Assignment of lease between lessees as joint tenants-is lessor’s consent required?

The decision of Lockrey v Historic Houses Trust of New South Wales [2012] NSWSC 654 raises an interesting issue about the necessity of seeking the consent of the lessor where there is an assignment of a lease between joint tenants who already hold the lease when one joint tenant sells the business operated on the leased premises to the other joint tenant. A secondary issue raised by the proceedings concerns whether the lessor’s consent was unreasonably withheld under the processes under Retail Leases Act 1994 (NSW) (“the Act”) upon the grounds of lack of provision of information as to the remaining lessee’s financial standing.

Assignment of reversion on put option contained in a lease : what is the effect?

Justice Mullins of the Queensland Supreme Court recently considered the status of a put option contained in a registered lease in circumstances where there was an assignment of the reversion. The matter arose for determination in Denham Bros Ltd v W Freestone Leasing Pty Ltd [2002] QSC 307. The decision is of interest as a lease containing a put option, exercisable by a landlord, is perhaps less commonly encountered than a lease containing a call option, exercisable by a tenant.

Unreasonable withholding of consent?

In Cathmark Pty Ltd v NetherCott Constructions Pty Ltd [2011] QSC 86, Cullinane J was asked to consider whether a landlord had unreasonably withheld consent to a tenant’s proposed assignment of lease. In reaching a conclusion that the landlord had acted unreasonably, the decision provides useful guidance on an issue that is common in a proposed sale of business context.

Confirmation of the assignment of vibrations of goethite: An ATR and IES study of goethite structure

Transmission electron microscopy (TEM), field emission scanning electron microscopy (FE-SEM/EDS) and X-ray diffraction (XRD) were used to characterize the morphology of synthetic goethite. The behavior of the hydroxyl/water molecular units of goethite and its thermally treated products were characterized using Fourier transform-infrared emission spectroscopy (FT-IES) and attenuated total reflectance–Fourier transform infrared (ATR–FTIR) spectroscopy. The results showed that all the expected vibrational bands between 4000 and 650 cm−1 including the resolved bands (3800–2200 cm−1) were confirmed. A band attributed to a new type of hydroxyl unit was found at 3708 cm−1 and assigned to the FeO–H stretching vibration without hydrogen bonding. This hydroxyl unit was retained up to the thermal treatment temperature of 500 °C. On the whole, seven kinds of hydroxyl units, involving three surface hydroxyls, a bulk hydroxyl, a FeO–H without hydrogen bonding, a nonstoichiometric hydroxyl and a reversed hydroxyl were observed, and three kinds of adsorbed water were found in/on goethite.

Regional chromosomal assignment of human renin gene to 1q12→qter and use in linkage studies in Charcot-Marie-Tooth disease

The gene for renin, previously mapped to human chromosome 1, was further localized to 1q12 → qter using human-mouse somatic cell hybrid DNAs. The renin DNA probe used (λ HR5) could detect a HindIII restriction fragment length polymorphism. When used in studies of 12 informative families, no linkage could be found between the renin and Charcot-Marie-Tooth disease. Furthermore, an association of any renin allele with hypertension was not apparent.

Using ambient ozone for assignment of double bond position in unsaturated lipids

Unsaturated lipids deposited onto a range of materials are observed to react with the low concentrations of ozone present in normal laboratory air. Parent lipids and ozonolysis cleavage products are both detected directly from surfaces by desorption electrospray ionisation mass spectrometry (DESI-MS) with the resulting mass spectra providing clear evidence of the double bond position within these molecules. This serendipitous process has been coupled with thin-layer chromatography (TLC) to provide a simple but powerful approach for the detailed structural elucidation of lipids present in complex biological extracts. Lipid extracts from human lens were deposited onto normal phase TLC plates and then developed to separate components according to lipid class. Exposure of the developed plates to laboratory air for ca. 1 h prior to DESI-MS analysis gave rise to ozonolysis products allowing for the unambiguous identification of double bond positions in even low abundant, unsaturated lipids. In particular, the co-localization of intact unsaturated lactosylceramides (LacCer) with products from their oxidative cleavage provide the first evidence for the presence of three isomeric LacCer (d18:0/24:1) species in the ocular lens lipidome, i.e., variants with double bonds at the n-9, n-7 and n-5 positions.

Using genetic algorithm in profile-based assignment of applications to virtual machines for greener data centers

The increase in data center dependent services has made energy optimization of data centers one of the most exigent challenges in today's Information Age. The necessity of green and energy-efficient measures is very high for reducing carbon footprint and exorbitant energy costs. However, inefficient application management of data centers results in high energy consumption and low resource utilization efficiency. Unfortunately, in most cases, deploying an energy-efficient application management solution inevitably degrades the resource utilization efficiency of the data centers. To address this problem, a Penalty-based Genetic Algorithm (GA) is presented in this paper to solve a defined profile-based application assignment problem whilst maintaining a trade-off between the power consumption performance and resource utilization performance. Case studies show that the penalty-based GA is highly scalable and provides 16% to 32% better solutions than a greedy algorithm.

