This article draws on survey results to provide a preliminary empirical benchmark of the impact in the Asia-Pacific Region of strict-liability product liability law reforms, implemented in many jurisdictions since the 1990s based often on the 1985 European Commission Directive. It identifies...

This article uses the context of tort reform legislation to trace the impact of legislation on the principles and operation of tort law, and to analyse the continuing role of the common law in an age of statutes. Broad legislative reforms raise a number of questions of statutory interpretation...

The introduction of proportionate liability for claims for purely economic loss and property damage arising out of tortious or contractual negligence, or misleading and deceptive conduct by corporations and others, will change the way litigation will be planned and conducted in Australia, as it...

Over the last decade there have been numerous revelations about the harms suffered by children in a range of institutions in Australia. In 1997 the Human Rights and Equal Opportunity Commission reported on the experiences of the Aboriginal Stolen Generations in Bringing them Home, and a number...

This paper, an edited and footnoted transcript of a presentation at a research Centre of Excellence at Hokkaido University, looks at the influence of “responsive regulation” theory on the large-scale “Australian Consumer Law” reforms enacted in 2010. It outlines some frameworks developed...

Judicial interviews with children in contested parenting proceedings are an uncommon and contentious practice in Australia and many other common law jurisdictions. While there has been some debate about the merits and risks of such a practice among professionals and academic commentators, there...

Judicial interviews with children in contested parenting proceedings are an uncommon and contentious practice in Australia and many other common law jurisdictions. This article reports on a study of the views of Australian judges concerning talking with children in chambers. Most judges were...

The meaning of "de facto relationship" has changed dramatically in Australian law in recent years. The most obvious changes are the raft of legislative reforms including same-sex couples as de facto couples in a wide array of state laws through 1999-2004. Additionally, an examination of recent...

In his keynote address to the annual conference of the Insolvency Practitioners Association of Australia (IPAA), October 2006, Justice Austin reviews the law concerning the fiduciary duties of external administrators, especially voluntary administrators appointed under Part 5.3A of the...