Academic Qualifications and Teaching Experience

Hon. Peter Vickery QC studied law at the University of Melbourne, graduating in 1972.

He undertook articles at Madden Butler Elder & Graham (now the global law firm – Norton Rose Fulbright) between 1972-1973,and was admitted to practice as a barrister and solicitor in Victoria and the High Court of Australia in 1973.

He subsequently studied for a Master of Laws degree at Kings College London and graduated from the University of London with an LLM degree conferred in 1975.

Between 1975 and 1978 he was appointed as a Senior Tutor in the Department of Legal Studies, La Trobe University, Victoria where he founded and taught the subject, Human Rights Law.

During this period he was one of the founding members of the Fitzroy Legal Service, the first voluntary community legal service in Australia.

Career at the Victorian Bar

Mr Vickery signed the role of Counsel of the Victorian Bar in 1978, having read in the chambers of Mr. M.E.J. Black (formerly Chief Justice, Federal Court of Australia). He was in continuous practice as a barrister from 1978 and was appointed Queen’s Counsel in December 1995.

In 30 years at the Victorian Bar Mr Vickery developed a wide-ranging practice in trial and appellate jurisdictions, in commercial and administrative law, while focussing on commercial law and engineering and construction law.

In the course of his practice as a silk, Mr Vickery was briefed in a number of major commercial cases arising from the collapse of the Pyramid Building Society and the property collapse in Victoria,includingPyramid Building Society (in liq) and Others v Farrow Finance Corporation (in liq)and Others, and in the field of engineering and construction, including acting for the State of Tasmania in a long running case arising from construction of the Bass Highway in TasmaniaState of Tasmania v Leighton Constructions Pty Ltd [2005] TASSC 133.

In another example Mr Vickery represented the Australian Submarine Corporation (a company wholly owned by the Commonwealth of Australia)Australian Submarine Corporation (ASC) v Kockums, in an arbitration conducted in 2006. The arbitration arose from the design and construction of the Australian “Collins Class” submarine. ASC brought the arbitration proceeding against the Swedish company KockumsAB, which operated a shipyard in Malmö, Sweden and was owned by the Swedish defence company, the Saab Group. The arbitrator was a former Federal Court Judge, the late John Lockhart QC.

Judicial Career

Peter Vickery QC was appointed as a Justice of the Supreme Court of Victoria in 2008. He retired from the Court on 8 May 2018. He established and managed the Technology Engineering and Construction List (the TEC List) and became a Judge of the Commercial Court upon its establishment.

Creation of the Technology Engineering and Construction List (TEC List), Supreme Court of Victoria

In mid-2008 Justice Vickery (as he then was) conceived of a project called the “TEC Project” to draw together under one management regime the three strands of related disputes in the areas of technology, engineering and construction. The focus of the TEC Project was to produce a state-of-the-art approach to Technical, Engineering and Construction dispute resolution and case management designed to achieve both practical and efficient working outcomes within a tolerable budget.

The TEC List commenced operation on 19 June 2009, with Justice Vickery (as he then was) becoming the first Judge-in-Charge, Technology, Engineering and Construction List, or the TEC List as it has come to be known.

He developed the RedCrest Electronic Case Management System for the Court and initiated a number of procedural reforms to save costs for litigants.

Procedural Reforms

During 2013 Justice Vickery participated in the Attorney-General’s review of discovery in litigation in Victoria, in the course of which his Honour presented a paper on the subject. This resulted in amendments to the Civil Procedure Act 2010 (Vic.) to include new sections ss 55A – 55C dealing with discovery.

During 2016 his Honour introduced procedures for the use of predictive Technology Aided Review (TAR) in large document cases. This is now included in Practice Note SC GEN 5 Guidelines for the Use of Technology; and in the same year his Honour introduced procedures for the use of de-duplication technology which is also now included in Practice Note SC GEN 5 Guidelines for the Use of Technology.

The Supreme Court of Victoria through the work of Justice Vickery became the first court in Australia to order the use of technology-assisted review (TAR) techniques, or predictive coding, to reduce the potentially huge task of discovering documents in civil litigation. The decision in McConnell Dowell v Santam [2017] VSC 640 by Justice Vickery was the first published case in Australia to recognise and adopt the TAR technology. It reflects an increasing trend by jurisdictions overseas to embrace TAR, as a highly efficient and practical means of simplifying the discovery process, particularly in large document cases.

Overview

His focus as a Judge has been to produce a binding outcome in the most efficient manner possible, to minimise cost and delay.in Australia he has been at the forefront of procedural reform and the use of technology to achieve these goals.

During the time of his career as a Judge, his Honour published over 400 judgments following trials he has heard in the TEC List and in commercial cases in the Supreme Court of Victoria. As a Judge, he presided over a number of complex commercial cases, including litigation arising from the Ying Mui Malaysian property investment in Australia and the Amcor litigation.

He remained as the Judge-in-Charge of the TEC List until 1 March 2017, when hebecame a TEC List judge until his retirement from the Supreme Court on 8 May 2018.