Breaches of lease between exercise of option to renew and expiry of lease in Queensland

The decision of Greppo v Jam-Cal Bundaberg Pty Ltd [2015] QCA 131 illustrates a defect in s 128 of the Property Law Act 1974(Qld) which gives a right to a lessee to apply for relief against forfeiture against loss of a right to exercise an option to renew. The defect arises because the legislation does not adequately deal with breaches that occur after the exercise of the option but before the expiry of the lease. Most commercial leases of all kinds have a standard provisions, as the lease in this case, as a conditions of the exercise of the option to renew that the lessee will have given notice of exercise within the time specified to the lessor and will have up to the date of expiry of the lease paid all rent and observed all lessee’s covenants. The difficulties occur because invariably an option must be exercised before the expiry of the lease when a lessee may not be in breach of the lease but may later prior to the expiry of the lease fall into breach. As this decision indicates,at least in Queensland, that the lessee who desires to challenge the lessor’s right to enforce those conditions can neither seek relief under s 128 against forfeiture of the right to exercise the option ,or indeed, under s 124 of the Property Law Act 1974 to preserve the agreement for lease brought about by the otherwise regular exercise of the option to renew. The decision cries out for legislative reform along the lines of s 133E of the Conveyancing Act 1919(NSW) which was amended in 2001 to meet this contingency.

Assignments of non-retail commercial leases: Some contentious issues

Assignment clauses in non-retail commercial leases are as infinitely varied as the circumstances in which disputes arise. Each clause must be individually interpreted as part of the lease in which it is embedded. Whilst the assignment of a lease is one of the most commonplace transactions between lessor and lessee, the case law reveals few unifying principles. This article seeks to cautiously identify a set of principles which should be in the mind of any lawyer when a dispute relating to an assignment arises. It concludes with a short checklist of matters which must be considered by such a person to encourage the application of principles in the first instance towards a resolution of the dispute.

The reliability of information on work-related injuries available from hospitalisation data in Australia

Objective: To examine the reliability of work-related activity coding for injury-related hospitalisations in Australia. Method: A random sample of 4373 injury-related hospital separations from 1 July 2002 to 30 June 2004 were obtained from a stratified random sample of 50 hospitals across 4 states in Australia. From this sample, cases were identified as work-related if they contained an ICD-10-AM work-related activity code (U73) allocated by either: (i) the original coder; (ii) an independent auditor, blinded to the original code; or (iii) a research assistant, blinded to both the original and auditor codes, who reviewed narrative text extracted from the medical record. The concordance of activity coding and number of cases identified as work-related using each method were compared. Results: Of the 4373 cases sampled, 318 cases were identified as being work-related using any of the three methods for identification. The original coder identified 217 and the auditor identified 266 work-related cases (68.2% and 83.6% of the total cases identified, respectively). Around 10% of cases were only identified through the text description review. The original coder and auditor agreed on the assignment of work-relatedness for 68.9% of cases. Conclusions and Implications: The current best estimates of the frequency of hospital admissions for occupational injury underestimate the burden by around 32%. This is a substantial underestimate that has major implications for public policy, and highlights the need for further work on improving the quality and completeness of routine, administrative data sources for a more complete identification of work-related injuries.

Student success : the identification and support of first year university students at risk of attrition

The engagement behaviour of 1,524 student-enrolments (“students”) in five first year units was monitored and 608 (39.9%) were classified as “at risk” using the criterion of not submitting or failing their first assignment. Of these, 327 (53.8%) were successfully contacted (i.e., spoken to by phone) and provided with advice and/or referral to learning and personal support services while the remaining 281 (46.2%) could not be contacted. Nine hundred and sixteen students (60.1%) were classified as “not at risk.” Overall, the at risk group who were contacted achieved significantly higher end-of-semester final grades than, and persisted (completed the unit) at more than twice the rate of, the at risk group who were not contacted. There were variations among the units which were explained by the timing of the first assignment, specific teaching-learning processes and the structure of the curriculum. Implications for curriculum design and supporting first year students within a personal, social and academic framework are discussed.

Narratives of mitigation : sentencing Indigenous criminal defendants in South Australia’s Higher Courts

In their statistical analyses of higher court sentencing in South Australia, Jeffries and Bond (2009) found evidence that Indigenous offenders were treated more leniently than non-Indigenous offenders, when they appeared before the court under similar numerical circumstances. Using a sample of narratives for criminal defendants convicted in South Australia’s higher courts, the current article extends Jeffries and Bond’s (2009) prior statistical work by drawing on the ‘focal concerns’ approach to establish whether, and in what ways, Indigeneity comes to exert a mitigating influence over sentencing. Results show that the sentencing stories of Indigenous and non-Indigenous offenders differed in ways that may have reduced assessments of blameworthiness and risk for Indigenous defendants. In addition, judges highlighted a number of Indigenous-specific constraints that potentially could result in imprisonment being construed as an overly harsh and costly sentence for Indigenous offenders.

