Taxation law — Principles of interpretation of tax Acts — Form and substance — Partnerships — Change in ownership — Disposals other than in the ordinary course of business — Election by partnership to value trading stock at cost price — Dividend stripping — Income Tax Assessment Act 1936 (Cth) — Ss. 36, 36A

The Australian Constitution expressly guarantees very few individual rights. One of its rights-conferring provisions is s 116. Incongruously situated in the Chapter dealing with the States, s 116 prohibits the Commonwealth from, amongst other things, legislating against the free exercise of religion or for the establishment of any religion. The United States Constitution, by contrast, includes a comprehensive Bill of Rights which includes a similar, though not identical, religious guarantee. In very different contexts therefore both the High Court of Australia and the Supreme Court of the United States of America have adjudicated upon a similar constitutional provision.

Much has been written about the general justifications for providing legal protection for trade marks — for example, it has been said that trade marks help to reduce consumer search costs, that they protect against the misappropriation of other traders’ labour and investment, and that they may provide traders with incentives to invest in the development of new marks. However, it is important not to conflate these justifications with the reasons for having registered trade mark systems. To the extent that this issue has been considered, the principal justification for registration that has been put forward is that trade mark registers act as an important source of public information. More specifically, trade mark registers provide information as to the signs that are protected in a given commercial sphere and as to matters such as initial ownership of trade marks and subsequent assignments thereof. Consequently, in order for a trade mark register to perform its function effectively, it is essential that it reflect as accurately as possible the marks that enjoy legal protection and that those consulting the register are able to rely on the information it conveys.

We report the first observation of the Dorantes longtail, Thorybes dorantes (Stoll, 1790) (Lepidoptera: Hesperiidae), in Canada. On 16 April 2023, a single adult was observed on the northwest shore of Lake Ontario, in Toronto, Ontario, Canada. The observation represents a 1500- to 2000-km disjunction from the species’ nearest known populations in North America. After considering several scenarios that could explain the occurrence of the Dorantes longtail in Canada, the most likely explanation is that the observed individual came in on produce through the Ontario Food Terminal, Etobicoke, Ontario, providing another example of the constant pressure of species introductions to the region.

A number of questions concerning the construction and application of section 57 of the Constitution have now been determined by the High Court. The purposes of this note are to examine critically some implications of these answers and to direct attention to some other technical questions that could arise in the future. The special interest of the writer in these matters arises from the fact that he was closely involved in the preparation of documents in relation to the double dissolutions of 1974 and 1975 and the joint sitting of 1974.

It is not within the purposes of this article to discuss generally the extent to which the Governor-General may be entitled to exercise a personal judgment or discretion in granting or refusing a double dissolution. That is a matter of constitutional propriety rather than the justiciable constitutional law with which this article is concerned.

The presented research investigates the impact of interference on the performance of aircraft Global Navigation Satellite System (GNSS) receivers with a specific focus on the behaviour of Automatic Dependent Surveillance-Broadcast (ADS-B) position quality indicators. Several experiments were performed with different aircraft types, such as Airbus, Boeing, Beechcraft King Air B350 or Tecnam, and using various intensities of GNSS jamming. The behaviour of various quality indicators, such as the Navigation Integrity Category, Navigation Accuracy Category, Source Integrity Level and System Design Assurance transmitted in different types of ADS-B messages, is analysed. We investigate not only situations where the quality indicators drop to zero, but also the complete evolution of the changes in the indicators as a function of the increasing power of the jamming signal. Based on the analysis of changes in the ADS-B quality indicators, the estimation of the most likely interference signal power required to discontinue the tracking of an already acquired GPS L1 Coarse/Acquisition signal is made. Additionally, the interference signal power to prevent re-acquisition is also estimated. The findings improve the understanding of interference effects and can support the development of robust interference mitigation techniques in aviation applications.

