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NSW Solicitor General Michael Sexton is ready to hang up the robe after almost three decades, eight Attorneys General and nine Premiers. He tells the LSJ Online how it feels to leave “one of the best jobs in law.”

After 27 years in the role, NSW Solicitor General Michael Sexton has announced his retirement.

Appointed in 1998 by the Carr government, Sexton will become the second-longest serving Solicitor General after Cecil Weigall.“I had been for 14 years at the private Bar,” he recalls. “So, I suppose I was familiar with the courts and with quite a number of areas of the law, although the areas of the law that you encounter in this role can be very wide ranging.”

The one thing he was not expecting is how much criminal law would occupy his time. “Sometimes this is because there is a constitutional challenge to legislation in this area,” he explained during the Fourteenth Annual Plunkett Lecture in 2025 Sexton cited the killings of Virginia Morse, Janine Balding and Anita Cobby. He said those convicted had been subject to a recommendation that they never be released from prison. “The legislative regime was challenged three times in the High Court but on each occasion the challenge was rejected by the Court.” But Sexton does not single out a particular case from his lengthy career. “Well, I don’t know that any cases stand out,” he tells LSJ Online. “There is a continuum, in a sense. A lot of the cases involve challenges to state law, sometimes federal law, in which the state has joined with the Commonwealth in resisting those limitations on legislative power.”

Spanning nine different Premiers, and eight Attorneys General, Sexton says his approach to the role did not shift between the different governments. “A great deal of the work continues, irrespective of any government that might be in office or any minister that might be in office,” he says. “But of course, individual ministers sometimes have particular areas in which they’re interested.”

Sexton admits he will miss the role and the opportunity to be involved in challenging cases. To his successor, Sexton says this is one of the best jobs someone can have in the law, an opportunity the office holder should take full advantage of. His admiration for the role was shown in Sexton’s opening remarks at the previously mentioned lecture, where he quotes Anthony Trollope’s Phinneas Finn, when the titular character reflecting on his career in politics instead of law says he wouldn’t have enjoyed his life if he had become a lawyer, “even if he should have come to be Solicitor General.”

NSW Attorney General Michael Daley says Sexton “… has been a standout as a Solicitor General and a superb servant of the people of NSW. For over a quarter of a century, he has played an exemplary role as Solicitor General for a number of Attorneys General from all political persuasions.

“He’s represented the state of NSW without fear or favour to the highest courts in Australia in a range of complex and groundbreaking legal matters. His contribution to the state of NSW can never be understated and will never be forgotten.”

What is left for a public servant who has dedicated his career to the law? “I’ve done quite a bit of writing outside the law over the years, and perhaps I’ll try and do some more.”