Our work as lawyers routinely requires us to hold the fortunes and even liberty of our clients in our hands. When either or both of these are at risk in litigation, emotions can run high.

There seems a general feeling that good manners and common courtesy are out of fashion. Indeed, in a recent episode of the ABC’s podcast ‘All in the mind’, Dr Kurt Gray, Professor of Psychology and Neuroscience at the University of North Carolina, observed that “we are more outraged and more polarised than ever”.

On occasion, acting in a client’s best interests may include robust exchanges with the other side. However, there is a point where seeking a forensic advantage at any cost could fall foul of solicitors’ conduct rule 4.1.2 to ‘be honest and courteous in all dealings in the course of legal practice’.

This rule does not require us to adopt a Pollyanna approach to dealing with the other side, but it does reinforce an axiom that good etiquette and courtesy are the lubricants that ensure the machinery of justice keeps working.

I was honoured to discuss this subject at the recent Annual Conference of the Law Society of NSW in a session with Justice Ian Pike of the Supreme Court, Acting District Court Judge Judith Gibson, and former President of the Law Society and Senior NCAT Member, Gary Ulman.

Judge Gibson recalled a matter she was told needed to ‘finish within the hour’ because one counsel had a commitment. When Her Honour realised the matter wouldn’t finish on time, she asked what the commitment was. Counsel said that he had to attend his father’s funeral, and the other side refused to agree to an adjournment. Judge Gibson promptly adjourned the matter for three weeks.

This story mirrors circumstances I heard at a session on professional courtesy at another conference last year, where a solicitor in another jurisdiction had requested an adjournment from the other side to attend her father’s funeral and was refused. Again, the judge stepped in to order the adjournment.

Justice Pike conceded that, given the Supreme Court deals with very substantial matters, it’s unsurprising that there is often a significant amount of animus and anger between the clients. His Honour said, however, that did not mean that practitioners should be writing aggressive correspondence to opponents on the assumption that’s what the client wants.

He said this approach would usually do nothing to advance the client’s interests, and would not reflect well, from a judge’s perspective, on the practitioner. Judge Gibson wisely observed that “there is nothing more important than wellbeing, health and good professional relationships with our colleagues.”

In fact, as the Court of Appeal observed in Council of the Law Society of New South Wales v Sideris [2025] NSWCA 159, courtesy and civility “are part of a practitioner's overriding duty to the court, indeed to the standards of the profession and to the public.”

You can access the on-demand video of the session on LawInform.

Ronan MacSweeney, President, The Law Society of NSW