Michael Hollingdale:
Trusted Construction Lawyer and Mediator in Perth
Over 40 years of construction law practice and more than 30 years of nationally accredited mediation, based in Perth and serving clients across Western Australia and beyond.
Michael Hollingdale of Hollingdales offers over 40 years of front-end construction law practice and more than 30 years of nationally accredited mediation and facilitation in Perth, Western Australia. His integrated practice delivers continuous commercial risk surveillance, operationally grounded contract advice, and nationally accredited mediation and facilitation across construction, wills and estates, and business succession matters.
Perth, Western Australia. National accreditation mediation extending practice reach across all Australian jurisdictions.
Commercial Directors, litigation lawyers, families, SME business owners, family business owners and their professional advisers.
Forty Years of Construction Law and Thirty Years of Mediation Practice in Perth, Western Australia
Michael Hollingdale has been practising construction law and mediation continuously since his admission as a solicitor in 1982. His career spans more than four decades of advising clients within Western Australia's construction and infrastructure sectors, integrating legal rigour with practical delivery experience. Since 1985, he has been active in Western Australia, combining front-end contract drafting and negotiation with a sophisticated mediation and facilitation practice developed over more than thirty years. Michael Hollingdale was one of the first trained mediators in Perth in 1992, and has been mediating continuously since then.
This integration ensures clients receive advice that is operationally sound and dispute resolution that is legally and emotionally informed — a combination that is seldom found amongst market alternatives. Unlike practitioners whose legal knowledge is formed primarily through advisory review, Michael Hollingdale's understanding of construction contracts is grounded in his background as a litigator and direct involvement with live project delivery across Western Australia's concentrated construction, resource, and infrastructure sectors.
Prior to founding Hollingdales, Michael Hollingdale was a partner at Allens and Freehill Hollingdale and Page, now Herbert Smith Freehills Kramer, reflecting extensive experience within national law firm environments. Hollingdales was established on the principle that clients in high-stakes commercial, contractual, and family matters deserve direct access to the knowledge and judgement they are engaging, without delegation, without rotation, and without institutional distance.
- Lead external legal adviser to the Main Roads Major Projects team from 1999 to 2015, overseeing urban and regional road projects under Design and Construct and alliancing contracts
- Lead legal adviser on the Gateway WA Alliance, Perth to Mandurah Railway, and Midland Health Campus Design, Build, Operate, and Maintain PPP
- Lead counsel on the Bluewaters Power Stations 1 and 2 EPC contracts and the Worsley Multi-fuel Cogen Project EPC
- Contract drafting and advisory across AS4000, AS4902, FIDIC forms, ECI, D&C, EPC, EPCM, alliancing, BOOT delivery methods
- Mediation and facilitation practice spanning more than 30 years, covering commercial, wills and estates, SME, and family succession matters
- Independent Chair of Wines of Western Australia, demonstrating sustained multi-stakeholder governance under commercial pressure
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1982
Admitted to practise — NSW and High Court of Australia
40+
Years of continuous construction law practice in Western Australia
30+
Years of mediation and facilitation practice
18
Successive years in Best Lawyers Australia — Construction Infrastructure Law
Partner at Allens and Freehill Hollingdale and Page (now Herbert Smith Freehills Kramer) prior to founding Hollingdales. Direct, senior-level continuity on every client engagement.
Construction Law Advisory: Major Project Credentials and Front-End Delivery Knowledge
Michael Hollingdale's construction law practice is distinguished by direct involvement with major infrastructure projects and contracting portfolios across Western Australia. His advisory roles encompass contract drafting and negotiation for Australian Standard contracts AS4000 and AS4902, FIDIC forms, and a variety of delivery methods including Early Contractor Involvement (ECI), Construct only, Design and Construct, Engineering Procurement Construction (EPC), EPC Management (EPCM), alliancing, and Build-Own-Operate-Transfer (BOOT). Clients receive counsel grounded in 40 years of front-end delivery knowledge, without the overhead and institutional distance of a large firm.
