15.12.2009
The Attorney-General, the Hon Robert McClelland MP, today announced the appointment of the ALRC’s current serving Commissioner and acting President, Professor Rosalind Croucher, for a five-year term as President of the ALRC.
Professor Croucher was appointed to the ALRC as a full-time Commissioner in February 2007 and led the Inquiry into Client Legal Privilege and Federal Investigations, producing the Report, Privilege in Perspective (ALRC 107, 2007), and the recently completed review of Commonwealth Secrecy Laws. Professor Croucher is also the ALRC Commissioner-in-charge of the Family Violence Inquiry, being conducted jointly with the New South Wales Law Reform Commission.
“I am honoured to be appointed to such a key position that bridges the policy, practice and academic worlds especially at a time when there is a strong commitment to achieving reform.” Professor Croucher said.
Professor Croucher joined the ALRC after a distinguished period of 25 years in university teaching and management, most recently as Dean of Law at Macquarie University (from 1999)—where she still holds a Chair in Law. Professor Croucher has served as Chair of the Council of Australian Law Deans (2002); Vice President (Western Pacific), International Academy of Estate and Trust Law (1998–2005); Chair of the Scientific Committee for the World Congress of Medical Law 2004 and on the Program Committee for the 8th biennial conference of the International Association of Women Judges (2006), for which she was also ‘Rapporteur’. Professor Croucher has lectured and published extensively— principally in the fields of equity, trusts, property, inheritance and legal history. She has written or edited nine books, and more than 100 other publications including book chapters, encyclopaedia entries, journal articles, case notes, book reviews and conference papers.
Professor Croucher obtained a BA (Hons) in History and an LLB from the University of Sydney; and her PhD from the University of New South Wales in the field of legal history. She was admitted as a legal practitioner in New South Wales in 1981. She was awarded an Honorary Fellowship of the Australian College of Legal Medicine in 2004 and is a Foundation Fellow of the Australian Academy of Law.
Professor Croucher paid tribute to the long line of her distinguished predecessors, from the Hon Michael Kirby, AC CMG, the first Chairman in 1975, to Emeritus Professor David Weisbrot AM, who recently completed over a decade as President. She also applauded the contribution of all the staff of the ALRC in the inquiry processes:
“Law reform reports—and really effective law reform outcomes—are achieved by a magnificent collective effort. In my three years at the ALRC I have been hugely impressed by the intelligence, commitment and professionalism of the legal officers, project assistants and all who produce the excellent reports that have made the ALRC’s work the benchmark amongst the international law reform community”.