New standalone innovation patents will no longer be able to be filed after 25 August 2021. Patentees who wish to benefit from the innovation patent system must take steps to ensure that any complete application for an innovation patent or a standard complete application (from which they could divide out later) be filed on or before 25 August 2021, say James Lawrence and Dominique Blik of Mills Oakley.
Brick by brick, the claim that funded class actions are the primary driver of rising directors’ liability insurance premiums is being dismantled. Even more precarious is the claim that the Commonwealth government’s continuous disclosure reforms are the answer and will result in enormous savings for Australian business, says Omni Bridgeway managing director and CEO Andrew Saker.
A record number of class actions were filed in the past year but shareholder class actions, which have been the primary target of the federal government’s attack on the class action regime, have decreased in significance, says Professor Vince Morabito.
Safe Work Australia has released new national guidance on preventing and responding to workplace sexual harassment which characterises sexual harassment as a workplace hazard, known to cause psychological and physical risks to health and safety, say Lucienne Mummé and Amy Millar of Johnson Winter & Slattery.
If the Government wishes to maintain its fearmongering about the perils of the litigation funding industry, it ought to put its money where its mouth is and establish a statutory fund that would finance meritorious class actions, provide security for costs, and indemnify applicants from adverse costs orders, says Slater and Gordon’s Claire Pirie.
The Australian class action landscape has undergone significant change in the last five years and that will continue in 2021 and beyond. Chris Pagent, Brad Woodhouse, Katrina Sleiman and Thomas Scott of Corrs Chambers Westgarth have identified 10 developments the firm’s class actions team expects to see this year.
McCullough Robertson partner David Hughes shares tax administration lessons learned from Covid-19 (and promptly forgotten).
In Wigmans v AMP the High Court will shortly deliver judgment on the vexed issue of class actions that compete to represent substantially the same class or group. Dr Michael Duffy of Monash University previews the decision.
The class members in the Gladstone Fisheries class action and their funder LCM Operations have successfully upheld in the Court of Appeal a declaration confirming the enforceability of the funding agreements in the case. This is an important decision, which validates the third party funding of class actions and puts to bed any residual arguments regarding the continuing effect of the medieval torts of maintenance and champerty on class action funding arrangements, says Susanna Taylor, LCM’s head of investment, APAC.
Will we see an increase in class actions and funded litigation following the COVID-19 financial crisis similar to that following the global financial crisis? If there is an onslaught of corporate failures, including failed managed investment schemes, then such litigation seems likely to ensue. However, in the last year, Parliament and the courts have taken steps which might slow such litigious activity, says Susan Goodman of Holding Redlich.