizens of Eden-Monaro,

Tomorrow is a very important day for our fledgling democracy. If you are anything like me, you will wake up at approximately 4am, have a glass of riesling then hunt local birdlife until dawn. It is two hours after this most symbolic of dawns, when polls open, that I ask you to write down my name. In that poll booth, whether in the Berridale Community Centre, the Cobargo school of Arts or the Queanbeyan District Hospital, you will have the choice to meekly continue down a path that leads us all to certain ruin, or to take a sharp right and boldly stride into a glorious new future.

Although you need no reminding, here are some of my many achievements which make me uniquely qualified to govern Eden-Monaro and which should help you make that brave and necessary decision:

i) I have received countless personal awards, including but not limited to the Knight of the Thistle, Order of the Companions of Honour, Knight of the Hutt River Province, 18 times Heraclitus Society man of the Year, The Leverhulme Medal for the application of Heraclitus to Chemistry, The Royal Guelphic Order, Knight Grand Commander of The Most Eminent Order of the Indian Empire, Kaisar-I-Hind Medal, Officer of the Order of Australia, Australian Antarctic Medal, Champion Shots Medal;

ii) I invented the after-dinner filibuster to avoid awkward conversations and masterminded the 1975 dismissal;

iii) I am close personal friends with German Chancellor Angela Merkel as well as cricket luminaries Sir Vivian Richards and Paul “Blocker” Wilson;

iv) I introduced both the Crown of Thorns Starfish and the European Carp into Australasian Waters;

v) I am, by some distance, the oldest candidate ever to run for the House of Representatives; and

vi) I have shot 3 Asiatic bears, 2 of which fatally.

But enough about me, tomorrow is about you and your future. I trust you will make the right decision.

My fondest wishes to you all,

Bullstrode Whitelocke K.C.
(by electronic transmission)

Bullstrode's Legal French Phrasebook: Dépeçage

Dépeçage means dismemberment, which is in turn derived from the verb dépecer, which means to carve up or to analyse in extraordinary detail.

This term is principally used in two (2) ways in a legal context:

1) As a description for every single oral and written submission every put by T Bullstrode Whitelocke KC. For example ‘Mr Whitelocke, I am not sure that a fourth day of surrejoinder is necessary for this directions hearing. To be frank, your ferocious depecage of the defendant’s proposed timetable, whilst showing admirable stamina, has left me longing for my 7oth birthday.’; and

2) To described the common law concept whereby different provisions within a single contract are expressed to be governed by different laws. I have used Dépeçage in this way extensively in all my drafting and find it leads to greatly enhanced outcomes for my clients.

I pioneered this concept when I drafted the ISDA standard documentation, which now regularly sees the ISDA Master Agreement governed by New York State Law while the credit support annexe is governed by English law.

After the success of this innovation I now use Dépeçage in all contracts as follows:

i) I typically use Allgemeines bürgerliches Gesetzbuch to govern my recitals;

ii) I have been known to rely on Scots Law to govern the operative provisions, except, of course, for any clauses relating to the doctrine of marshalling, which I ensure are governed by the Napoleonic Civil Code, Delaware Law or Halakha;

iii) I will use non-legal laws, such as the law of diminishing returns or the Hicks-Marshall laws of derived demand, in sensitive or confidential contractual provisions (for example, in a particularly cheeky move I employed when negotiating Eddie Maguire’s employment contract with Channel Nine, I provided for various provisions to be governed by the laws of gravity); and

iv) for all boiler plate clauses (including governing law provisions), I will only apply Papuan Customary law.

I have also been known to hand annotate standard form contracts, including dry cleaning tickets and the large poster displaying the terms and conditions for entry to my local car parking station, to ensure that the consumer friendly laws of the Cayman Islands apply at all times.

As you can imagine, this is yet another of my legal innovations which has greatly enhanced and simplified contract law for businesses in Australia.

How I Modernised Cricket

The incredible hype surrounding Australia’s Test Match against Pakistan at Lords this week (largely, I imagine, the result of the continued and rightful selection of prodigious run machine Marcus North) has reminded me of my own role in shaping the modern game of cricket.

While the actions of my old sparring partner Kerry Packer in establishing World Series Cricket to grab the television rights for his Nine Network at the expense of the Australian Broadcasting Corporation is the stuff of legend, my involvement in the game's tumult in the late 1970’s is not widely known.

Although it is a notorious fact that I am an authority on the game* many people do not realise that I acted for my close friends Allen Stanford and Ted Turner, who formed a rival consortium, Power Cricket America (PCA), which tried to sign the very same players to play in the “Pan-American Power Cricket League”. This would have given Turner’s CNN global rights to cricket and made me the most powerful man in the game, to the extent I wasn't already.

Unfortunately, Packer’s consortium, recognising the imminent threat of Turner, Stanford and myself, quickly signed almost every high profile international player of the day, including such luminaries as Tony Greig, Clive Lloyd, Greg and Ian Chappell. Packer’s masterstroke was using that dapper, silver-tongued devil Richie Benaud as a recruitment consultant and publicist. This was the beginning of my well publicised feud with Benaud. PCA, on my advice, engaged Steve Randell and Saleem Malik to fulfill a similar role. This ultimately proved a bad decision.

After months of effort and despite my enthusiastic negotiating style, Turner’s PCA consortium was ultimately only able to sign five players: English Journeyman Arnold Sidebottom, teenage Queensland Heartthrob Carl “Big Mocha” Rackemann, little known Sri Lankan tweaker Hettithanthrige Don Kapila Haritha Perera (who was a better player than his modest record of 3 first class matches for Burgher Recreation Club suggests) and two retired Major League Baseballers: relief pitcher Albert Walter "Sparky" Lyle and reliable second-baseman Bernie Allen.

Despite our limited playing stocks, Turner and Stanford would not be dissuaded and funded PCA matches in the USA for the entire 1977 season. The three-on-two matches, while not a commercial success were surprisingly engaging contests. The Rest of the World (Sidebottom, Rackemann and Perera) had an advantage in youthful enthusiasm and cricketing experience while the Americans (Lyle and Allen) were technically limited but absolutely ruthless on anything short (a lesson Mocha refused to learn after he was dispatched over mid-wicket by the powerful Bernie Allen time and time again). For the record, the Rest of the World won the only SuperTest by an innings and 11 runs while the USA won the 50 over series 11-8. Yorkshireman Sidebottom was player of the series and won a magical night with Michael Douglas.

While the role of Power Cricket America is now largely forgotten, many astute critics of the game believe it was the entrepreneurial flair and commercial dynamism I demonstrated in promoting PCA and recruiting a powerful roster that spurred Packer to make One Day Cricket such a powerful force in the game over the last 30 years. It is hard not to agree.

* Based largely on my childhood friendship with Sir Donald and my many critically acclaimed articles on the sport (such as “Age limits in the judiciary but not in cricket commentary: The case against Richard Benaud” C&SLJ 54 2001”)

Donald Bradman learns a valuable lesson

Originally developed to sharpen my eye for interpreting statute, the technique shewn above was later used by my close childhood friend Donald 'Milky' Bradman to dominate the cricket world.