"Then again, there is something to be said for vindicating reputation." Echoing the views of leading defamation experts and judges, Mr Bathurst said the law of defamation "always seemed to me unnecessarily complex". "I might be wrong. That's a matter for review," he said. In 2014 the District Court awarded a school teacher damages of $105,000 for defamatory posts on social media, in the first case of its kind in Australia. The 20-year-old defendant declared bankruptcy after the judgment. Mr Bathurst said that "regardless of what changes are made to the law" it was "important the procedures be simplified" in defamation cases and it was "much more difficult" to do so when the case was heard by a jury.

Four-member juries – as opposed to juries of 12 used in criminal trials – are used regularly in defamation cases in NSW. Stressing that it was "very much a preliminary view", Mr Bathurst said "consideration should be given" to whether smaller defamation cases should be heard by juries "because the costs are worrying". "I'm not saying they shouldn't have [a jury], I just think it's something worth considering," Mr Bathurst said. "In relation to all small claims, it's important that procedures be simplified." Mr Bathurst also sounded a note of caution about a push for a new tort, or civil action, allowing people to sue for damages for serious invasions of privacy.

"The devil's always in the detail," he said. "What is a serious invasion of privacy? I think that's the real problem about it." Mr Bathurst said "people ... in the public domain have to expect some degree of media scrutiny" but the "unauthorised publication of material on social media, for example, is something that should be dealt with". On courts reform, he embraced a proposal by the NSW Bar Association to establish a new indigenous court as a division of the District Court. "Anything that could be done to reduce the rate of Indigenous incarceration is well worth trying," he said. He said the court should not be "imposed" but "established in consultation with Indigenous elders and the like, who have a far greater appreciation of their culture than we have".

Mr Bathurst has championed open justice since he was appointed chief justice in June 2011, including publishing judgment summaries and decisions on the Supreme Court's Facebook and Twitter pages. And while he has a famously wry sense of humour, he has cautioned against judicial "self-indulgence" in the form of jokes in judgments. He said the legal profession had undergone rapid change since 1987, when he took silk after just a decade at the bar, and the style of advocacy had shifted as juries became less common. "I think it's fair to say we don't have the great flamboyant advocates who were around when juries were commonplace," Mr Bathurst said. "Advocacy has had to adapt to the fact that a lot is done in writing."

He said technology had "by and large" been a good thing for the profession and helped drive down the cost of litigation, for example, by allowing documents to be filed online. "Who knows where technology will develop, but I think there will be an increasing emphasis on harnessing it," he said. "There may well be fewer appearances in court. But I think fundamentally what will remain the same is that cases won't be determined according to some mathematical algorithm. Law always involves the human element. You can't entirely take that out."