34 Facts About Dyson Heydon

John Dyson Heydon was born on 1 March 1943 and is an Australian former judge and barrister who served on the High Court of Australia from 2003 to 2013 and the New South Wales Court of Appeal from 2000 to 2003, and previously served as Dean of the Sydney Law School.

Dyson Heydon retired from the bench at the constitutionally-mandated age of 70 and went on to chair the Royal Commission into Trade Union Governance and Corruption between 2014 and 2015, an appointment that was politically controversial due to his avowed conservatism and connections with the governing conservative party.

Dyson Heydon did not apply to renew his practising certificate with the New South Wales Bar Association upon its expiry in 2020.

Later, in 2022, Dyson Heydon resigned from the Order of Australia.

Dyson Heydon was born in Ottawa, Canada, in 1943, to Muriel Naomi and Peter Richard Dyson Heydon.

Dyson Heydon was raised in Sydney, attending the Shore School, before going on to receive a BA in history from the University of Sydney, where he was a resident of St Paul's College.

Dyson Heydon was then awarded a Rhodes Scholarship to attend University College, Oxford, where he received an MA and a BCL and was awarded the Vinerian Scholarship.

In 1967, Dyson Heydon became a fellow of Keble College, Oxford and, after graduating in 1968, he began teaching at the University of Ghana in 1969.

Dyson Heydon was elected dean of the University of Sydney Law School in 1978, serving a one-year term.

Dyson Heydon left to become a barrister, working at Selborne Chambers, where his colleagues included future High Court colleague William Gummow and New South Wales Supreme Court judge Roddy Meagher.

Dyson Heydon was appointed a Queen's Counsel in 1987 on the advice of Michael Kirby.

In 1977, Dyson Heydon married Pamela Elizabeth Smith, with Gummow as the best man.

Pamela Dyson Heydon died on 13 June 2017 at the age of 66.

Dyson Heydon's books are mainly doctrinal treatises, designed principally as information to assist practitioners in their advice and pleadings.

Dyson Heydon has taken over from his former colleague, at Sydney University and on the High Court, William Gummow as one of the editors of Meagher, Gummow and Lehane's Equity: Doctrines and Remedies.

Dyson Heydon is a co-author of Jacobs' Law of Trusts in Australia.

Dyson Heydon was appointed a Justice of the Court of Appeal of the Supreme Court of New South Wales in 2000, and appointed a Justice of the High Court of Australia in February 2003.

Dyson Heydon reached the same outcome as the Chief Justice in all but one case and frequently wrote joint judgments with the latter pair.

Dyson Heydon dissented in the case of Charles Zentai, and in the challenge to the Australian government's plain tobacco packaging legislation.

Dyson Heydon was known as a conservative judge, and spoke out against what he termed "judicial activism".

Dyson Heydon's publicly expressed views, set out while a senior New South Wales judge, criticised the evolution of the High Court under the two immediately preceding Chief Justices, Sir Anthony Mason and Sir Gerard Brennan, were described by contemporaneous commentators as a "job application" for appointment to the High Court by the government of Liberal Party Prime Minister John Howard.

Dyson Heydon did not join any majority decision in his last year on the High Court, and in a 2013 article in the English Law Quarterly Review argued that "compromise is alien to the process of doing justice according to law".

Legal academics have noted several cases in which Dyson Heydon was the lone dissenter, starting his judgments with the words "I dissent", which was described by Gabrielle Appleby as "pugnacious and irrefutably terse".

Dyson Heydon tended to take a conservative approach to human rights.

On 13 March 2014, Dyson Heydon was appointed to conduct a Royal Commission into trade union governance and corruption on the recommendation of the Abbott government.

Dyson Heydon handed down the Commission's interim report in December 2014 and found that the Construction, Forestry, Mining and Energy Union acted in "wilful defiance of the law".

Dyson Heydon recommended that criminal charges of blackmail be considered against John Setka, the Secretary of CFMEU Victoria, along with charges against other senior CFMEU officials in Queensland and New South Wales for activities that included death threats, extortion, gross neglect, and other "serious criminal matters".

Dyson Heydon recommended that fraud charges be considered against former Australian Workers Union officials for their use of a secret slush fund in the 1990s.

In 2015, while the Royal Commission was still sitting, Dyson Heydon agreed to deliver the Sir Garfield Barwick Address, an event organised by a branch of the Liberal Party.

Dyson Heydon later withdrew, saying he had overlooked the political connection.

Dyson Heydon submitted his final report to the Governor-General on 28 December 2015, finding "widespread and deep-seated" misconduct by union officials in Australia.

Dyson Heydon denied the claims and apologised for any "inadvertent and unintended" offence.

Dyson Heydon did not apply to renew his practising certificate with the New South Wales Bar Association upon its expiry on 30 June 2020.

On 14 October 2022, Dyson Heydon resigned from the Order of Australia.