The High Court of Australia has decided that a third party claimant can join an insolvent or potentially insolvent defendants insurer to proceedings to seek a declaration that the insurer is liable to indemnify the defendant Partner Andrew Maher and Lawyer Shelley Drenth discuss the decision and its ...

The Productivity Commission has released an issues paper inviting submissions on the criteria that should be used to assess the efficiency and competitiveness of Australias superannuation system This will be of interest not only to superannuation trustees but also to service providers including fund ...

In this issue we look at a dismissal case emanating from poor behaviour at a company Christmas party the importance of the employment contract in determining whether a reduction in an employees pay and duties results in dismissal an employers difficulty in justifiying a summary dismissal and the ...

The Dodd Frank Act is a bit like the US financial system it is trying to regulate - vast complex and hard to wade through It creates a bunch of new regulators on top of what was already a pretty solid cast and gives them wide-ranging powers They can not only set capital and liquidity requirements ...

The Government has finally begun the process of implementing its policy on crowd-sourced equity funding CSEF by introducing a Bill and releasing draft exposure regulations late last year which envisage the establishment of a CSEF regime in Australia The Bill has been referred to the Senate Economics ...

The forecast for the year ahead for Australian anti-bribery laws and compliance is a busy one with a Senate inquiry new laws and a continued focus on suspected foreign bribery offences ...

The acting Federal Treasurer has made a determination under Australias national access regime to not declare access to the Newcastle shipping channel The decision is a reminder of the limits of the national access regime in challenging the pricing of infrastructure owners Partner John Hedge and ...

Water Services Association of Australia and Infrastructure Partnerships Australia the peak bodies for water utilities and infrastructure respectively have released a joint report that calls for major reform in the provision of urban water services across Australia The report suggests that there is a ...

The Federal Government has proposed new legislation that introduces two new criminal offences for false accounting into the Commonwealth Criminal Code The proposed false accounting offences are designed to help Australia comply with the OECDs Convention on Combating Bribery of Foreign Public ...

The release of the text of the Trans-Pacific Partnership Agreement has renewed the debate about the ability of foreign investors to sue governments under investor-State dispute settlement mechanisms which are commonly part of international trade agreements or investment treaties between States ...