There are 12 bills before the Parliament or awaiting Royal Assent at the end of the 2010 parliamentary year.  They are:

Civil Dispute Resolution Bill 2010

This Bill has passed the House of Representatives and, on 25 October, passed the second reading phase.  The bill was referred to the Senate Legal and Constitutional Affairs Legislation Committee.  It’s report is  due 2 December 2010. The text of the bill and the explanatory memorandum are both on line.

Criminal Code Amendment (Cluster Munitions Prohibition) Bill 2010

This bill amends the Criminal Code Act 1995 to enable Australia to ratify the Convention on Cluster Munitions by creating offences and penalties in relation to cluster munitions and explosive bomblets with some defences for certain circumstances and provides for certain authorisations to be made.

It is currently before the Senate.  The text of the bill and the explanatory memorandum are on line.

Family Law Amendment (Validation of Certain Parenting Orders and Other Measures) Bill 2010

The bill validates certain parenting orders affected by the High Court decision in MRR v GR [2010] HCA 4 and amends the Family Law Act 1975 to Read the rest of this entry »

Yesterday’s Federal Court decision in Grant Thornton Services (NSW) Pty Limited v St. George Wholesale Distributors Pty Ltd (No 2) throws up both a curious factual situation but the relatively little considered section 459(S) of the Corporations Act 2001. It is also a salient and sombre lesson in how to run an application.

Facts

Grant Thornton Services (NSW) Pty Ltd (“Grant Thornton”) provides accounting services.  It provided those services to the “Paul’s Warehouse” group of companies.  St George Wholesale Distributors Pty Ltd (St George) is part of that group but unlike other companies in that group it had net asssets.  Grant Thornton issued invoices on St George totalling $91,305.50. When the invoices were not paid Grant Thornton issued a statutory demand.  St George neither paid the sum nor applied to set aside the demand.  When St George found itself the subject of winding up application it roused itself to apply for leave to oppose the application on the basis that there was a genuine dispute. Leave is required because, per section 459 (S), St George could have earlier applied to set aside the statutory demand because there was a genuine dispute.

The issues

Section 459(s) (pars [7]  – [10])

To get leave section 459(s) requires that a court is satisfied that the ground is material to proving that a company is solvent.