After the disruption of COVID for the past three years, we started this year with a rebuild and a reset and were excited that many new students joined the team.

On Tuesday night, we had our first trial at the Supreme Court, after many weeks of team meetings, Coach meetings with Honourable John McKechnie KC, emails, drafts, feedback and lots of practice. We had two teams competing; ‘Hearslay’ as Prosecution were beaten by a strong team from Kingsway Christian College, and ‘The Justice Gamers’ as Defence won in a tight scoring contest 134.5 to 130 against St Stephens.

The judges in both courtrooms were impressed by the high standard of the teams, which is quite the compliment. The case involved the criminal offence of graffiti and an alleged jealous artist who lost a lucrative competition. She said she was just at the scene to pick up her bag of expensive paints and it could’ve been one of the many vandals known to be in the area. As usual there were many different perspectives on the night but the best quote was by Blake Morin as the accused when cross-examined about being at the scene and he needed to get his expensive paints ‘man’, said with just the right dramatic flourish, so much so even the judge laughed. Also notable on the night was Nicola Clover and Josie McAllister as the best prepared Witness and Barrister 1.

The best part was seeing every student taking on the challenge of public speaking and thinking on their feet, which is a terrific opportunity.

We are proud of all of you for your competitive spirit, good sportsmanship and impressed by your confident calm delivery. We were also very happy to welcome parents and spectators back. Next round is at the start of Term 2.

Ms Natasha Clark & Miss Andrea Ranalli
Politics and Law Teachers