A comparative analysis of Australian sex offender legislation for sex offender registries

Australia has followed the course taken by other English-speaking countries in recent years of enacting legislation that requires convicted sexual offenders to register personal details with law enforcement agencies. These laws have been enacted to protect the public from the perceived threat posed by sex offenders, but have been written with little apparent reference to the available research literature about the nature and extent of this threat. In addition, there is no empirical evidence supporting the effectiveness of legislatively based sex offender registries to either reduce sexual offending or to enable the police to investigate sex crimes and apprehend offenders. This article compares and contrasts the current laws governing sex offender registration enacted by the various states and territories in Australia, and offers a critical analysis of their provisions in light of the research literature on sexual offending.

Authoritarian deliberation : the deliberative turn in Chinese political development

Authoritarian rule in China is now permeated by a wide variety of deliberative practices. These practices combine authoritarian concentrations of power with deliberative influence, producing the apparent anomaly of authoritarian deliberation. Although deliberation is usually associated with democracy, they are distinct phenomena.Democracy involves the inclusion of individuals in matters that affect them through distributions of empowerments such as votes and rights. Deliberation is a mode of communication involving persuasion-based influence. Combinations of non-inclusive power and deliberative influence—authoritarian deliberation— are readily identifiable in China, probably reflecting failures of command authoritarianism under the conditions of complexity and pluralism produced by market-oriented development. The concept of authoritarian deliberation frames two possible trajectories of political development in China: the increasing use of deliberative practices stabilizes and strengthens authoritarian rule, or deliberative practices serve as a leading edge of democratization.

The discursive practices of nurse practitioner legislation in Australia

Aim.  The aim of this paper was to examine the nurse practitioner legislative framework in Australia from a critical social theory perspective. Background.  National regulation for nurses and midwives has superseded all previous state legislation with effect from July 2010. The aim of this change was to streamline regulation processes across all health professionals requiring regulation, in order to eliminate diverse state-based regulatory policies that were identified as hindering transferability of the workforce across Australia. This paper explores the changes with reference to nurse practitioners. Since their introduction to Australia different legislative practices between states have presented difficult endorsement procedures which have affected employment. Data sources.  Information for the paper is drawn from a doctoral study which examined the politics of advancing nursing in Australia, with particular reference to the discourses of nurse practitioners. This is augmented by more recent legislative documents and policies, as well as media reports, to examine the process of change in legislation and the unfolding discourses on employment and practice. Implications to nursing.  Nurse practitioner endorsement may be more complicated, defeating the original premise of transferability of a skilled workforce across state jurisdictions. Conclusion.  This paper exposes the influence that powerful discourses can have on a major change to professional practice.

List of colonial era Papua New Guinea legislation

This dataset is a list of all Papua New Guinean legislation (Acts and Regulations) during Australia's colonial administration of the country. It includes data on legislation from 1925 through to 1974 and identifies the act/regulation title, the act number, the act commencement date and chapter number.

The application of universal design legislation and standards in Malaysia and Australia

Legislation and standards are alleged to be one of the key solutions for improving accessibility and Universal Design implementation in Malaysia including its implementation in housing design. In response to this concern, the government of Malaysia has taken considerable steps in articulating professional practice obligations as demonstrated in continual improvements in relevant new laws and standards (Malaysian Standard (MS)). The findings from a preliminary study have however evidenced a clear gap between having laws and standards and ensuring their implementation in the construction industry. This paper reviews the issues faced by the existing Malaysian enforcement and practices to Universal Design. The findings emphasise awareness, understanding and practice implications for the legislation and its standards in Malaysia, and problems and assumptions perceived. Findings indicate that there is lack of understanding and awareness of the current legislation and standards in the construction industry, in addition to the insufficiency of comprehensive guidelines to regulate Universal Design in Malaysia.