Raman spectroscopic study of the hydroxy-arsenate mineral geminite Cu(AsO3OH)•H2O

The mineral geminite, an hydrated hydroxy-arsenate mineral of formula Cu(AsO3OH)•H2O, has been studied by Raman and infrared spectroscopy. Two minerals from different origins were investigated and the spectra proved quite similar. In the Raman spectra of geminite, four bands are observed at 813, 843, 853 and 885 cm-1. The assignment of these bands is as follows: (a) The band at 853 cm-1 is assigned to the AsO43- ν1 symmetric stretching mode (b) the band at 885 cm-1 is assigned to the AsO3OH2- ν1 symmetric stretching mode (c) the band at 843 cm-1 is assigned to the AsO43- ν3 antisymmetric stretching mode (d) the band at 813 cm-1 is ascribed to the AsO3OH2- ν3 antisymmetric stretching mode. Two Raman bands at 333 and 345 cm-1 are attributed to the ν2 AsO4 3- bending mode and a set of higher wavenumber bands are assigned to the ν4 AsO43- bending mode. A very complex set of overlapping bands is observed in both the Raman and infrared spectra. Raman bands are observed at 2288, 2438, 2814, 3152, 3314, 3448 and 3521 cm-1. Two Raman bands at 2288 and 2438 cm-1 are ascribed to very strongly hydrogen bonded water. The broader Raman bands at 3152 and 3314 cm-1 may be assigned to adsorbed water and not so strongly hydrogen bonded water in the molecular structure of geminate. Two bands at 3448 and 3521 cm-1 are assigned to the OH stretching vibrations of the (AsO3OH)2- units. Raman spectroscopy identified Raman bands attributable to AsO43- and AsO3OH2- units.

Vibrational spectroscopic studies of wool

Fourier transfonn (FT) Raman, Raman microspectroscopy and Fourier transform infrared (FTIR) spectroscopy have been used for the structural analysis and characterisation of untreated and chemically treated wool fibres. For FT -Raman spectroscopy novel methods of sample presentation have been developed and optimised for the analysis of wool. No significant fluorescence was observed and the spectra could be obtained routinely. The stability of wool keratin to the laser source was investigated and the visual and spectroscopic signs of sample damage were established. Wool keratin was found to be extremely robust with no signs of sample degradation observed for laser powers of up to 600 m W and for exposure times of up to seven and half hours. Due to improvements in band resolution and signal-to-noise ratio, several previously unobserved spectral features have become apparent. The assignment of the Raman active vibrational modes of wool have been reviewed and updated to include these features. The infrared spectroscopic techniques of attenuated total reflectance (ATR) and photoacoustic (P A) have been used to examine shrinkproofed and mothproofed wool samples. Shrinkproofing is an oxidative chemical treatment used to selectively modifY the surface of a wool fibre. Mothproofing is a chemical treatment applied to wool for the prevention of insect attack. The ability of PAS and A TR to vary the penetration depth by varying certain instrumental parameters was used to obtain spectra of the near surface regions of these chemically treated samples. These spectra were compared with those taken with a greater penetration depth, which therefore represent more of the bulk wool sample. The PA and ATR spectra demonstrated that oxidation was restricted to the near-surface layer of wool. Extensive curve fitting of ATR spectra of untreated wool indicated that cuticle was composed of a mixed protein conformation, but was predominately that of an a.-helix. The cortex was proposed to be a mixture of both a.helical and ~-pleated sheet protein conformations. These findings were supported by PAS depth profiling results. Raman microspectroscopy was used in an extensive investigation of the molecular structure of the wool fibre. This included determining the orientation of certain functional groups within the wool fibre and the symmetry of particular vibrations. The orientation ofbonds within the wool fibre was investigated by orientating the wool fibre axis parallel and then perpendicular to the plane of polarisation of the electric vector of the incident radiation. It was experimentally determined that the majority of C=O and N-H bonds of the peptide bond of wool lie parallel to the fibre axis. Additionally, a number of the important vibrations associated with the a-helix were also found to lie parallel to the fibre axis. Further investigation into the molecular structure of wool involved determining what effect stretching the wool fibre had on bond orientation. Raman spectra of stretched and unstretched wool fibres indicated that extension altered the orientation ofthe aromatic rings, the CH2 and CH3 groups of the amino acids. Curve fitting results revealed that extension resulted in significant destruction of the a-helix structure a substantial increase in the P-pleated sheet structure. Finally, depolarisation ratios were calculated for Raman spectra. The vibrations associated with the aromatic rings of amino acids had very low ratios which indicated that the vibrations were highly symmetrical.