Australia, Aug. 19 -- New South Wales Land and Environment Court issued text of the following judgement on July 18:

1. THE COURT: By Summons filed on 10 December 2024, the Council of the Law Society of New South Wales (the Council) sought:

1) a declaration that Mr George Sideris (the Respondent) is not a fit and proper person to remain on the Roll of Australian lawyers (the Roll) maintained by the Supreme Court of New South Wales, pursuant to s 22 of the Legal Profession Uniform Law (NSW) (LPUL);

2) an order that the Respondent's name be removed from the Roll; and

3) an order that the Respondent pay the Council's costs of the proceedings.

2. These orders were sought pursuant to s 23(1)(c) of the LPUL which empowers this Court to order the removal of the name of persons from the Roll on the recommendation of the NSW Civil and Administrative Tribunal (the Tribunal).

3. The inherent jurisdiction and powers of the Supreme Court with respect to the control and discipline of Australian lawyers are not affected by anything in ch 5 of the LPUL which deals with professional discipline. So much is stated in LPUL s 264(1). The objectives of ch 5 include the monitoring, promotion and enforcement of the professional standards, competence and honesty of the Australian legal profession: LPUL s 260(c).

4. The Tribunal is empowered, if it thinks fit, to recommend that a lawyer's name be removed from the Roll if, after completing a hearing into the lawyer's conduct, it finds the lawyer guilty of unsatisfactory professional conduct or professional misconduct: LPUL s 302(1)(f). That is what occurred in the present case: Council of the Law Society of New South Wales v Sideris (No 2) [2024] NSWCATOD 121 at [147(1)] (Stage 2 Decision or TD2).

5. As Brereton JA observed in Council of the Law Society of New South Wales v Clifton [2021] NSWCA 340 at [7] (Clifton):

"The jurisdiction conferred on this Court by s 23 is a parallel jurisdiction to its inherent jurisdiction in respect of its officers and does not replace that jurisdiction. It supersedes the longstanding statutory arrangements for the discipline of the legal profession which have operated alongside the Court's inherent jurisdiction for many decades. ... The current regime ... perhaps ... recognising that it is fitting that this Court as the keeper of the roll should be the ultimate determinant of whether a lawyer's name is removed from the roll, no longer confers that ultimate power on the Tribunal, but reserves it to the Court, albeit upon the recommendation of the Tribunal."

6. The Court is not bound to follow the Tribunal's recommendation that the practitioner's name be removed from the Roll; it retains the responsibility to be satisfied that the orders sought are appropriate on the facts found which is to say that the Court must independently exercise the power under s 23(1)(c) of the LPUL on the evidence and material before it: de Robillard v Council of the New South Wales Bar Association; Council of the New South Wales Bar Association v de Robillard (No 2) [2024] NSWCA 299 at [227] (de Robillard), quoting Council of the Law Society of New South Wales v Leslie [2021] NSWCA 59 at [30] (Leslie). Absent any challenge to the Tribunal's findings by way of an appeal (and there has been no such challenge in this matter), it is open to this Court to accept those findings and the Tribunal's characterisation of the practitioner's conduct: see Council of the Law Society of New South Wales v Yoon [2020] NSWCA 141 at [22], [32]-[33] (Yoon); Clifton at [8]-[9]; Leslie at [30]; and de Robillard at [222]-[224].

*Rest of the document can be viewed at: (https://www.caselaw.nsw.gov.au/decision/198172deb42e57da3a6dda53)

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