• Victoria
• New South Wales

• Civil Liberties/Discrimination
• Commercial Law
• Contract
• Employment Law
• Equal Opportunity
• Industrial Law

Mark Irving QC specialises in employment, industrial and anti-discrimination law. He has been briefed in over 100 matters in the Federal Court and other superior courts, as well as in the High Court of Australia. Mark’s practice consists of four parts: employment law, industrial law, wage theft cases, and teaching and writing.

Mark has extensive experience in dealing with legally and factually complex employment law matters. He provides legal and strategic advice as well as representing clients in litigation. He has considerable experience in representing clients in all manner of employment contract disputes, from disputes around remuneration and termination to acting for employers against employees setting up rival businesses.

In industrial law, over the last few years Mark represented and advised many of Australia’s major unions. Since 2013 he has represented unions in six large-scale work value arbitrations (often involving more than 20,000 employees) in the Fair Work Commission and State Industrial Commissions in NSW, WA and SA. He has appeared for unions in the Federal Court and elsewhere in issues arising out of industrial action. He represents various unions in disputes about corporate governance. He also represents and advises regulators about a range of industrial law issues.

One of Mark’s passions is representing victims of wage theft, being employees who are paid about 20% less than the statutory minimum. He often represents migrant workers. In 2019, for example, he represented about 100 employees in various wage theft actions, including over 50 seasonal workers from various Pacific nations, over 25 workers on temporary work visas, and advised about and represented numerous workers on working holiday visas. He works with unions and community legal centres across Australia and over the last two years has delivered over 10 seminars to about 200 lawyers in New South Wales, Victoria and Western Australia about wage theft litigation.

The final part of Mark’s practice is teaching and writing. He is a Senior Fellow of the University of Melbourne and lectures undergraduate and postgraduate classes in various aspects of employment law. Mark is the author of both editions of The Contract of Employment. The first edition was awarded the Centenary Book Award by the Honourable Dyson Heydon AC, QC, the former Federal Court judge the Honourable Kevin Lindgren AM, QC and Emeritus Professor Gillian Triggs, the then President of the Australian Human Rights Commission. The prize was awarded to foster ‘the highest standards of authorship in legal publishing’. The judges praised the ‘depth and quality’ of the commentary in Mark’s book. The second edition is about 1500 pages long, cites around 4000 cases and seeks to be a comprehensive analysis of the contract of employment. He is also the co-author of the leading textbook, Creighton and Stewart’s Labour Law, with Professor Stewart, Professor Forsyth, Professor Johnstone and Professor McCrystal. He is the author of various articles and case notes, and is often a referee for law journals. He often presents conference and seminar papers on a broad range of topics touching on employment and industrial law.

Mark has adopted the Law Council of Australia Equitable Briefing Policy.

Liability limited by a scheme approved under Professional Standards legislation