Barrister’s battle to keep ‘offensive’ Lamborghini personalised plates
A Sydney barrister has declared war on Transport NSW after it tried to confiscate the personalised number plates on his prized supercar. The government body says the plates “LGOPNR” are offensive but Peter Lavac disagrees. SEE EXAMPLES OF BANNED NUMBER PLATES.
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Peter Lavac has had a hugely successful career taking on gangsters and murderers in the courtroom.
But his latest victory has seen him fight “bureaucratic bullies” for the right to “take the piss” out of himself and his prized bright yellow Lamborghini supercar — and its personalised number plate “LGOPNR”.
“I resent anyone who’s trying to violate my freedom of speech and expression,” the veteran barrister told The Sunday Telegraph.
Mr Lavac said 99 out of 100 people would never guess the letters are an abbreviation of the phrase “leg opener”.
“How can anyone be offended by something if they don‘t know what the f**k it means?” he said.
But it seems Transport NSW disagrees.
Last month, the department wrote to Mr Lavac, demanding he hand in his black and gold plates within 18 days.
“Transport for NSW determined that these number plates could be considered offensive and must be returned,” the letter stated.
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Mr Lavac challenged the letter in the local court on September 1 and won.
He appealed on the grounds the legislation Transport NSW referred to in ordering the plates be handed in was outdated and the letters were not offensive.
“They are meant to be humorous, tongue-in-cheek, funny and entertaining,” the former Hong Kong crown prosecutor said.
“That is how most people find them when it‘s explained to them.
“But how could you possibly construe recreational sex between two consenting adults as ever being offensive or demeaning in any way, shape or form?
“How many other little Aussie battlers who have similar bullying letters, have caved in and laid down and let (Transport NSW) walk all over them because they didn‘t have my resources or legal expertise to stand up to this and challenge them?”
Mr Lavac is calling the court result a win as Transport NSW used an incorrect section of law to request the plates.
But the motoring body believes the local court determined it didn’t have jurisdiction to determine an appeal.
Whatever the interpretation, Transport NSW still wants the plates back and Mr Lavac is ready for a fight.
Mr Lavac bought the V10, 650hp racing car about 12 months ago with a plan to spend less time in the courtroom and more time in the gym and on the road.
He wouldn’t specify how much he paid for the car but new it would cost about $500,000.
The self-described adrenaline junkie said the idea for the personalised plates came from a mate as a tribute to his playboy reputation.
“We were thinking of the usual bullshit words like maverick, top gun, iceman, which are all pretty tame and then one of the guys said: ‘What about LGOPNR’?” the married man of four decades recalled.
Asked to elaborate on this playboy tag, Mr Lavac explained that, much to his surprise early in life, he discovered he could “get girls very easily”.
“A lot of guys ribbed me about it, some guys hate me for it but it stuck with me my whole life,” he said.
“It is a massive taking-the-piss exercise.”
He successfully applied for the plates a year ago through Transport NSW and there were no questions asked.
After receiving the letter last month, he could only speculate about who filed a complaint about his tongue-in-cheek plates.
Maybe a member of the political correctness brigade, the “ridiculous woke movement fanatics” or a crazy feminist.
“Someone who decided to fire a complaint from coward‘s corner sitting behind the safety and anonymity of their keyboard,” he said.
“Or somebody who knows me and the car and resents me for driving a car like this — the old tall poppy syndrome is alive and well in Australia.”
Transport NSW safety, environment and regulation deputy secretary Tara McCarthy said while all personalised number plates are vetted on application, it is difficult to pick up content that give rise to controversy.
“If a member of the public finds a plate offensive they can report it to Transport for NSW which will investigate and the plate may then be recalled,” she said.
The Northern Beaches-based barrister is not the kind of bloke who does anything in halves.
He discovered a love for the gym as a 15-year-old boy, when he needed to build strength to defend himself and his mother against his abusive, alcoholic father.
Fitness became his greatest passion outside the courtroom and earned him world record status for a surfski voyage from Hong Kong to the Philippines and a gold medal in surf lifesaving.
It also helped him recover from lung cancer in 2008, a condition he famously attributed to a set of chain-smoking neighbours.
Now, he is “working hard to work as little as possible”.
But he couldn’t resist the lure of a legal challenge, when his friend and solicitor Greg Meakin urged him to appeal the Transport NSW letter.
Still, to anyone who finds the plates offensive, Mr Lavac is unashamedly unapologetic: “Tough shit.”