Judge to decide before the fan hits

*Pic: Channel 7’s pic of Tony Abbott at Oxford … The Age: Dyson Heydon was on panel that awarded Tony Abbott his prized Rhodes Scholarship

On Friday, former top lawyer Sir Heydon Dyson will decide whether or not his membership of the Royal Commission into Union Rorts and Grievous Error Recantation should disqualify him from being a speaker at a Liberal Party fundraising event.

The jury is out on what his decision will be.

On the one hand, he has admitted that, for several months, he has appeared to preside over the URGER tribunal. However, he claims he was unaware that the tribunal was connected with unions and unionism before last week.

It was only when a story in a newspaper was brought to his attention that he realised RC URGER involved people who may or may not have been union officials. Subsequently, he was also made aware of some video coverage of URGER’s staff lawyer presenting allegations against witnesses, who could be described by some as being loosely attached to trade unionism, in its shortened form.

“I was shown the television news coverage of one metropolitan news station for last week. It appears that there was brief coverage of URGER, but I wish it to be known publicly that I had not seen the TV news -– I don’t bother with such frippery,” Sir Heydon said yesterday.

“At no time did I make the connection to trade, rough or smooth, in presiding over the RC. I had not fully read the papers. In the judges’ union, that is not an uncommon approach.”

Commentators have pointed to Sir Heydon’s advanced age – he was forced to retire from the High Court last year due to the fear of judges becoming clinically senile after 70 – and the fact that he may be reverting to upside-down thought in his dotage, stemming from his birth in Canada.

While head of URGER, he has been cross on evidence presented, claiming one witness had exhibited self-interest and may have lacked credibility, charges that are now being laid back at Sir Heydon’s own feet.

As for the Liberal Party, it is believed they no longer want him to speak for them. “I’m afraid the ticket price was $80, which would have raised nothing like the funds which pour in when Treasurer Joe Hockey holds a selective breakfast,” one Liberal lawyer said.

“But, after the controversy caused by Sir Heydon’s dissenting stance on apprehended bias, at least so far, I’m afraid that Liberal lawyers would run 100km to not attend any function he attended. In fact, a fun run with Sir Heydon firing the first shot might be a better choice: we’d have to be careful where he aimed, as Im not certain of his accuracy.

“It is likely that the only lawyers who might turn up to the speech now would be Coalition Ministers and MPs. They would, of course, claim attendance as a perk of office (POO), which may not be a good look in the current climate.

“If some of them have to fly to Sydney from WA to attend, it would be ugly when the POO deposits are revealed publicly later on.”

Sir Heydon, unfortunately, faces a legal limbo in future. He can continue to preside over RC URGER, but any hankering to be a legal elder statesman to the Liberal Party and his long-time, personal and close friend Tony Abbott, of whom he is a fan, appears to have been thwarted.

The situation should be seen for what it really is, the eminent jurist says: “It is a tiny pimple on the canvas of my brilliant career!” he is believed to have told one friend.

It is believed Sir Heydon blames the media for his predicament. He is reported to have said that it was lucky he received his knighthood from PM Abbott before the fan hits the zit.

*Alisha Munney is a Liberal lawyer and member of the group where Sir Heydon will likely not be presenting his address, which was to be entitled: ‘Sir Garfield Barwick. Ducking and Weaving: How to Appear Impartial While Paddling Furiously Under Water in Different Directions’.