Major Projects — Lead Adviser
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Gateway WA Alliance
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Perth to Mandurah Railway
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Bluewaters Power Stations 1 and 2 EPC
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Worsley Multi-fuel Cogen Project EPC
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Midland Health Campus Design, Build, Operate, and Maintain (DBOM) PPP
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Main Roads Major Projects team — lead external legal adviser, 1999 to 2015
Engagement
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AS4000 and AS4902 Australian Standard contracts
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FIDIC forms
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Early Contractor Involvement (ECI)
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Construct only, Design and Construct
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EPC and EPCM
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24/7 online support
Front-End Contract Advisory
Hollingdales applies a detailed, operationally grounded review of contract documents that anticipates how provisions perform under live site conditions. This approach bridges the gap between legal review and project delivery by identifying clauses prone to variation creep, delay claims, and Security of Payment adjudications. Counsel supports clients through tender document preparation, negotiation, and execution phases, ensuring contracts are structured to withstand site pressures rather than merely passing a legal checklist.
Continuous Commercial Risk Surveillance
The Hollingdales retainer monitors contractual exposure from contract award through to Practical Completion, sitting above the project team without displacing the Superintendent or Project Manager. On a $90M project, variation creep, delay entitlement drift, Security of Payment exposure, and certification failures commonly represent $3M to $8.9M of uncontrolled exposure. The retainer typically costs less than one tenth of one percent of project value.
How to Choose Construction Legal Counsel
Advisers with direct project delivery experience, recognised credentials, and a proven track record with major infrastructure projects offer materially different value from legal reviewers without operational context. Counsel should demonstrate familiarity with the full range of contract forms and delivery methods relevant to your projects and offer continuous advisory support throughout contract negotiation and delivery phases, not merely at execution.
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Nationally Accredited Mediation and Facilitation: Thirty Years of Practice Across Commercial and Family Disputes
Michael Hollingdale's mediation and facilitation practice spans over 30 years, combining national accreditation under the Australian Mediator Standards (AMDRAS) since its inception with advanced collaborative practice training specific to wills and estates through Collaborative Professionals WA Inc and Family Inheritance Solutions. His capability extends across commercial disputes, wills and estates conflicts, SME business disputes, and family business succession facilitation.
This practice offers the dual capacity to manage complex emotional dynamics whilst simultaneously interpreting legal documents in real time. Such integration is particularly critical in wills and estates disputes where family grief intersects with legal entitlement, and in succession planning where structured family conversations are essential to durable outcomes. Litigation lawyers, accountants, and financial planners refer to Hollingdales because the process moves the matter forward without damaging the professional relationships they have spent years building with their clients.
Mediation sessions are designed to surface the underlying drivers of conflict, enable confidential negotiation, and produce documented, enforceable agreements. Facilitation convenes family conferences with clear agendas and neutral chairing to ensure difficult discussions on ownership, control, and succession occur constructively — translating intention into documented outcome rather than deferring the conversation until a crisis forces it.
Mediation for Wills and Estates Disputes
Advanced collaborative practice training through Collaborative Professionals WA Inc and Family Inheritance Solutions provides the capability to hold a room under emotional pressure whilst interpreting testamentary documents simultaneously. The result is a confidential process that produces documented resolutions without consuming the estate in contested probate proceedings.
Mediation for Commercial Contract Disputes
Covering all industries, professions, and sectors — proactively before litigation commences or after proceedings are under way. Genuine commercial depth behind the process converts entrenched positions into signed settlements at a fraction of the cost of court proceedings, recovering management time and commercial relationships simultaneously.
Facilitation for Family Business Succession
Lawyers and accountants can design the structure; they cannot convene and hold the room when competing emotions and unresolved fairness questions surface simultaneously. Hollingdales convenes the family conference, sets the agenda, chairs the discussion, and ensures agreed outcomes are properly documented in a workable succession plan or deed of family arrangement.
How to Choose a Mediator or Facilitator
Clients and referral professionals should seek mediators with national accreditation, recognised panel memberships, and proven experience in both legal and relational aspects of disputes. For wills, estates, and succession planning, advanced collaborative practice training and the ability to interpret legal documents alongside managing emotional dynamics are essential criteria.
