A podcast about public interest cases which have shaped Australia
ITC#7: Tim Marsh on DPP v Walters
Politicians regularly seek to constrain the discretion of sentencing judges. Victoria’s baseline sentencing regime was a strange, unique, and ultimately unsuccessful attempt to do so. Tim Marsh talks about the decisions of the Supreme Court and Court of Appeal in DPP v Walters, which grappled with this unusual legislative scheme.
Podcast: Play in new window | Download
ITC#6: Ella Ingram on Ingram v QBE
Ella Ingram was excited about a school trip to New York City, but experienced depression and was unable to go. She made a travel insurance claim, but her insurer refused to pay. To her surprise, she found herself running a case testing whether her insurer had a justification for doing so.
Podcast: Play in new window | Download
ITC#5: Brian Walters on environmental protest
From bushwalking, to establishing Wild magazine, to supporting the Franklin Dam campaign, to decades representing environmental protesters. Brian Walters talks about this history, and about some key cases he’s been involved in: representing protesters against a South Australian uranium mine, and Bob Brown when he protested logging the Goolengook.
Podcast: Play in new window | Download
ITC#4: Tamar Hopkins on Haile-Michael v Konstantinidis
When Tamar Hopkins started at the Flemington Kensington Community Legal Centre in 2005, she was immediately struck by the persistent complaints, from young people of African ethnicity, about their treatment at the hands of local police. Eventually, those complaints led to a claim of unlawful discrimination, and the creative settlement of the ensuing case continues to have an impact on Victorian policing.
Podcast: Play in new window | Download
ITC#3: Rodney Croome on Croome v Tasmania
In 1993, Nicholas Toonen and Rodney Croome took Australia to the UN Human Rights Committee, on the basis Tasmania’s anti-gay laws. After the Committee found Australia in breach of its international human rights obligations, the Commonwealth Parliament legislated to render the Tasmanian laws inoperative. But Tasmania still didn’t repeal the laws, so Croome and Toonen went to the High Court…
Podcast: Play in new window | Download
ITC#2: Jason Kioa and Michael Clothier on Kioa v West
Jason Kioa came from Tonga to Australia in 1981, overstayed his entry permit, and ended up reshaping the exercise of Australian government power, when the High Court upheld his challenge to his deportation in 1985. Jason and his lawyer Michael Clothier talk about their experience of making Australian legal history.
Podcast: Play in new window | Download
ITC#1: Stephen Keim on the Haneef case
Stephen Keim discusses with me the twists and turns of the Haneef case, from anti-terrorism laws to visa cancellation, to professional regulation. The case absorbed Australia in the second half of 2007, and it’s still as interesting now as it was then.
Podcast: Play in new window | Download