In response to a recommendation of the Joint Select Committee on the Family Law Act, the Government has announced the appointment of an ad hoc committee of enquiry to study the implications of introducing a full matrimonial property regime in Australia. This committee will recommend whether there should be a fixed set of rules determining the ownership of property of married persons. Such a set of rules could apply during the subsistence of marriage, upon dissolution of marriage or both. Adoption of a set of rules governing property rights during the subsistence of marriage would displace the ordinary law of property and the special doctrines developed by the courts of equity as applicable to married persons. Adoption of fixed rules governing re-allocation of property upon dissolution of marriage would displace the discretionary system as applied by courts exercising jurisdiction under the Family Law Act 1975 (Cth). Since there is a world-wide movement away from fixed rules determining property interests during marriage, legislation to this effect is unlikely.

Proceedings in some Australian legislatures in recent years in relation to alleged contempts of Parliament and breaches of Parliamentary privilege have been followed by a similar episode in the House of Assembly of the Territory of Papua and New Guinea. The proceedings in the Territory are noteworthy not only because they were the first of their kind there, but also because they drew attention to substantial and unforeseen difficulties in attempts to transfer the power to deal with contempts and breaches of privilege from Parliament to the courts. The House of Assembly of the Territory of Papua and New Guinea, along with the Legislative Council of the Northern Territory, has effected through legislation an abdication of its powers to punish those persons found guilty of contempts. This transfer of power from Parliament to the courts has been shown to be of uncertain extent by the proceedings in the House of Assembly. The fact that even a partial delegation of this power has been achieved in these two jurisdictions distinguishes the two territorial legislatures from those of all the Australian States and from the House of Representatives of the Parliament of the Commonwealth, which have generally preserved to themselves the power to deal with alleged breaches of privilege. As will be seen, this transfer of power presents the two territorial legislatures with novel and distinctive problems, no solution to which has yet been reached.

In this article the author examines the expanding rôle which public interest groups can play in decision making in our society. He discusses the proposals of the Law Reform Commission to ease the present rigid locus standi requirements and points out that the main issue is not access to the courts but to government itself, and that various matters which he then investigates control public access. He concludes by suggesting several ways in which the present situation may be modified and improved.

The possibility that an Australian State might one day seek to unilaterally secede from the Commonwealth has always held an ambiguous position in the political and constitutional folklore of Australia. On the one hand, such a notion conjures up visions of rampant political idiosyncrasy so ludicrous as to provoke little more than amused disbelief. On the other, even to pose the conceptual question of the disintegration of the painstakingly constructed and laboriously maintained Australian federal structure is to raise an issue almost too distasteful to contemplate. The status of secession as both a political and constitutional topic has thus essentially been that of a joke, but of a joke which, when fully considered, might be regarded as being in thoroughly bad taste.

These exasperated words were uttered by John Quick on Wednesday, 2nd March, 1898, in the concluding stages of the Australasian Federal Convention Debates that led to the formation of the Australian Constitution. Quick wanted a definition of citizenship in the Constitution. The Commonwealth, he argued, should have power to deal with Commonwealth citizenship, and membership of the Commonwealth; he advocated a “common citizenship for the whole of the Australian Commonwealth”. His proposals were rejected.

Individuals and organisations are frequently required to provide public agencies with information about their affairs which they would not wish disseminated to others. Income tax returns represent one illustration. From time to time attempts are made to compel the recipient public agencies to produce such material as evidence in court proceedings. The agency may resist disclosure on the basis of a statutory secrecy provision and/or a claim to Crown privilege. The court is thus required to resolve a conflict between competing public interests: the public interest in the proper administration of justice, and the public interest in the ability of the agency to maintain the confidentiality of information entrusted to it. Professor Nettheim considers a number of decided cases and concludes that, on the whole, the courts have failed to develop a body of principles adequate to deal with the situation. In particular, established Crown privilege doctrines about waiver and secondary evidence are inappropriate in this context. The author puts forward a suggested model of principles and procedures, and notes that similar issues may arise for adjudication under Freedom of Information legislation, particularly in the form of the “reverse FOIA lawsuit”.