July 2010

  • Surprise calls in Buckley Street Footscray

    Posted by Andrew Blogg

    We have received a number of queries this week from residents and business owners in and around Buckley Street in Footscray on the back of the State Government's announcement earlier this week on its plans for the regional rail link. We visited the area yesterday, and it is fair to say the land owners were taken as much by surprise as we were.

    It seems about 25 residences and maybe the same numbers of businesses will be affected by acquisitions.

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  • Adverse Possession - Getting what you're paying for?

    Posted by Rob Bradley

    Rob Bradley has been interviewed by Domain in The Age on the concept of adverse possession.

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  • Kookaburra gets 5% of Down Under

    Posted by Sandra McColl

    In February 2010, Justice Jacobs of the Federal Court held that the quotation of two out of four bars of the round ‘Kookaburra sits in the old gum tree’ in Men at Work’s song Down Under constituted the copying of a ‘substantial portion’ of Kookaburra and therefore an infringement of the copyright of its owner, Larrikin Music Publishing Pty Ltd: Larrikin Music Publishing Pty Ltd v EMI Songs Australia Pty Ltd (No 2) [2010] FCA 29.

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  • Bankruptcy Law Reform: Parliament Raises Threshold to $5,000

    Posted by Sandra McColl

    On 24 June 2010, Federal Parliament passed the Bankruptcy Amendment Bill 2009. Among the amendments included in the bill is an increase in the threshold of indebtedness entitling a creditor to issue a Bankruptcy Notice and a Creditor’s Petition, which are the two significant steps in the most commonly employed process by which a creditor may obtain a sequestration order against a debtor — or, in simple terms, make the debtor bankrupt.

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  • MSI - 'Mobile apps for lawyers and accountants are here to stay'

    Posted by Andrew Clarke

    The launch of the iPhone 4 this week, with long queues of desperate people trying to get their hands on this latest piece of technology, simply highlights the growing dependency that we all place on Smartphone technology. The pace of working life is fast, and we want tools and information on the move that will help us to be more productive and stay in touch.

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  • MSI - 'Top law firm that aimed too high crashes down to earth'

    Posted by Andrew Clarke

    Before anyone accuses me of writing melodramatic headlines, let me point out that the headline for this blog has been copied directly from the business section of yesterday's edition of The Times.  In fact, it was the lead story in the business section.

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  • Minimum Pension Payments

    Posted by

    The Prime Minister announced today that the Government will extend for another year the 50% reduction in the required minimum payment amounts that must be made from account-based, allocated and market-linked pensions. The SIS and RSA regulations will be amended as soon as possible in the new financial year.

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