Profile
Year of Call:
1999Year of Silk:
2015Overview
Rob is an experienced and versatile trial and appellate advocate. He provides advice in relation to a wide range of commercial matters, with defamation, insurance and professional negligence, property law, land valuation and compulsory acquisition, and insolvency as areas of particular focus.
His expertise in defamation law and associated areas of media law extends from pre-publication advice to litigation, and includes experience in applications concerning urgent injunctive relief, suppression orders, the operation of the Shield Laws, the implied Constitutional freedom of speech, trials (including before a jury) and appeals. He acts for plaintiffs and defendants (often media defendants) and frequently appears in proceedings in New South Wales and Western Australia, as well as in Queensland.
Further, Rob has acted for sports governing bodies, athletes, clubs and other entities in a wide range of sports related matters, including relating to funding, governance, media concerns, other commercial matters and disciplinary issues.
He has appeared in the High Court and in the trial and appellate divisions of the Federal Court and the Supreme Courts of Queensland, Western Australia, New South Wales and Victoria.
In addition to his busy litigation practice, Rob is an experienced mediator. He has mediated a wide range of commercial disputes.
Rob is an Interstate Member of Francis Burt Chambers in Perth.
Recommendations
Australian Financial Review’s Best Lawyers
- 2024 – Listed for Alternative Dispute Resolution, Commercial Law, Defamation & Media Law and Litigation. Brisbane’s ‘Lawyer of the Year’ for Defamation and Media Law.
- 2024 – Listed for Alternative Dispute Resolution, Commercial Law, Defamation & Media Law and Litigation.
- 2023 – Listed as Brisbane’s Defamation & Media ‘Lawyer of the Year’.
- 2023 – Listed for Alternative Dispute Resolution, Commercial Law, Defamation & Media Law and Litigation.
- 2019 & 2022 – Listed for Alternative Dispute Resolution, Defamation & Media Law and Litigation.
Doyle’s Guide to the Australian Legal Profession
- 2022 – Recommended as a leading Queensland Commercial Litigation & Dispute Resolution barrister.
- 2021 – Recommended as a leading Australian IP & TMT barrister.
- 2020 – Recommended as a leading Australian IP & TMT barrister.
- 2020 – Recommended as a leading Queensland Commercial Litigation & Dispute Resolution barrister.
- 2019 – Recommended as a leading Queensland Commercial Litigation & Dispute Resolution barrister.
- 2018 – Recommended as a leading Australian IP & TMT barrister practising in intellectual property, defamation, technology, media, and telecommunications matters.
- 2018 – Recommended as a leading Queensland IP & TMT barrister practising in intellectual property, defamation, technology, media, and telecommunications matters.
- 2017 – Recommended as a leading Queensland IP & TMT barrister practising in intellectual property, defamation, technology, media, and telecommunications matters.
Legal 500
- 2024
- 2023 – “…a calm and deeply considered advocate, who goes about his craft in a disarming, effective and efficient way”.
- 2022 – Listed as a Leading Silk for TMT and IP.
Appointments
2021 Law Council of Australia Defamation Group - Chair
Member
Member, Bar Association of Queensland
Member, Bar Association of New South Wales
Career
2015 Queen's Counsel
2007 Counsel Assisting the Commonwealth Government Inquiry into Equine Influenza
2001 Member of the Bar Council
1999 Barrister
1998 Associate to his Honour Justice Callinan
Education
LLB
B.Sc (Arch)
Awards
1999 James Archibald Douglas Prize for Best Reader, Bar Practice Course