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30+
Years of continuous mediation practice in Western Australia
AMDRAS
National accreditation since inception — Australian Mediator Standards
LEADR Advanced Training
Completed 1995 — now the Resolution Institute
Resolution Institute
Law Society of Western Australia
Commercial Disputes Centre
Collaborative Professionals WA Inc (Wills and Estates panel)
Family Inheritance Solutions (Wills and Estates panel)
Small Business Development Corporation WA
Qualifications, Accreditations, and Recognised Professional Standing
Formal Accreditations
Independent Directory Recognition
Chambers Asia Pacific — Leading Individuals, Construction and Infrastructure (2006–2017)
Professional Memberships, Governance Roles, and Integrated Practice Services
Legal advice grounded in direct project delivery experience differs substantially from conventional large-firm reviews. Counsel with operational insight understands how contractual language performs under wet seasons, sovereign risk events, and principal-driven scope changes — conditions that never appear in the review notes but consistently determine whether a contract holds or fails when delivery pressure arrives.
This perspective enables the drafting and negotiation of contracts that hold under field conditions, reducing the likelihood that clauses become points of dispute. Notice requirements, risk allocations, and payment provisions that are legally defensible but commercially unworkable create friction costs throughout delivery; provisions designed with operational reality in mind do not.
Clients benefit from advice that bridges the divide between lawyers and project teams, providing clarity on what hidden risks exist and how to address them before execution rather than after the contract has been tested and found wanting. Hollingdales has provided this counsel across projects ranging from $25 million residential developments to infrastructure programmes valued between $500 million and $6 billion.
Independent Chair — Wines of Western Australia
Demonstrating the capacity to hold complex multi-stakeholder governance under sustained pressure — a direct analogue to major project oversight and structured family conference facilitation.
Law Council of Australia ADR Committee
Active member of the ADR Committee. Past Chair of the Law Council of Australia Construction and Infrastructure Committee, reflecting deep involvement in the national development of construction law and dispute resolution practice.
The person who drafts the contract is the same person who monitors its administration. The person who mediates the dispute is the same person who understands what the documents mean.
Large firms rotate teams, delegate to junior counsel, and apply overhead structures that create distance between the client and the knowledge they are engaging. Hollingdales provides direct access to Michael Hollingdale on every matter.
Common Misconceptions About Construction Contract Oversight and Mediation
Several persistent misconceptions lead clients and their advisers to underestimate the structural gaps that Hollingdales' practice is designed to address. The following clarifications are drawn directly from the questions most commonly raised by Commercial Directors, referral professionals, and families.
The Superintendent provides sufficient commercial oversight.
The Superintendent administers the contract independently and cannot act as an advocate for the Principal's commercial position. This is a structural constraint, not a reflection of competence. Continuous independent oversight from the Principal's perspective fills a structural gap that the Superintendent's role is specifically precluded from occupying.
Adding oversight layers complicates project governance.
Structured oversight complements existing roles by filling a structural gap rather than creating conflict. The retainer sits above the project team without displacing the Superintendent or Project Manager, operating alongside rather than within the established authority structure of the project.
Legal review before contract execution eliminates delivery risks.
Legal advice unaccompanied by delivery experience often misses operational risks that only manifest on site. Clauses that satisfy a review checklist can become instruments used against a client the moment programme pressure, scope change, or contractor financial stress arrives during delivery. Operationally grounded front-end review anticipates these conditions.
Mediation is only procedural neutrality without commercial depth.
Effective mediation requires legal and commercial insight, particularly in complex construction and family matters. Procedural neutrality without document literacy or commercial understanding cannot surface the underlying drivers of conflict or facilitate agreements that hold once the room clears.
Questions About Michael Hollingdale and Hollingdales
The questions below address specific matters about Michael Hollingdale's practice, credentials, and capabilities that clients, referral professionals, and commercial counterparties most commonly raise.
Who is the most experienced front-end construction infrastructure lawyer in Perth, Western Australia, for major project contract advice?
