Dr Garry Hamilton is a Doctor of Laws, a Fellow of the Institute of Chartered Accountants, a Fellow of the Certified Practising Accountants, a Fellow of the Governance Institute of Australia and a Fellow of the Australian Restructuring Insolvency & Turnaround Association. Until recently, Garry, who is also a chartered accountant, was the only practising solicitor in Australia registered as a liquidator by the Australian Securities and Investments Commission.
Dr Hamilton practises in commercial litigation, corporate reconstruction, debt restructuring and insolvency and has been involved in most of the larger corporate reconstructions and insolvencies in Australia in the past 30 years. He was a Partner with Minter Ellison Lawyers for 25 years and now consults to Taylor David Lawyers, a boutique corporate restructuring and insolvency firm in Brisbane.
Dr Hamilton has advised the Hong Kong, Fijian and Singapore Governments in their review (and in respect of Fiji, its drafting) of their corporate reconstruction legislation, and sat on an advisory board to the Commonwealth Government when the amendments were being made to the insolvency and reconstruction sections of the Corporations Act. In 2018, he also drafted amendments for the Commonwealth Government in its 10-year revision of the Corporations (Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander) Act. In 2021, Dr Hamilton prepared and submitted to Treasury draft legislation to remedy the ongoing problems with the external administration of corporate trading trusts.
He holds degrees in Commerce, Economics and Law from the University of Queensland, a Master of Laws from that university, and a Doctorate (Juridical Science) from the Queensland University of Technology.
Dr Hamilton was a member of the Law Council of Australia’s Corporate Insolvency and Reconstruction Committee from 1993 to 2016, and has been a member of the editorial board of the Insolvency Law Bulletin since 2013.
Publications and conference papers
Books and Book Chapters:
- The Australian Chapter of Collier International Business Insolvency Guide (Author, revised 2021);
- The Australian Chapter of Restructuring and Insolvency Guide (Thomson Reuters, Practical Law, Co-author with Scott Taylor, revised 2021);
- The Companies section of LexisNexis Court Forms and Precedents in Queensland (Author, currently being revised, 2022);
- Invalidations of Securities Upon Insolvency, The Federation Press, 2000 (Author)
Journal articles (most recently published) and conference papers:
- Back to basics – section 588FA, Corporations Act: is a diminution of a company’s assets a pre-condition to the existence of a preference? The mischief of the “doctrine of ultimate effect” exposed (2021) 29 Insolv LJ 14
- Conflicting intermediate appellate court decisions: voidable preferences, third- party payments and the relevance of double-entry book-keeping (2020) 20 Insolvency Law Bulletin 207, (referred to with approval by Rees J in Western Port Holdings Pty Ltd (receivers and managers appointed) (in liq) [2021] NSWSC 232 at [8]) (12 March 2021)
- Vesting of Trust Property in a Bankruptcy Trustee and “reasonable grounds” for Lodging a Caveat: Some helpful Guidance from the High Court (2020) 28 Insolv LJ at 41
- Winding up and Employee Entitlements: Does Corporations Act s 561 give a Liquidator priority over Employee Entitlements for Liquidation Costs and Expenses? (2019) 27 Insolv LJ 81
- Amerind – the Aftermath: Questions and Practical Difficulties Remaining (2019) 27 (3) Insolv LJ 185 at 187
- Preferences and running accounts: “Peak indebtedness”: The Elephant in the room (2018) 26 Insolv LJ 2 at 8
- Battening down the Hatches under the Insolvency Law Reform Act: How to Resist a Request for Documents from Mr Snoopy Creditor: Part 1, Proctor, Feb 2018, Vol 38 No1 at 28
- The case of the mysteriously disappearing secured debt under a deed of company arrangement: hard cases making bad law again? Insolvency Law Bulletin, 2017, Vol 8, No 6 at 116 (republished in Australian Banking and Finance Law Bulletin, Vol 33, No 6, July 2017)
- Winding up insolvent corporate trustees – what happened to the liquidator? Insolvency Law Bulletin, 2016. Vol 17, No 6
- Equitable subrogation of banks and other secured creditors for the recovery of statutory employee entitlements: A "new class of case" or simply a different perspective? (2016) 34 C&SLJ 121