A Greens senator has called for reducing a proposed immunity from climate disclosure litigation from three years to one after lawyers, including the NSW Bar Association, blasted the moratorium. But some law firms say the immunity doesn’t go far enough and should shield companies and their officers from continuous disclosure-related claims.
A Senate committee has release a damning report blasting the Australian Securities and Investments Commission as a failed regulator that should be broken up.
The Australian Energy Regulator has filed proceedings against several units of Origin Energy, after they admitted to breaching life support obligations for 5,000 customers over three years, including deregistering or disconnecting premises where someone was receiving life support.
The federal government has backed suggestions for changes to the Food and Grocery Code that would slap major grocery stores with fines of up to $10 million for violating the code, amid concerns over rising food prices.
An energy company has taken the minister for climate change and energy to court for refusing to greenlight its Seadragon wind farm project, which would have placed up to 150 wind turbines in waters off the coast of Gippsland, Victoria.
A new report from the Australian National Audit Office has found weaknesses in the Federal Court’s oversight of corporate credit cards, with the court agreeing to strengthen its policies and procedures, including in relation to the use of credit cards to cover taxi fares.
Offering a mixed review of the NSW budget on Tuesday, the Law Society of NSW welcomed the funding boost to legal aid and other key agencies but said the state should do more to modernize the courts.
A Senate report into the government’s use of consultants, launched in the wake of PwC’s leak of confidential Treasury information, has recommended an inquiry into whether partnerships should be subject to the same regulations as corporations and again called on PwC to release the names of all those involved in the leak of confidential government information.
A day after the National Anti-Corruption Commission closed its investigation of six officials linked to the Robodebt scandal, an appeals court has overturned a decision barring access by a campaigner to documents related to the disastrous scheme for collecting Centrelink debts.
A report tabled in Parliament has called for the introduction of a federal human rights law to replace the “inadequate” and “confusing” patchwork of state and federal laws, which the Law Council of Australia said was “long overdue”.