The Australian Consumer Law

Reform of Australia’s inconsistent Commonwealth, State and Territory consumer laws is now a reality. The 1 January 2011 commencement of the Australian Consumer Law (ACL), within the Competition and Consumer Act 2010, is the culmination of a long process of consultation. Unifying and rationalising the plethora of laws, this new Act sees the disappearance of the “Trade Practices Act” and the amendment of a raft of State and Territory legislation; the new national regime informed by them operates in their stead. This is indisputably the most comprehensive change in the history of the Trade Practices Act 1974. This book aims to assist practitioners, academics and students understand the Australian Consumer Law regime and its impact. It summarises the history and constitutional basis of the ACL, explaining how the ACL will be implemented, amended and enforced. In addition it explores how the various general and specific protections interrelate, and the scope of their overlap, and considers the content of the ACL, and the principal changes from the provisions of the Trade Practices Act.

Skill development and social inclusion via peer assisted learning in first-year higher education : an evaluation of student experiences across two law units

Because professions seek graduates who can 'collaborate, share skills and knowledge, and communicate' (Kruck and Reif, 2001, p 37), it is important that university graduates are not equipped solely with the content knowledge of their discipline, but also with prospective employment skills. Furthermore, when students 'interact more in positive ways with their teachers and peers, they gain more in terms of essential skills and competencies, such as critical thinking, problem~solving [and] effective communication' (NSSE, 2000, p 2)./n this way, peer assisted fellowing has the potential to enhance students' professional development, and provide the social inclusion and engagement necessary for effective learning. This session describes two peer assisted learning models embedded within first year QUT Faculty of Law units. Through a partnership between teaching staff, student mentors and mentees, the models aim to facilitate student socialisation whilst supplementing understanding of substantive law with the development of academic and work·related skills. Mentor and mentee perceptions, and program implications, are considered.

Risky driving behavior among university students and staff in the Sultanate of Oman

Background: There is a well developed literature on research investigating the relationship between various driving behaviours and road crash involvement. However, this research has predominantly been conducted in developed economies dominated by western types of cultural environments. To date no research has been published that has empirically investigated this relationship within the context of the emerging economies such as Oman. Objective: The present study aims to investigate driving behaviour as indexed in the Driving Behaviour Questionnaire (DBQ) among a group of Omani university students and staff. Methods: A convenience non-probability self- selection sampling approach was utilized with Omani university students and staff. Results: A total of 1003 Omani students (n= 632) and staff (n=371) participated in the survey. Factor analysis of the BDQ revealed four main factors that were errors, speeding violation, lapses and aggressive violation. In the multivariate logistic backward regression analysis, the following factors were identified as significant predictors of being involved in causing at least one crash: driving experience, history of offences and two DBQ components i.e. errors and aggressive violation. Conclusion: This study indicates that errors and aggressive violation of the traffic regulations as well as history of having traffic offences are major risk factors for road traffic crashes among the sample. While previous international research has demonstrated that speeding is a primary cause of crashing, in the current context, the results indicate that an array of factors is associated with crashes. Further research using more rigorous methodology is warranted to inform the development of road safety countermeasures in Oman that improves overall traffic safety culture.

The OO files : providing online formative feedback on Contract Law learning in a narrative setting

Feedback, both formative and summative, enables students to reflect on their understandings and to restructure their thinking to develop their capabilities. It can also encourage positive motivation and help boost self-esteem. Online multiple choice questions can be an efficient and effective means of providing timely formative feedback. At the same time, locating learning in a narrative environment can facilitate engaging and effective learning experiences. Narratives can help learners to navigate through information and support cognitive and imaginative engagement. This article will discuss The 00 Files, an online suite of modules containing multiple choice questions situated in the narrative of a fictional law firm. It notes student responses to the program and discusses lessons that may be learnt from its development which may be of assistance to academics considering the development of similar programs for their courses.

Principles of Taxation Law 2013

Taxation law can be an incredibly complex subject to absorb, particularly when time is limited. Written specifically for students, Principles of Taxation Law 2013 brings much needed clarity to this area of law. Utilising many methods to make this often daunting subject achievable, particular features of the 2013 edition include: • seven parts: overview and structure, principles of income, deductions and offsets, timing issues, investment and business entities, tax avoidance and administration, and indirect taxes; • clearly structured chapters within those parts grouped under helpful headings; • flowcharts, diagrams and tables, end of chapter practice questions, and case summaries; • an appendix containing all of the up to date and relevant rates; and • the online self-testing component mentor, which provides questions for students of both business and law. Every major aspect of the Australian tax system is covered, with chapters on topics such as goods and services tax, superannuation, offsets, partnerships, capital gains tax, trusts, company tax and tax administration. All chapters have been thoroughly revised. Principles of Taxation Law 2013 is the perfect tool to guide the reader from their initial exposure to the subject to success in taxation law exams.

