Key Takeaways
The judge deduced that the risk of injury was foreseeable because the defendant asserted that it had taken steps, some years earlier, to remedy the risk. That remedy had ceased to exist by the time of the plaintiff’s injury, as was demonstrated by the very occurrence of the injury.
Key Takeaways
The Personal Injury Commission (PIC)* is set to commence operations on 1 March 2021 replacing the Workers Compensation Commission (WCC) and the Dispute Resolution Service (DRS) to provide a ‘one stop shop’ for resolving disputes that arise in connection with workers compensation and motor accidents legislation.
Key Takeaways
On 1 February 2021, the new ministerial guidelines published by the Minister of Planning on 13 January 2021 came into force in Victoria, banning the use of combustible external cladding such as that responsible for the fires at Melbourne’s Lacrosse Tower and London’s Grenfell Tower and also extending existing limitation periods to 12 years for ‘cladding building actions’.
Key Takeaways
Important changes have taken place from 1 January 2021 that concern bankruptcy notices and temporary debt protection for individual debtors. These changes include:
Key Takeaways
On 18 February 2020, new laws designed to combat illegal phoenix activity and improve the accountability of resigning directors were introduced into the Corporations Act 2001 (Cth) (‘Corporations Act’). The laws were initially foreshadowed in an announcement on 12 September 2017 by the Turnbull government as part of its crackdown on illegal phoenix activity.
Temporary restructuring relief extended again (for some)
Key Takeaways
Less than four months after Treasurer Josh Frydenberg announced reforms to current small business insolvency laws in response to COVID-19, the legislation has been enacted and will come into effect on 1 January 2021.
The new insolvency regime involves new processes for small business restructuring and relatively simplified small business liquidations with the purpose of improving the prospects of businesses continuing to trade and reducing costs, even if they cannot continue.
New Legislation
The Attorney-General Christian Porter today announced that Australia’s personal bankruptcy threshold for the issue of bankruptcy notices will change to $10,000 from 1 January 2021. The time for compliance with bankruptcy notices will revert back to 21 days.
The threshold for issuing a bankruptcy notice was temporarily increased from $5,000 to $20,000 in March 2020 in response to COVID-19 with the time for compliance extended to six months. These changes were due to expire on 31 December 2020.