Australian Competition Tribunal Appointments

The Treasurer, Mr Peter Costello, today announced eight new appointments to the Australian Competition Tribunal. The appointments are for 5 year terms. The Honourable Justice Alan Goldberg, of Melbourne, has been appointed a Deputy President. Seven other persons have been appointed as members of the Tribunal. They are:

• Mr Rob Davey of Batemans Bay NSW.
• Professor Ron Duncan of Canberra.
• Mr Grant Latta of Melbourne.
• Dr Malcolm Messenger of Adelaide.
• Associate Professor David Round of Adelaide.
• Ms Margaret Starrs of Melbourne.
• Mr Mike Waller of Melbourne.

Justice Golberg has been a judge of the Federal Court of Australia since February 1997.

Mr Davey is a business consultant who has held a number of positions in the Commonwealth Attorney-General’s Department as well as senior appointments with the former Trade Practices Commission. In 1989 he was appointed the first Chairman of the Australian Telecommunications Authority (Austel) and in 1994 he was appointed Regulator-General of Victoria, an office he held until 1997.

Professor Duncan was appointed Professor of Economics and Executive Director of the National Centre for Development Studies at the Australian National University in 1994. Prior to this he held senior positions with the World Bank in Washington.

Mr Latta is a business consultant and has held senior business appointments with Repco and the Pacific Dunlop Group.

Dr Messenger is a consultant with a background in chemical engineering and metallurgy. After working for the Commonwealth Government, he held senior appointments with the South Australian Government, finishing as Chief Executive, Office of Energy, Department of Mines and Energy.

Associate Professor Round has a distinguished academic and economic consulting career and holds a part-time appointment on the Australian Communications Authority. Until his appointment to the Tribunal he was an associate member of the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission since 1995 and, before that, the Trade Practices Commission from 1986.

Ms Starrs is a consultant who worked in the South Australian Department of Transport between 1972 and 1985 before taking a masters degree in transport economics. Subsequently working in the private sector, she served between 1992 and 1996 as Deputy Chief Executive and Director Economic Policy, National Road Transport Commission.

Mr Waller has been Chief Economist and Director, Public Policy of BHP Ltd since 1996. He previously served in the British Civil Service until he was appointed in 1989 as a senior executive in the Australian Public Service and rose to be a Deputy Secretary in the Department of Transport.

Background

The Tribunal was created in 1966 as the Trade Practices Tribunal. It was renamed the Australian Competition Tribunal in 1995 as part of the national competition policy reforms. Since 1975, its core function has been to review authorisation and exclusive dealing notification decisions made by the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission (and its predecessor) under the Trade Practices Act 1974. More recently, the Tribunal has taken on responsibility for reviewing access decisions made under Part IIIA and functions under Part XIB (Telecommunications Industry: Anti-Competitive Conduct and Record Keeping Rules) of the Act.

The Tribunal consists of presidential members – who must be federal judges – and other members who must be qualified by virtue of their ‘knowledge of, or experience in, industry, commerce, economics, law or public administration’. Members serve on a part-time basis, as required, for a term of up to 7 years.

In addition to these new appointments, the Tribunal comprises:

2 April 1998