Statutory right of user - its impact in practice?

Scenario 1 A buys a two storey commercial building built along the only street frontage to the property. Vehicles cannot reach the rear of the property as the building extends across the entire width of the land. A bought the building with full knowledge that vehicular access to the rest of the property had been compromised by a desire to obtain maximum street frontage for the building which was occupied by a commercial tenant. On street parking is scarce in the surrounding area. A (to the knowledge of the adjoining owner B) constructs a carpark at the rear of the building. The employees of A’s tenant have been using the carpark obtaining access via a driveway on B’s land. To formalise this arrangement, A seeks a right of way for vehicles to travel down B’s driveway to access the carpark...

Efficiency comparison of Markov Chain Monte Carlo simulation with subset simulation (MCMC/ss) to standard Monte Carlo Simulation (sMC) for extreme event scenarios

Standard Monte Carlo (sMC) simulation models have been widely used in AEC industry research to address system uncertainties. Although the benefits of probabilistic simulation analyses over deterministic methods are well documented, the sMC simulation technique is quite sensitive to the probability distributions of the input variables. This phenomenon becomes highly pronounced when the region of interest within the joint probability distribution (a function of the input variables) is small. In such cases, the standard Monte Carlo approach is often impractical from a computational standpoint. In this paper, a comparative analysis of standard Monte Carlo simulation to Markov Chain Monte Carlo with subset simulation (MCMC/ss) is presented. The MCMC/ss technique constitutes a more complex simulation method (relative to sMC), wherein a structured sampling algorithm is employed in place of completely randomized sampling. Consequently, gains in computational efficiency can be made. The two simulation methods are compared via theoretical case studies.

Polycarbonate based non-chemically amplified photoresists for extreme ultraviolet lithography

Some initial EUVL patterning results for polycarbonate based non-chemically amplified resists are presented. Without full optimization the developer a resolution of 60 nm line spaces could be obtained. With slight overexposure (1.4 × E0) 43.5 nm lines at a half pitch of 50 nm could be printed. At 2x E0 a 28.6 nm lines at a half pitch of 50 nm could be obtained with a LER that was just above expected for mask roughness. Upon being irradiated with EUV photons, these polymers undergo chain scission with the loss of carbon dioxide and carbon monoxide. The remaining photoproducts appear to be non-volatile under standard EUV irradiation conditions, but do exhibit increased solubility in developer compared to the unirradiated polymer. The sensitivity of the polymers to EUV light is related to their oxygen content and ways to increase the sensitivity of the polymers to 10 mJ cm-2 is discussed.

Getting the right words right

Oscar Wilde once complained that having spent an entire morning putting a comma into one of his poems, he spent the afternoon removing it. Peter Selgin calls this revisionitis: the inability of a writer to part with their work, the compulsion to go on fiddling and picking until there is nothing left to fret about. There can be real danger, Selgin warns, in fussing with things. The question then of how much to revise or how little to rewrite is one without certain answer and writers themselves hold differing views...

A rapid assessment of the effects of extreme weather on two Great Barrier Reef industries

In coastal areas, extreme weather events, such as floods and cyclones, can have debilitating effects on the social and economic viability of marine-based industries. In March 2011, the Great Barrier Reef Marine Park Authority implemented an Extreme Weather Response Program, following a period of intense flooding and cyclonic activity between December 2010 and February 2011. In this paper, we discuss the results of a project within the Program, which aimed to: (1) assess the impacts of extreme weather events on regional tourism and commercial fishing industries; and (2) develop and road-test an impact assessment matrix to improve government and industry responses to extreme weather events. Results revealed that extreme weather events both directly and indirectly affected all five of the measured categories, i.e. ecological, personal, social, infrastructure and economic components. The severity of these impacts, combined with their location and the nature of their business, influenced how tourism operators and fishers assessed the impact of the events (low, medium, high or extreme). The impact assessment tool was revised following feedback obtained during stakeholder workshops and may prove useful for managers in responding to potential direct and indirect impacts of future extreme weather events on affected marine industries. © 2013 Planning Institute Australia.

