About

After spending almost a decade in private practice with Corrs Chambers Westgarth, Tig Pocock joined leading mining company BHP to undertake support on the company’s legal matters where he has remained for over a decade since. Recognised for his output in 2016’s GC Powerlist: Australia and New Zealand, Pocock has since added a range of new highlights to his already outstanding track record. He states he is particularly proud of the role he played in the investigation of ‘two fatalities at [BHP’s] Queensland operations over the past three years. BHP took the approach of not conducting these investigations under legal privilege, to ensure that the important organisational and practical safety lessons from these tragic events could be shared as widely as possible, both internally and externally. I believe that this approach is unique in the industry’.

Passionate about the role in-house legal functions can play in ensuring high-quality investigations that deliver critically important safety lessons, while balancing legal risks, Pocock has also led a project to develop and roll-out guidance and training for BHP’s legal function globally. Well acclimatised to the regulatory environment affecting BHP’s business, Pocock states he ‘continues to play a leading role in regulatory reform in the resources sector in Queensland, including as one of two industry representatives on a government working group negotiating important reforms to mine safety legislation in Queensland; coordinating BHP’s response to the parliamentary inquiry on coal miners’ pneumoconiosis; and playing an important role in representing industry and BHP’s interests in other regulatory reform including [the] environmental chain of responsibility laws, mining tenure reform, mine rehabilitation and financial assurance, and workers’ compensation’. Pocock’s record in transactions is also worthy of praise, and he has played a leading role in several major M&A’s for BHP in Australia, New Caledonia and Indonesia, including the recently announced sale of the Gregory Crinum mine to Sojitz. He has also supported BHP’s business-defining operations in Queensland, New South Wales and Indonesia, as well as being the lead advisor or legal reviewer on a number of major development projects including for new mines and major rail and port infrastructure in Australia, Indonesia and the US. In addition to his work for BHP, Pocock has actively contributed to the body of knowledge in the sector, his article “10 Commandments for External Counsel from an In-House Counsel”, on the LinkedIn Corporate Lawyers’ Network ‘continues to attract likes and comments, has been reposted multiple times, and has been adopted in graduate training programmes by at least one top-five Australian law firm’.

His contribution to industry discussion is also seen through his membership of Queensland Law Society’s Mining and Resources Committee, and the Queensland Resources Council’s Health and Safety and Exploration and Tenure Committees. Pocock’s standing within the industry is therefore well-established, and as one nominating source explains, she has ‘worked closely with Pocock in his role as principle, legal, BHP over the past six years on a wide range of matters. He has made a significant contribution to the Queensland resources sector over the past decade, through his participation and leadership in a range of important regulatory reforms relevant to the sector. He has a deep understanding of the sector and what is important to it, across a broad range of issues, and leads with passion and integrity’.