Opportunities for Regional Cooperation in Law Reform

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Opportunities for Regional Cooperation in Law
Reform

• Professor David Weisbrot AM
• President, Australian Law Reform Commission
• ALRAC 2008, Port Vila, 11 Sept 2008

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LRAs Across the Commonwealth

• England and Wales (1965), Scotland, Northern
  Ireland, Ireland
• Canada (federally most provinces)
• Caribbean Jamaica, TT
• Asia India, Pakistan, Sri Lanka, Hong Kong
• South Africa, Namibia, Malawi, Lesotho, Kenya,
  Uganda, Tanzania (Botswana planning for 2009)

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ALRAC / Oceania

• Australia Cth, NSW, Vic, WA and Qld LRCs NT
  LRCee, Tas LRI
• NZ LC
• PNG LRC ? CLRC (entrenched in Const)
• Solomon Islands LRC
• Nauru CRC
• AGs/SGs offices Tonga, Vanuatu, Kiribati
• Role for Unis (USP, UPNG, NUS)?

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Institutional law reform charters

• Systematically develop and reform law, by
• Adapting the law to current conditions, needs
• Removing defects, and obsolete or unnecessary
  laws
• Simplifying the law
• Adopting new or more effective methods of
  administering the law and dispensing justice
• Improving access to justice
• Consolidating, harmonising laws
• While having regard to
• Personal rights and liberties, the ICCPR,
  Australias international obligations
• The costs of gaining access to, and dispensing,
  justice

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Now more of a think tank

• ALRC ? the Australian Governments think tank
  for major legal and policy issues
• black letter (marine insurance, legal
  professional privilege)
• socio-legal (Aboriginal custom, multiculturalism,
  women and the law, ageing population, privacy)
• harmonisation (evidence, privacy)
• over the horizon issues (genetic privacy and
  discrimination, gene patenting)
• PNG and others ? also have constitutional review
  and reform dimension

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The Promise of Law Reform

• Federation Press, 2005
• ALRC 30th anniversary project
• 30 chapters on all aspects of law reform
  (Australia and internationally)

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Sawers four attributes (1970)

• The new principle of law reform involves a
  body with four attributes
•     permanent
•     full-time
•     independent, and
•     authoritative

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Attributes of a 21stC LR agency

• To survive and thrive, a modern Law Reform
  Agency also must be
•    generalist
•    interdisciplinary
•    consultative and
•    implementation-minded.

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Generalist

• Should be prepared to work in any area of law or
  procedure
• including (especially?) outside of the comfort
  zone, and pull in specialist expertise.
• Particularly well placed to
• monitor dispersed reform activity
• provide some coherence to the general project of
  law reform
• promote harmonisation, complementarity
• transcend specialist categories.

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Authoritative

• Reform must proceed from a platform of
  outstanding, meticulous scholarship
• A Report should have independent and enduring
  value as an authoritative text, beyond the
  specific recommendations
• eg ALRC reports on Evidence, Admiralty, Genetics,
  Sentencing, Privacy
• ALRC website figures highlight demand older
  reports still heavily requested
• eg Recognition of Aboriginal Customary Laws (1986)

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Interdisciplinary

• International and comparative approaches
• Work on complex issues at the intersection of law
  and social policy
• Manage sophisticated empirical and
  multidisciplinary research
• something courts (eg) cannot do

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Tailored consultation

• Deep commitment to public consultation the
  essential and distinguishing feature
• Challenge in designing effective consultation
• Properly done, confers benefits
• for those consulted
• for the process of law reform and
• enhanced effectiveness and acceptability of the
  law once reformed.

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Tailoring outcomes

• not all issues and disputes are legal
• appreciation of the complexity of social
  institutions and problems, and of competing
  interests
• power much more diffused, and not entirely
  invested in the government
• seeking practical, low cost solutions
• meeting increased desire for direct participation
  in civil society and in public policy-making.

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ALRC Cooperation Efforts

• Hosting attachments, on-site training (usually
  1-4 weeks)
• Singapore Law Review and Reform Division
• Malawi LRC
• Lesotho LRC
• Kenya LRC
• PNG CLRC
• Solomon Islands LRC
• On-site training programs
• for PNG CLRC (Moresby),
• for Brazil INQJ (Sao Paolo, Rio and Brasilia)

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Program at PNG CLRC 2/07
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Training session at PNG CLRC
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Training session at PNG CLRC / 2
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Training session at PNG CLRC /3
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SILRC _at_ the ALRC - Dec 2007
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SILRC in Sydney - Dec 2007 2/
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SILRC in Sydney - Dec 2007 3/
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ALRC Cooperation Efforts 2/

• Meetings (2005-)
• Bangladesh, Indonesia, Japan, China, Vietnam,
  Philippines, Macau, Malaysia, Sri Lanka,
  Kazakhstan, Tanzania, Uganda, South Africa, NZ,
  Sweden, Fiji, Solomon Islands, PNG
• Provision of materials
• consultation papers, reports
• Research design, empirical methodology (Brazil,
  HK re civil justice)
• Support for CALRAs (website etc)

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CALRAS.org
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For further information

• ALRC website all papers, reports available
  online (free) www.alrc.gov.au
• Email info_at_alrc.gov.au
• GPO Box 3708, Sydney 2001