Symone Anstis : the tax advocate for higher education students

Many who have taken a tax course in the last few years will be aware of the plight of Ms Symone Anstis. Her story is a simple one. The year is 2006 and Ms Anstis, an undergraduate student is undertaking a teaching degree at the Australian Catholic University. To support herself she works at Katies earning $14,946, and receives Youth Allowance of $3,622. In her tax return for that year Ms Anstis claims $920 for ‘self-education expenses’ comprising travel, supplies, student administration fees, depreciation on her computer, textbooks and stationery. These expenses totalling $1,170 are correctly reduced by the non-deductible first $250, per s 82A of the Income Tax Assessment Act (1997) (Cth) (ITAA97). Ms Anstis claims a deduction for ‘self-education expenses’ on the basis that a condition of receiving Youth Allowance is the enrolment and satisfactory progress in an acceptable course of study. Generally, a deduction is allowed where a loss or outgoing is incurred in gaining or producing assessable income and that loss or outgoing is not of a private or domestic nature. Ms Anstis claims the expenses are incurred to meet the requirements of maintaining Youth Allowance so the nexus is satisfied. On assessment, the Commissioner of Taxation disallows the deduction claimed on the basis that ‘self-education expenses’ are only deductible if they have a relevant connection to the taxpayer’s current income-earning activities or they are likely to lead to an increase in a taxpayer’s income from his or her current income-earning activities in the future.

Inclusion, schools and anti-discrimination law : parents' experiences and inclusion

With the increasing enrolment of students with disabilities in primary schools and the enactment of legislative protections for students with disabilities in Disability Discrimination legislation and the Disability Standards for Education, this study examines the experiences of parents of students with disabilities in Queensland State schools. This study is concerned with the experiences that parents of children with disabilities have in relation to the concept and processes of inclusive classroom practice within the primary school. The experiences of parents in large metropolitan schools in Queensland, Australia are analysed in light of current anti-discrimination legislation operating within Australia. Data were collected using a mixed methodology in which 50 parents from nine large metropolitan Queensland State schools responded to a Parent Questionnaire about their experiences in their child’s school. This was followed by two focus groups with a total of six parents who described their experiences in their child’s school. Together the qualitative and quantitative information complemented the other to provide a unique perspective on the impact of anti-discrimination legislation. The findings from the study suggest that parents and their children continue to be discriminated against and that the legislation and associated standards have not eliminated this discrimination. Recommendations are made in the final chapter that propose an inclusive schooling framework for students with disabilities. This intends to ensure not only compliance with the ‘spirit’ of Anti-Discrimination legislation and the Disability Standards, but also a means by which schools may evolve to become inclusive and embracing of difference as part of overall richness of schools as opposed to deficiency.

Ethics, Law and Health Care : a Guide for Nurses and Midwives

Understanding ethics and law in health care is an essential part of nurses’ and midwives’ professional standards. Ethics, Law and Health Care focuses on teaching applied ethics and law in a manner that illustrates the real world applications of these core components of the nursing and midwifery curriculum and practice. It equips readers with the ability to recognise and address legal and ethical issues that will arise in their professional practice. The book uses the four principles of biomedical ethics (autonomy, non-maleficence, beneficence and justice) together with the use of both the Nursing and Midwifery Codes of Ethics and Codes of Professional Conduct, issued by the Nursing and Midwifery Board of Australia, as a central means through which to analyse and approach ethical and legal issues. Ethics, Law and Health Care is scaffolded to assist readers in understanding legal and ethical principles, to integrate them in the context of a particular issue within professional practice, and provide them with a decision-making framework to take action in a professional context by utilising the Codes as well as state and federal law. Aided by pedagogical features such as case studies, review questions, further reading and a glossary of common terms, this book is an essential resource for students, academics and practitioners.

Principles of Taxation Law 2014 [7th Edition]

"Taxation law can be an incredibly complex subject to absorb, particularly when time is limited. Written specifically for students, Principles of Taxation Law 2014 brings much needed clarity to this area of law. Utilising many methods to make this often daunting subject achievable, particular features of the 2014 edition include: seven parts: overview and structure, principles of income, deductions and offsets, timing issues, investment and business entities, tax avoidance and administration, and indirect taxes; clearly structured chapters within those parts grouped under helpful headings;flowcharts, diagrams and tables, end of chapter practice questions, and case summaries; an appendix containing all of the up to date and relevant rates; and the online self-testing component mentor, which provides questions for students of both business and law. Every major aspect of the Australian tax system is covered, with chapters on topics such as goods and services tax, superannuation, offsets, partnerships, capital gains tax, trusts, company tax and tax administration.All chapters have been thoroughly revised"-- Publishers website

Students' engagement with Facebook in a university undergraduate policing unit

Web 2.0 technologies are increasingly being used to support teaching in higher education courses. However, preliminary research has shown that students are using such technologies primarily for social purposes, rather than as a means of further engaging with academic content. This study examines a cohort of tertiary students' use of a Facebook page, which was created for a second year university policing unit at the Queensland University of Technology in Brisbane, Australia. Results from content analysis of the Facebook "wall" and a survey of student users and non-users showed that although students only demonstrated very little active engagement with academic content posted on the site (that is, they were reluctant to interact with unit materials in a way that would leave a digital trace), they reported that Facebook had increased their ability to engage with and critically analyse the unit content. In alignment with other research in this area, students also reported the usefulness of the Facebook page for increasing communication with their peers and with the teaching staff. This paper concludes by offering a number of best practice guidelines for the use of Facebook in tertiary education.

