Crispin Hull

We have juries in Australia for serious criminal cases. They determine the facts, apply the law as explained to them by the judge, and decide whether the accused is innocent or guilty.

Juries, selected from the mass of the population, and are a bastion of freedom against the oppression of the state. That’s the theory, anyway. They also provide another function: they make sure that excessive legalism and technicalities are not used to defeat justice. They apply a common-sense view to the facts and the law.

The division is clear. Judges deal with the law. Juries deal with the facts and the applying of the facts to the law. That’s the theory, anyway.
Continue reading “July 07 1992 – Column28a”

Why is the Archbishop of Melbourne and Primate of the Anglican Church in Australia going to be stopped from performing in a circus in the ACT?

This idiotic thought came to me as I was reading a proposed amendment to the Animal Welfare Bill. It says a “”prohibited circus animal means _ (a) a primate; (b) a bear cheetah, elephant, giraffe, leopard, lion, puma or tiger or (c) and animal prescribed (by the Minister).

I looked in the dictionary to find that a primate means head of the Anglican Church or any mammal of the order Primate that includes man, the apes, monkeys the lemurs etc. Ah, ah, so humans are going to be prohibited circus animals, too. No so fast, the people who draft laws are more clever than that. Earlier on in the Act is says “”animal means an amphibian, bird, fish, a mammal and a reptile but does not include a human being”.
Continue reading “July 07 1992, Column21”

Who knows, Alan Bond may yet again become a millionaire. But one thing’s for sure, he will never get back the two years he spend in jail. This it is with PC owners. They make a huge investment in their computer programs. The money is trivial. The investment is in time. The money spent on a dud program can always be re-earned; the time is gone forever.

Few users will willingly toss out a program they have learned for something supposedly superior. It is hard to get people to swap from one program to another, let alone swap from Apple to MS-DOS or vice versa.

Some people are forced to swap because they change jobs and the new one has different programs. But generally people grow into a program or family of programs and stay with them, and will announce the programs they use are the best thing since sliced bread even though many other users are quite happy and healthy eating multi-grain rolls.
Continue reading “1992_07_july_excel”

The republican movement in Australia shows there is little demand for radical constitutional changes, according to the Clerk of the Senate, Harry Evans.

In a lecture at Parliament House yesterday, Mr Evans said republicans wanted the constitutional system left as it is, with the exception of a change in the Head of State. Thus it showed Australia’s constitutional system was in good shape.

There was no the same demand for radical changes as in Britain, Canada and New Zealand. these countries had real problems which caused the demands for change. Many of the changes sought were already in place in Australia.
Continue reading “1992_07_july_evans”

Accused people in custody in the ACT can expect a wait of 2 months before trial.

This is an increase of nearly one month from December last year, according to the latest figures issued by the ACT Law Society.

Accused not in custody can now expect to wait 16 months for a trial.

The waiting times underline recent pleas from judges and the profession for the appointment of a fourth resident judge for the ACT Supreme Court.
Continue reading “1992_07_july_delay”

The right of newspapers to report court proceedings was stressed in the ACT Supreme Court yesterday in the over-turning of a $10,500 award for defamation.

Constable Daniel Peter Edwards sued Federal Capital Press of Australia Pty Ltd, publisher of The Canberra Times, over a court report. He won his case in the Magistrates Court before Magistrate Peter Dingwall earlier this year. That was overturned yesterday by Justice John Gallop.

It is only the second time in 28 years that a media defendant has won a defamation case in the ACT. The Canberra Times won an action in May this year. The last media defendant to win before that was in 1964.
Continue reading “1992_07_july_defowin”

The ACT Attorney-General, Terry Connolly, is hoping to serve the ACT community by standing and waiting on defamation law reform, despite the fact that the three eastern states have gone into an advanced state of farnarkling over proposals first put by the Queensland Attorney-General, Dean Wells, in June, 1990, for a uniform law.

Mr Connolly said yesterday that, the ACT had not given up on uniform defamation laws, despite the delays in NSW and Victoria.

“”There are enormous advantages in uniform laws for the ACT,” he said, bravely taking the John Donne approach. Just as Donne recognised “”no man is and island”, Mr Connolly said the ACT was as island in NSW and nearly all publication and broadcasts in the ACT were also publications and broadcasts in NSW.
Continue reading “1992_07_july_defo”

The ACT would not press ahead with a separate defamation reform Act despite the delay in the uniform Bill in the eastern states, the Attorney-General, Terry Connolly, said yesterday.

The reform plan was first put by the Queensland Attorney-General, Dean Wells, in June, 1990. He called for greater protection for publication of matter of public importance while safeguarding privacy.

Mr Connolly said he had not given up on uniform defamation laws.

“”There are enormous advantages in uniform laws for the ACT,” he said, “”The ACT is as island in NSW and nearly all publications and broadcasts in the ACT were also publications and broadcasts in NSW.
Continue reading “1992_07_july_defo15”

The first draft chapter of a new plain-English criminal code for Australia has been issued by the committee of the eight Australian Attorneys-General.

At present the Australian states and territories are divided into “code” states (Queensland, Western Australia, Tasmania and the Northern Territory) and common-law states (NSW, Victoria, South Australia and the ACT).

The standing committee of Attorneys-General said in 1990 that the inconsistency in criminal law in Australia could no longer be justified and set up the criminal law officers committee to build on work done by the Gibbs committee on criminal law to achieve consistency if not uniformity among the states.
Continue reading “1992_07_july_crime”