Pub­li­ca­tions

May 19, 2025

Devel­op­ers beware the statu­to­ry ​‘non del­e­gable’ duty of care under the Design and Build­ing Prac­ti­tion­ers Act 2020

The Design and Build­ing Prac­ti­tion­ers Act 2020 (DBP Act) came into effect in NSW in June 2020. Since its intro­duc­tion the courts have pro­vid­ed guid­ance on the inter­pre­ta­tion and reach of this Act. This arti­cle looks at the recent High Court deci­sion of Paf­burn Pty Ltd v The Own­ers – Stra­ta Plan No…

May 7, 2025

Which edi­tion of Build­ing Code of Aus­tralia applies to devel­op­ments in NSW?

The Build­ing Code of Aus­tralia (BCA) is part of the the Nation­al Con­struc­tion Code (NCC). The NCC is updat­ed every 3 years, based on required reg­u­la­to­ry prac­tices, indus­try research, pub­lic feed­back and pol­i­cy direc­tions from gov­ern­ments between pub­lish­ing cycles.Con­struc­tion projects often span 2 ver­sions of the BCA.There has his­tor­i­cal­ly been much debate in the New…

May 5, 2025

Meta’s AI law­suit in the USA & what it could mean for the future of AI & copyright

Recent­ly, Meta appeared in a US fed­er­al court to defend one of the most close­ly watched copy­right chal­lenges of the AI era. The law­suit is being brought by a group of promi­nent US authors includ­ing Ta-Nehisi Coates and Richard Kadrey. The plain­tiffs allege that Meta unlaw­ful­ly used mil­lions of copy­right­ed books, down­loaded…

May 1, 2025

Match­ing Par­ent­ing Orders to Risk: Craft­ing orders to prop­er­ly address the dan­gers in a fam­i­ly law matter

The focus of any par­ent­ing mat­ter being dealt with in the Fed­er­al Cir­cuit and Fam­i­ly Court of Aus­tralia is what orders are in the best inter­ests of the child. To deter­mine what is in the best inter­ests of the child, the Court must con­sid­er all of the evi­dence pre­sent­ed in…

Apr 30, 2025

Amend­ments to NCC 2022 com­menc­ing on 1 May 2025

Back­groundThe Aus­tralian Build­ing Codes Board (ABCB), a joint ini­tia­tive of the Com­mon­wealth and state and ter­ri­to­ry gov­ern­ments togeth­er with the build­ing and plumb­ing indus­tries, is respon­si­ble for the Nation­al Con­struc­tion Code, Water­Mark and Code­Mark Cer­ti­fi­ca­tion Schemes, and reg­u­la­to­ry reform in the con­struc­tion industry. One of the ABCB’s pri­ma­ry roles is to update and main­tain…

Apr 29, 2025

Choose Your Own Respon­dent in Gen­er­al Pro­tec­tions Dis­missal Disputes

Usu­al­ly when one par­ty is tak­ing legal pro­ceed­ings against anoth­er the respon­dent enti­ty needs to be care­ful­ly iden­ti­fied. It can be fatal to the pro­ceed­ings if the wrong enti­ty is sued. This stands to rea­son giv­en the adverse con­se­quences that can flow from lit­i­ga­tion. There is usu­al­ly a process by which…

Apr 9, 2025

Res­i­den­tial Ten­an­cies Act 2010 (NSW) reforms and oblig­a­tions of land­lords — effec­tive from 19 May 2025

Intro­duc­tionThe Res­i­den­tial Ten­an­cies Act 2010 (NSW) (the Act) and the Res­i­den­tial Ten­an­cies Reg­u­la­tion 2019 (NSW) (the Reg­u­la­tions) have under­gone some sig­nif­i­cant changes fol­low­ing a pro­longed and exten­sive con­sul­ta­tion peri­od with prop­er­ty man­age­ment stake­hold­ers. These changes have gen­er­at­ed a lot of buzz as they seek to improve the rights of ten­ants in NSW and…

Apr 1, 2025

Fail­ing to Reg­is­ter a PPSR Secu­ri­ty Inter­est on Time – Legal Risks and Options

Intro­duc­tionTime­ly reg­is­tra­tion of secu­ri­ty inter­ests under the Per­son­al Prop­er­ty Secu­ri­ties Act 2009 (Cth) (PPSA) is essen­tial for secured cred­i­tors to pro­tect their rights. Fail­ure to reg­is­ter with­in the pre­scribed time­frames can result in the cred­i­tor los­ing pri­or­i­ty to unse­cured cred­i­tors in the event of insolvency.While cred­i­tors who have failed to reg­is­ter…

Mar 28, 2025

Con­struc­tion con­tracts are more than just a doc­u­ment — remove con­trac­tu­al claus­es at your peril

Your con­struc­tion con­tract will map out the path­way to your build­ing project com­plet­ing on time and with­in bud­get and detail­ing how any loss­es and risks are handled. It is an essen­tial tool in man­ag­ing and shift­ing risk dur­ing the con­struc­tion phase and impor­tant­ly, lays out the rules if a dis­pute aris­es. The chances…

Mar 26, 2025

Fed­er­al Bud­get 2025: Lim­i­ta­tion on Non-Com­pete Clauses

As part of the 2025 Fed­er­al Bud­get, the gov­ern­ment has announced a pro­hi­bi­tion on non-com­pete claus­es for employ­ees earn­ing less than the high income thresh­old (present­ly $175,000 per annum). It is planned that the change will take effect in 2027. There is noth­ing for employ­ers to do at the moment, although both busi­ness…