I am pleased to announce that Judge Paul Anthony Howard has been appointed as a judge of the Family Court of Australia. Judge Howard has been appointed to the Brisbane registry and will commence on 6 April 2021. The appointment of Judge Howard elevates him from his current position as a judge of the Federal Circuit Court of Australia (FCC).
Judge Howard was admitted as a solicitor and barrister in the Supreme Court of Queensland in 1986 and 1990, respectively. Judge Howard commenced his legal career in 1987 as a solicitor at Pattisson & Barry Solicitors and then at Vercorp Pty Ltd in 1988. Judge Howard then practised as a barrister from 1990 to 2007, before being appointed as a judge in the Brisbane Registry of the FCC in 2007, where he predominantly heard family law matters.
On behalf of the Australian Government, I congratulate Judge Howard on his appointment and thank him for his willingness to continue to serve the people of Australia as a judge of the Family Court of Australia.
Judge Paul Howard
Judge Howard graduated with a Bachelor of Laws from the Queensland Institute of Technology in 1986 and was appointed to the FCC in 2007. Since Judge Howard's appointment to the FCC, he has finalised more than 4,500 family law cases. He has extensive experience working through complex family law trials, including as a trial judge in the Brisbane pilot from 2018-2019.
In 2018, Judge Howard completed the Fulbright Scholarship as a visiting foreign judicial fellow at the Federal Judicial Center in Washington DC. Judge Howard has lectured extensively on his research, domestically and internationally, and has published extensively on Australia's family law system.