Estimating present day extreme water level exceedance probabilities around the coastline of Australia : tides, extra-tropical storm surges and mean sea level

The occurrence of extreme water levels along low-lying, highly populated and/or developed coastlines can lead to considerable loss of life and billions of dollars of damage to coastal infrastructure. Therefore it is vitally important that the exceedance probabilities of extreme water levels are accurately evaluated to inform risk-based flood management, engineering and future land-use planning. This ensures the risk of catastrophic structural failures due to under-design or expensive wastes due to over-design are minimised. This paper estimates for the first time present day extreme water level exceedence probabilities around the whole coastline of Australia. A high-resolution depth averaged hydrodynamic model has been configured for the Australian continental shelf region and has been forced with tidal levels from a global tidal model and meteorological fields from a global reanalysis to generate a 61-year hindcast of water levels. Output from this model has been successfully validated against measurements from 30 tide gauge sites. At each numeric coastal grid point, extreme value distributions have been fitted to the derived time series of annual maxima and the several largest water levels each year to estimate exceedence probabilities. This provides a reliable estimate of water level probabilities around southern Australia; a region mainly impacted by extra-tropical cyclones. However, as the meteorological forcing used only weakly includes the effects of tropical cyclones, extreme water level probabilities are underestimated around the western, northern and north-eastern Australian coastline. In a companion paper we build on the work presented here and more accurately include tropical cyclone-induced surges in the estimation of extreme water level. The multi-decadal hindcast generated here has been used primarily to estimate extreme water level exceedance probabilities but could be used more widely in the future for a variety of other research and practical applications.

Estimating present day extreme water level exceedance probabilities around the coastline of Australia : tropical cyclone-induced storm surges

The incidence of major storm surges in the last decade have dramatically emphasized the immense destructive capabilities of extreme water level events, particularly when driven by severe tropical cyclones. Given this risk, it is vitally important that the exceedance probabilities of extreme water levels are accurately evaluated to inform risk-based flood and erosion management, engineering and for future land-use planning and to ensure the risk of catastrophic structural failures due to under-design or expensive wastes due to over-design are minimised. Australia has a long history of coastal flooding from tropical cyclones. Using a novel integration of two modeling techniques, this paper provides the first estimates of present day extreme water level exceedance probabilities around the whole coastline of Australia, and the first estimates that combine the influence of astronomical tides, storm surges generated by both extra-tropical and tropical cyclones, and seasonal and inter-annual variations in mean sea level. Initially, an analysis of tide gauge records has been used to assess the characteristics of tropical cyclone-induced surges around Australia. However, given the dearth (temporal and spatial) of information around much of the coastline, and therefore the inability of these gauge records to adequately describe the regional climatology, an observationally based stochastic tropical cyclone model has been developed to synthetically extend the tropical cyclone record to 10,000 years. Wind and pressure fields derived for these synthetically generated events have then been used to drive a hydrodynamic model of the Australian continental shelf region with annual maximum water levels extracted to estimate exceedance probabilities around the coastline. To validate this methodology, selected historic storm surge events have been simulated and resultant storm surges compared with gauge records. Tropical cyclone induced exceedance probabilities have been combined with estimates derived from a 61-year water level hindcast described in a companion paper to give a single estimate of present day extreme water level probabilities around the whole coastline of Australia. Results of this work are freely available to coastal engineers, managers and researchers via a web-based tool (www.sealevelrise.info). The described methodology could be applied to other regions of the world, like the US east coast, that are subject to both extra-tropical and tropical cyclones.

Baidu’s perfect paradox : free speech and the right to censor

China’s biggest search engine has a constitutional right to filter its search results, a US court found last month. But that’s just the start of the story. Eight New York-based pro-democracy activists sued Baidu Inc in 2011, seeking damages because Baidu prevents their work from showing up in search results. Baidu follows Chinese law that requires it to censor politically sensitive results. But in what the plaintiffs’ lawyer has dubbed a “perfect paradox”, US District Judge Jesse Furman has dismissed the challenge, explaining that to hold Baidu liable for its decisions to censor pro-democracy content would itself infringe the right to free speech.

Do left and right asymmetries of hemispheric preference interact with attention to predict local and global performance in applied tasks?

Many cognitive neuroscience studies show that the ability to attend to and identify global or local information is lateralised between the two hemispheres in the human brain; the left hemisphere is biased towards the local level, whereas the right hemisphere is biased towards the global level. Results of two studies show attention-focused people with a right ear preference (biased towards the left hemisphere) are better at local tasks, whereas people with a left ear preference (biased towards the right hemisphere) are better at more global tasks. In a third study we determined if right hemisphere-biased followers who attend to global stimuli are likely to have a stronger relationship between attention and globally based supervisor ratings of performance. Results provide evidence in support of this hypothesis. Our research supports our model and suggests that the interaction between attention and lateral preference is an important and novel predictor of work-related outcomes.

