Australian Legal System

Although legal formalism is a critical component to the Australian legal system, judicial creativity is essential when the legislation fails to satisfy rule of law ideals. One key example of this is that although abortion is an offence under the Queensland Criminal Code, it was ruled this year by the Supreme Court that a 12 year old was able to proceed with terminating a pregnancy in a Queensland public hospital. This case’s outcome would be viewed as incorrect using reasoning from a strict legal formalism approach, however it is justified as it demonstrates judicial creativity can be employed when legal formality and procedural legality have not been met.

The Australian Criminal Justice system has an intricate and diverse structure that makes it one of the most unique systems in the world. The Commonwealth of Australia was approved by the British Parliament in 1900 and came into existence on January 1, 1901. The federal constitution combined British and American practices, with a parliamentary government, but with two houses - the popularly elected House of Representatives and Senate representing the former colonies. This began the start of a new era of policing. (Findlay, Odgers, Yeo). The Commonwealth of Australia is a federalist government composed of a national government and six State governments. There are nine different criminal justice systems in Australia - six states, two territories, and one federal. The eight States and Territories have powers to enact their own criminal law, while the Commonwealth has powers to enact laws. Criminal law is administered principally through the federal, State and Territory police. (Chappell, Wilson, Heaton). In this essay an in depth analysis of the Australian criminal justice system will be given, along with a comparison to the United States criminal justice system throughout the essay. As well as an evaluation of the effectiveness of the system and finally a brief summary of how the Australian criminal justice system structure could be improved to better suit the evolving society. Australia has a complex and very intuitive system of policing that

The federal and national parliaments often deal with a large number of issues, so the power needs to be split. In Australia, the federal parliament consists of the Senate (upper house) and House of Representatives (lower house). This is also similar in Indonesia as they have The People’s Representatives Council (lower house) and The Regional Representatives Council (upper house). However, Australia's federal parliament is a bicameral system as bills are required to be passed in both houses to become law, while in Indonesia is only partly bicameral as bills only need to be passed in the lower house. So, as a result, Indonesia and Australia are both similar in the way their federal and national parliaments work as they both consist of a lower and upper

The Australian justice system implements the adversarial system in which opposing parties present their case before an unbiased decision maker, to ensure procedural fairness and the principles of natural justice are upheld.The system has been structured this way to ensure justice is served for the victim, offender and the broader community. The nature of justice is that it is equal to all, fair from bias and is accessible. In the case on R v Rolfe and R v Weston (2017) the two offenders; Timothy Rolfe and John Weston, members of the Rebels Outlaw Motorcycle Club were sentenced at the NSW Supreme Court on a joint criminal enterprise for the murder of 29-year-old Laurence Starling. The killing was motivated by revenge for an unpaid extortion debt of $200,000 between the deceased’s business partner Mr Fields and a high-ranking member of the ‘’Rebels’’ who sent his subordinates to seize Mr Field’s assets as compensation. The complex circumstances of the crime were problematic for the justice system because particular methods had to be implemented in the process of achieving justice however the justice system was relatively effective in reaching a just outcome for majority of the stakeholders due to its resource efficiency, responsiveness, accessibility, standards of fairness, protection of individual rights and meeting society’s needs.

“A first class court system and a first class legal profession are of no avail to a person who cannot afford to access them.” Sir Anthony Mason, former Chief Justice of the High Court of Australia.

The High Court of Australia is essentially focused towards textualism, however as it can be seen there has been a more current relaxation of the rule in recent years.

The adversarial nature of Australia’s court system deal with facts and legal implications. Here lies the establishment of such principles that make the law

Having made visits to the Supreme, District and the Local Courts, I was able to obtain a better understanding of the Australian adversarial system. This report will attempt to analyze the distinctions between the different types of courts through primary observations. The report will also assess the models of justice in operation, the triviality of the lower courts compared to the higher courts and assess court procedure in each court.

There are certain areas of conflict between the Aboriginal Justice system and the Australian Law. Persons following the aboriginal customary laws if

Australian laws have two forms, public and private law. Public law is an individual versus the Australian government, for example, criminal law, constitutional law and environmental law. It involves public bodies, public matters and is the concern of everybody in Australia. Private law involves disputes between private citizens or entities, for example, contract law, family law and probate laws.

The Oxford Learner’s Dictionary defines fairness to be ‘the quality of treating people equally or in a way that is reasonable’ and justice as ‘the quality of being fair or reasonable’ (Oald8.oxfordlearnersdictionaries.com, 2014). Investigation of the characteristics of the Australian Legal System (ALS) including its adoption, structure and operational rules, reveal that for the most part the system is based on these two attributes. This inference is further evidenced by the legally binding operational framework assigned to the financial services industry and reflected in the codes of practice that also guide it.

The highest court and the final court of appeal in our country is the High Court of Australia, in the ACT. Interpreting and applying the Constitution are their two main roles. They also hear appeals, by special leave, from Federal, State or Territory courts (Hcourt.gov.au, 2010). The High Court has seen its fair share of notorious cases. Al-Kateb v. Godwin is one of the most debated and controversial cases Australia has seen.

The Australian legal system doesn’t have a bill of rights so it must protect individual human rights in other ways. Individual human rights consist of civil, economic and social rights. The law protects these in four ways: through common law, the Australian Constitution, ordinary legislation and International Law. The common law protects human rights through judges making court decisions within cases that involve human rights. This is prevalent in cases that are heard in the superior courts where the decision later becomes a precedent for similar cases.

Is our NSW court system effective? It is if you have money. Is it something that we can just adhere to with out ever allowing it to adapt and evolve to meet societies needs? Absolutely not. Just like humanity, the NSW court system contains protruding faults that are made apparent with further scrutiny. The court system is something that requires our constant attention and support to improve and advance. In order for the court system to attain eligibility it relies heavily on 4 fundamental components; affordability, simplicity, fairness and accessibility. For countless Australians our legal system is lacking on all these fronts.

The term "Court Hierarchy" is a very important word in the law world in modern society. It's definition gives a very clear and concise meaning to the law industry. The phrase can be split into two words to be easily dealt and understood. The word "court" is from a Greek derivative "cohors" or "cohort" meaning courtyard or retinue. It's definition from the dictionary certainly portrays the law as a very important and distinguished practice. "a. A person or body of persons whose task is to hear and submit a decision on cases at law." "b. The building, hall, or room in which such cases are heard and determined." The word, "hierarchy", however, has a more powerful and specific relation to the law world. It is a Greek derived word and