Topic 1: Explainer: is a High Court challenge about to bring down the Turnbull

government?

Link : https://theconversation.com/explainer-is-a-high-court-challenge-about-to-bring-
down-the-turnbull-government-80671

In that case, Chief Justice Garfield Barwick took an extremely narrow interpretation of the
provision, based on a finding that its historic purpose was to protect parliaments freedom
and independence from the influence of the Crown. An indirect pecuniary influence would
only be disqualifying where it involved a legal or equitable interest in a contract with on-
going obligations, and where the possibility of financial gain by the agreements existence or
performance could conceivably allow the Crown to influence an MP in relation to
parliamentary affairs.

Topic 2: The Rule of Law as an Assumption of the Australian Constitution

Link: https://auspublaw.org/2017/06/the-rule-of-law-as-an-assumption-of-the-
australian-constitution/

the aim of that broader project is to elucidate the relationship between the Constitution and
the rule of law. I examine whether the rule of law is a judicially enforceable doctrine of
Australian constitutional law, or a political ideal only partly implemented by constitutional
rules. This requires an assessment of whether, and to what extent, the Constitution reflects
various competing conceptions of the rule of law and indeed, how that protean concept is
understood within the Australian constitutional order. It also requires consideration of the
theory known as common law constitutionalism, which Thomas Poole described as a
potent phenomenon within contemporary public law discourse.

Topic 3: Australia doesnt have a constitutional right protecting freedom of the

person it needs one.

Link: https://theconversation.com/australia-doesnt-have-a-constitutional-right-
protecting-freedom-of-the-person-it-needs-one-80603
The recent wrongful detention of two Australian citizens by immigration authorities
highlights that our Constitution offers inadequate protection for freedom of the person. This
is not the first time Australian citizens have been unlawfully detained. In 2001, Vivian Solon,
who had suffered a head injury, was deported even though she told immigration officials she
was an Australian citizen. In 2004, Cornelia Rau, also an Australian citizen, was held in
immigration detention after she was unable to identify herself because of mental illness. The
government could do this because migration legislation does not require judicial authorisation
for a person to be deprived of their freedom. The Solon and Rau cases were found to be only
two of more than 247 instances of unlawful detention that had occurred over the previous 14
years. The extent of the governments power was revealed in 2015, when the Department of
Immigration announced Operation Fortitude. This would have involved stopping people
randomly on Melbournes streets to check their migration status. The operation was cancelled
only after mass public protest.

Topic 4: The State of the Australian Judicature

that is a judicature that is seen to be impartial, independent and fearless in applying the law, a
competent judicature with judges and practitioners who know the law and its purposes and
who are alive to the connection between abstract legal principle and its practical effect and
who accept and observe the limitations on judicial power and within those limitations
develop or assist in developing the law to answer the needs of society from time to time.

Topic 5: Access to Justice Issues Faced by Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander
Peoples in Western Australia

In this paper we look at the history within Western Australia of providing government
assisted legal representation to the Indigenous community, what services are currently
provided within the justice system and what other countries have done to address the
overrepresentation of Indigenous people within the justice system.