Teaching and using analogy in law

Analogy plays a central role in legal reasoning, yet how to analogize is poorly taught and poorly practiced. We all recognize when legal analogies are being made: when a law professor suggests a difficult hypothetical in class and a student tentatively guesses at the answer based on the cases she read the night before, when an attorney advises a client to settle because a previous case goes against him, or when a judge adopts one precedent over another on the basis that it better fits the present case. However, when it comes to explaining why certain analogies are compelling, persuasive, or better than the alternative, lawyers usually draw a blank. The purpose of this article is to provide a simple model that can be used to teach and to learn how analogy actually works, and what makes one analogy superior to a competing analogy. The model is drawn from a number of theories of analogy making in cognitive science. Cognitive science is the “long-term enterprise to understand the mind scientifically.” The field studies the mechanisms that are involved in cognitive processes like thinking, memory, learning, and recall; and one of its main foci has been on how people construct analogies. The lessons from cognitive science theories of analogy can be applied to legal analogies to give students and lawyers a better understanding of this fundamental process in legal reasoning.

Health Law in Australia [Second Edition]

Health Law in Australia is the country’s leading text in this area and was the first book to deal with health law on a comprehensive national basis. In this important field that continues to give rise to challenges for society Health Law in Australia takes a logical, structured approach to explain the breadth of this area of law across all Australian jurisdictions. By covering all the major areas in this diverse field, Health Law in Australia enhances the understanding of the discipline as a whole. Beginning with an exploration of the general principles of health law, including chapters on “Negligence”, “Children and Consent to Medical Treatment”, and “Medical Confidentiality and Patient Privacy”, the book goes on to consider beginning-of-life and end-of-life issues before concluding with chapters on emerging areas in health law, such as biotechnology, genetic technologies and medical research. The contributing authors are national leaders who are specialists in these areas of health law and who can share with readers the results of their research. Health Law in Australia has been written for both legal and health audiences and is essential reading for undergraduate and postgraduate students, researchers and scholars in the disciplines of law, health and medicine, as well as health and legal practitioners, government departments and bodies in the health area, and private health providers.

An intentional class design model to engage first year students with threshold concepts using the academic discourse theories of Vygotsky and Laurillard

In the context of the first-year university classroom, this paper develops Vygotsky’s claim that ‘the relations between the higher mental functions were at one time real relations between people’. By taking the main horizontal and hierarchical levels of classroom discourse and dialogue (student-student, student-teacher, teacher-teacher) and marrying these with the possibilities opened up by Laurillard’s conversational framework, we argue that the learning challenge of a ‘troublesome’ threshold concept might be met by a carefully designed sequence of teaching events and experiences for first year students, and we provide a number of strategies that exploit each level of these ‘hierarchies of discourse’. We suggest that an analytical approach to classroom design that embodies these levels of discourse in sequenced dialogic methods could be used by teachers as a strategy to interrogate and adjust teaching-in-practice especially in the first year of university study.

Drinking games participation among female students at a regional Australian university

Participation in drinking games (DGs) by university students is often associated with heavy drinking and negative social and health impacts. Although research in Australia indicates that university students tend to drink at risky levels, there is paucity of literature on DGs among students, especially those residing at regional universities. This research examined drinking among female college students of white background. Eighteen female students participated in face-to-face in-depth interviews to describe their DG experiences. Most women played DGs for social and monetary reasons, with many drinking high volumes of alcohol during the game. Excessive drinking was linked with the type of beverage consumed. Despite knowing the health risks associated with DGs, there was a strong social imperative for these young women to play these games. Research and public health initiatives to better understand and address problematic drinking activities in rural and regional Australia have tended to ignore women and the dominant white populations whose heavy drinking has been largely restricted to private spheres.

Whole-of-Curriculum Design in Law

In this book teaching professionalism is characterised by the scholarly underpinning of each contribution; and every contribution provides a rich resource for enhancing teaching practice. The critical concerns for legal education have been identified and discussed: curriculum design that includes graduate attributes; embedding specific attributes across the curriculum; empowering students to learn; academic teamwork to manage large student cohorts; first year and final year transition strategies; tracking students' personal development through the use of ePortfolio; assessment strategies; improving student well-being and promoting resilience; teaching practice to achieve deep learning; flexibility in delivery; the use of Web 2.0 technology; and understanding the 21st century student.