Right to trial by jury - construction of Uniform Civil Procedure r474

In Smit v Chan [2001] QSC 493 (Supreme Court of Queensland, S1233 of 1995, Mullins J, 21.12.2001) the sixth defendant successfully obtained an order that a complex medical negligence action be tried without a jury. This was the first application to be decided under r474 of UCPR 1999, and the decision is a significant precedent for defendants in similar cases who want to avoid the unpredictability of outcome and the inflated damages awards sometimes associated with jury trials.

Reproductive Health as a Human Right: A Matter of Access or Provision?

This article seeks to understand why, despite over three decades of claiming women's reproductive health as a human right, we have seen little progress in reducing their health inequalities and poor health outcomes. I argue that one reason for this lack of progress may be due to a failure to clearly articulate the responsibilities of key actors, crucially states, in ensuring that women have access to, and provision of, services required to realize their reproductive rights. What is needed, this article suggests, is a framework that can translate decades of rights language into action and specifically identify the provisions required to address women's health.

Estimating present day extreme total water level exceedance probabilities around the Australian coastline

The occurrence of extreme water level events along low-lying, highly populated and/or developed coastlines can lead to devastating impacts on coastal infrastructure. Therefore it is very important that the probabilities of extreme water levels are accurately evaluated to inform flood and coastal management and for future planning. The aim of this study was to provide estimates of present day extreme total water level exceedance probabilities around the whole coastline of Australia, arising from combinations of mean sea level, astronomical tide and storm surges generated by both extra-tropical and tropical storms, but exclusive of surface gravity waves. The study has been undertaken in two main stages. In the first stage, a high-resolution (~10 km along the coast) hydrodynamic depth averaged model has been configured for the whole coastline of Australia using the Danish Hydraulics Institute’s Mike21 modelling suite of tools. The model has been forced with astronomical tidal levels, derived from the TPX07.2 global tidal model, and meteorological fields, from the US National Center for Environmental Prediction’s global reanalysis, to generate a 61-year (1949 to 2009) hindcast of water levels. This model output has been validated against measurements from 30 tide gauge sites around Australia with long records. At each of the model grid points located around the coast, time series of annual maxima and the several highest water levels for each year were derived from the multi-decadal water level hindcast and have been fitted to extreme value distributions to estimate exceedance probabilities. Stage 1 provided a reliable estimate of the present day total water level exceedance probabilities around southern Australia, which is mainly impacted by extra-tropical storms. However, as the meteorological fields used to force the hydrodynamic model only weakly include the effects of tropical cyclones the resultant water levels exceedance probabilities were underestimated around western, northern and north-eastern Australia at higher return periods. Even if the resolution of the meteorological forcing was adequate to represent tropical cyclone-induced surges, multi-decadal periods yielded insufficient instances of tropical cyclones to enable the use of traditional extreme value extrapolation techniques. Therefore, in the second stage of the study, a statistical model of tropical cyclone tracks and central pressures was developed using histroic observations. This model was then used to generate synthetic events that represented 10,000 years of cyclone activity for the Australia region, with characteristics based on the observed tropical cyclones over the last ~40 years. Wind and pressure fields, derived from these synthetic events using analytical profile models, were used to drive the hydrodynamic model to predict the associated storm surge response. A random time period was chosen, during the tropical cyclone season, and astronomical tidal forcing for this period was included to account for non-linear interactions between the tidal and surge components. For each model grid point around the coast, annual maximum total levels for these synthetic events were calculated and these were used to estimate exceedance probabilities. The exceedance probabilities from stages 1 and 2 were then combined to provide a single estimate of present day extreme water level probabilities around the whole coastline of Australia.

Who selects the 'right' directors? An examination of the association between board selection, gender diversity and outcomes

Using a sample of companies from the top 500 listed firms in Australia, we investigate whether the presence of a designated nomination committee and female representation on the nomination committee affect board gender diversity. We also examine whether gender diversity on the board affects firm risk and financial performance. We find that board gender diversity is significantly and positively associated with the presence of a designated nomination committee and that female representation on the nomination committee is a significant explanatory factor of increasing board gender diversity following the release of the 2010 Australian Securities Exchange Corporate Governance Council (ASXCGC) recommendations. Further, our results support the business case for board gender diversity as we find greater gender diversity moderates excessive firm risk which in turn improves firms’ financial performance. Our results are robust after correcting for selection bias and controlling for other board, firm and industry characteristics.