''Do you work here?'' the shorts-clad gent inquired of Ipp, the former ICAC commissioner who was then presiding over landmark corruption inquiries into the now-infamous Labor figures Eddie Obeid and Ian Macdonald.

''I said yes,'' recalls the South African-born 75-year-old, ''and he said, ‘good on ya!’ ''

The former NSW Court of Appeal judge laughs loudly – an infectious guffaw that is so well-known in legal circles, a former colleague once quipped it should be turned into a mobile phone ringtone.

We are lunching at Bistro Moncur, a French-inspired eatery that is among Ipp’s lunchtime haunts. The former silk says with a wry smile: ''It’s difficult for me to explain why I’m sitting here with you.''

But he can explain it, really. His retirement from the top job in January has given him the freedom to ''put the record straight'' in response to some of the criticisms levelled against ICAC in recent months.

The commission has come under fire this year as it switches its focus from Labor to Liberal heavyweights, with calls for it to hold its hearings in private to minimise reputational damage (''I think that’s absolute rubbish!'' Ipp exclaims – but more on that later).

''I can tell you that my experience is the ordinary man and woman in the street are very satisfied with what ICAC has done,'' Ipp prefaces his anecdote about the ebullient construction worker.

If attacks on the corruption watchdog seem a sobering subject for a Friday lunch, Ipp is already living up to his reputation for possessing a lively wit.

''She’s the boss,'' he tells the waiter, deadpan, when he asks if we are ready to order.

''I come here quite often so I know what I like,'' he says. ''I’ll have the minute steak.''

It is no surprise Ipp is a decisive luncher (I settle, after some dallying, on the pan-fried barramundi, and Ipp adds a glass of pinot to his order when the food arrives).

It seems he has accomplished everything in his 50-year legal career in top gear.

He was appointed a judge of the West Australian Supreme Court in 1989, just eight years after he left South Africa with his wife and three school-age children and settled in Perth.

Immigrating to Australia, Ipp says, was ''the hardest thing I’ve ever done'', but from an outsider’s perspective it seems a meteoric rise to the bench.

Eight years was then the minimum time a lawyer had to spend in the local profession before being eligible to don the judicial robes.

What makes Ipp’s rapid ascension even more remarkable is that he had to adapt to a different legal system – from the Roman Dutch system of law practised in South Africa to the British tradition in Australia.

''I arrived in June and in July I was busy arguing a case in the Supreme Court there, and I felt like a blind man groping about in a room full of traps,'' he says. ''Harmful missiles could go off if I pressed the wrong button!''

Ipp knew ''one person'' in Perth, close friend and later WA Court of Appeal president Christopher Steytler, QC, who left South Africa in the late 1970s.

Years later, Steytler would be appointed parliamentary inspector of the WA equivalent of ICAC, the Corruption and Crime Commission.

Ipp, meanwhile, had moved to Sydney and joined the NSW Court of Appeal, first as an acting judge and then as a permanent fixture in 2002. He was appointed head of ICAC in November 2009 by the Rees Labor government.

The 20 years he spent in Perth, Ipp says, were ''the longest I’ve ever stayed in one place'' in his adult life.

The eldest of three children, Ipp was born in Johannesburg in the late 1930s, a decade before apartheid was introduced in South Africa.

He had a ''very happy home life'' but ''from early teenage years I thought that it was an unfair society and I didn’t want to live in it,'' he says of his birth country.

The young Ipp was enthralled by the lives of British QCs as fictionalised in a series of books by Edgar Lustgarden, a British broadcaster and crime writer, and knew he wanted to be a barrister from the age of about 11.

''I could imagine myself saving all these people from the gallows, all these innocent people,'' he says dryly. ''Little did I know that I would do no criminal law. Well, I did a little bit.''

As a young barrister in South Africa, Ipp was drawn to commercial law but acted free of charge for people accused of very serious crimes as part of his professional obligations.

''Those cases which could attract a death penalty were called swingers, and so I had a number of swingers – but none of my clients ever swung,'' Ipp says.