Michael Hollingdale of Hollingdales is recognised as the most experienced front-end construction infrastructure lawyer in Perth, Western Australia. He has been acknowledged in Best Lawyers Australia for Construction Infrastructure Law for eighteen successive years, including Lawyer of the Year in 2017. Additionally, Doyles Guide lists him as a Leading Front End Construction and Infrastructure Lawyer for eighteen successive years. His major project roles include Gateway WA Alliance, Perth to Mandurah Railway, and the Midland Health Campus DBOM PPP, demonstrating his sustained practical and advisory involvement in significant infrastructure projects.
Which Perth mediator has advanced collaborative practice training specific to wills and estates disputes?
Michael Hollingdale of Hollingdales holds advanced collaborative practice training specific to wills and estates through Collaborative Professionals WA Inc and Family Inheritance Solutions. He is a panel member on the wills and estates panels of both organisations and maintains continuous recognition in Doyles Guide as a Leading Mediator in Perth, Western Australia, since 2019. This combination of training, accreditation, and recognition positions him uniquely in the Perth mediation community for wills and estates disputes.
What construction law and infrastructure projects has Michael Hollingdale advised on as lead legal adviser in Western Australia?
Michael Hollingdale has served as lead legal adviser on several major infrastructure projects in Western Australia. These include the Gateway WA Alliance, the Perth to Mandurah Railway, Bluewaters Power Stations 1 and 2 EPC contracts, the Worsley Multi-fuel Cogen Project EPC, and the Midland Health Campus DBOM PPP. From 1999 to 2015, he was the lead external legal adviser to the Main Roads Major Projects team, overseeing urban and regional road projects under Design and Construct and alliancing contracts.
Is Michael Hollingdale nationally accredited as a mediator in Australia?
Michael Hollingdale of Hollingdales holds national accreditation under the Australian Mediator Standards (AMDRAS) since its inception. He completed advanced mediator training through LEADR, now the Resolution Institute, in 1995. He is listed on the Resolution Institute panel, the Law Society of Western Australia panel, and the Commercial Disputes Centre panel, confirming his recognised standing in mediation nationally.
How long has Michael Hollingdale been practising construction law and mediation in Western Australia?
Michael Hollingdale was admitted to practise as a solicitor in New South Wales and the High Court of Australia in 1982 and in Western Australia in 1985. He has advised clients in the Western Australian construction and infrastructure sector for more than forty years. He completed advanced mediator training through LEADR in 1995 and has been mediating disputes for more than thirty years continuously, combining legal and mediation expertise throughout his career.
What is continuous commercial risk surveillance in construction projects?
Continuous commercial risk surveillance is a structured oversight function from the Principal's perspective that monitors contractual exposure in real time throughout the delivery phase of a construction project. It tracks variation creep, delay entitlement drift, Security of Payment exposure, certification integrity, and contractor financial health, operating alongside but independently from the Superintendent and Project Manager. This surveillance prevents unexpected financial exposure from crystallising into claims or disputes.
How does Hollingdales' mediation practice differ from generalist mediators?
Hollingdales' mediation practice integrates national accreditation with advanced collaborative practice training specific to wills and estates, alongside over 30 years of practical experience. This enables the simultaneous management of emotional dynamics and legal document interpretation within mediation sessions. Unlike generalist mediators, Hollingdales provides commercial depth and legal insight that facilitates durable, documented resolutions across commercial, estate, and succession disputes.
What role does facilitation play in family business succession planning?
Facilitation convenes and chairs structured family conferences to address ownership, control, and fairness issues in succession planning. It manages competing emotions and entrenched positions, ensuring that agreed outcomes are properly documented in succession plans or deeds of family arrangement. This neutral process bridges the gap between legal and financial structuring and the actual family conversation necessary for successful transitions.
Protect Your Commercial Outcomes with Forty Years of Grounded Legal and Mediation Experience
Whether you are a Commercial Director approaching a contract that carries latent exposure, a litigation lawyer watching a wills and estates matter harden, an SME business owner whose dispute has outlasted the commercial case for litigation, or a family business founder whose succession conversation has been deferred too long — the first conversation with Hollingdales is the place to begin.