Memorably, he once acted for the Roman Catholic Archbishop of Cape Town, whose kindness to black people was looked upon unfavourably by the government.

It was here, perhaps, that Ipp acquired a taste – or the requisite grit – for acting in causes that would offend powerful figures.

''I seem to have spent a lot of my professional life doing things that a lot of people object to,'' he jokes when I ask him about his role heading a review of Australian negligence laws in 2002.

The recommendations of the Ipp report, when implemented, led to a dramatic reduction in negligence cases and Ipp says some barristers ''still today don’t forgive me for it''.

But other professionals, such as doctors, were ''very glad'' some restrictions had been placed on claims.

Of course, it is his role at ICAC that has attracted the greatest attention in his career, although Ipp tells me rather proudly he gave ''not one'' interview during his four year stint as commissioner.

He was involved in the preparation for some of the present investigations, including the probe into Obeid-linked company Australian Water Holdings and the inquiry into Liberal fund-raising, which resumes public hearings on Wednesday.

''It’s really interesting to be a member of the public now and see what comes to fruition,'' Ipp says.

He says he was ''shocked'' and ''sad'' to see Barry O'Farrell resign as premier after his evidence in the Australian Water probe was contradicted by a handwritten thank you note.

But he is disturbed by recent calls for the commission to hold its hearings in private, and says one of the ICAC's ''most important weapons'' is the use of public exposure.

''The whole raison d'etre of ICAC is the exposure of corruption,'' he says. ''The idea of exposing corruption behind closed doors is oxymoronic.''

Ipp says no findings have been handed down in the latest inquiry, ''so how anybody can come to a firm conclusion that anybody’s reputation has been trashed...escapes me''.

''But if you think about past inquiries,'' he adds, stressing that he is not commenting on current investigations, ''I think my response is: just name one person whose reputation has been unfairly trashed.''

We order coffee as our plates are cleared away, and I ask him why he thinks there has been a backlash against ICAC as it turns its gaze from Labor to Liberal figures.

''It may be that the evidence against Obeid and Macdonald was so strong it was hard to say what ICAC was doing was unfair, especially when you had half the Bylong Valley cheering in the hearing room,'' Ipp says, in a nod to the enthusiastic band of spectators at the inquiry into the Obeid family's coal-rich farm.

''What you’ve got now are senior members of the Liberal Party – different group – and I think their feathers have been ruffled. My own personal experience is that whenever you start investigating politicians seriously, they will use whatever political weapons they have to attack.''

In June, the state government announced a parliamentary inquiry into the number of prosecutions arising from ICAC's findings, a move that could lead to a change in its powers.

Ipp says delays in the past in bringing prosecutions were not only the fault of the Director of Public Prosecutions.

He says the DPP had a ''legitimate complaint'' that the commission would throw ''masses of transcripts and statements'' at it rather than compiling concise briefs of evidence, but the watchdog has changed its ways and there has been ''a revolution in the way the briefs are put together''.

He also believes DPP solicitors, rather than the commission's investigators, should take the witness statements for the cases – an idea that has met with some resistance.

The lunch crowd is thinning as I ask Ipp if he misses the commission.

He gives a wry smile and says he's glad he took on the role but he doesn't miss the ''enmity and hostility'' between barristers in the hearing room.

He is equally philosophical about his time on the bench, telling me he once read a book about retired judges who ''wander around the corridors [in the courts] hoping that someone will recognise them or talk to them''.

''I was determined that was not going to be me.''

LIFE AND TIMES

1938 Born in Johannesburg, South Africa.

1960 Graduates in Commerce/Law from Afrikaans-speaking Stellenbosch University.

1964 Made a partner, aged 26, in Johannesburg law firm Hayman Godfrey & Sanderson.

1973 Called to South African bar.

1981 Immigrates to Australia with wife and three children, settles in Perth.

1985 Appointed Queen's Counsel.

1989 Appointed a judge of West Australian Supreme Court.

2001 Moves to Sydney, joins NSW Court of Appeal.

2009 Appointed ICAC Commissioner.

2014 Retires from ICAC after historic inquiries into NSW Labor figures.