News and Insights

For the second year running, BEL alumni led the pack at the annual UQ Alumni Awards, securing eight of the 17 top honours.

A national, publicly-available resource for judicial officers dealing with cases involving domestic and family violence, developed by University of Queensland’s Professor Heather Douglas, was launched today.

Dr Lalotoa Mulitalo is visiting the UQ Law School on a 3 month sabbatical to complete a book on the consequences of legal pluralism for law reform in the South Pacific. This work is being conducted under the auspices of the Legitimus Project, funded by the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada, and the TC Beirne School of Law.

University of Queensland TC Beirne School of Law students - Suvradip Maitra, Priam Rangiah, Rubaina Sehgal and Hannah Whitton - batted above their weight to break third of the fifteen teams into the semi-finals of the QUT Torts Moot on 5 August.

Three of the eight finalists for the Australian Law Awards' prestigious Law Student of the Year prize are some of UQ's finest.

UQ Law students, Jamiee O’Brien and Madeleine Ryan recently traveled to Knox County with the assistance of funding through Endeavour Mobility Grants. Ten such Grants were secured by Dr Alan Davidson, supporting UQ students’ study experience at the UN, New York, Vienna and the UK in addition to Tennessee. Endeavour Mobility Grants support Australian Students to have an overseas study experience that contributes to their Australian qualification.

TC Beirne School of Law academics Professors Heather Douglas, Simon Bronitt, Dr Melanie O'Brien and PhD scholar Victoria Colvin presented at the The Evolving Role of the Prosecutor, Domestically and Internationally workshop held at the Onati Institute in Spain on the 28th to 29th July 2016. The Onati Institute hosts a small number of workshops each year that </strong>contribute to socio-legal studies or sociology of law. Professors Heather Douglas (TC Beirne School of Law and Philip Stenning (School of Criminology and Criminal Justice, Griffith University) co-ordinated the 2 day workshop.

In September, law students Ashley Chandler, Christopher Vale and Pavlos Nicolas assisted law firm Slater and Gordon to prepare its submission to the Senate Standing Committee into Suicide by Veterans and Ex-Service Personnel. 

His Excellency Ambassador David Stuart travelled to Strobl, south of Salzburg, to meet 18 UQ law students participating in the summer school of the University of Vienna. Now in its 68th year, 99 students from over 25 countries participate in the summer school which offers specialised courses on European Union Law, Arbitration, and International Law.

Congratulations to Dr Twana Hassan and Dr Ruth Walker who attended their PhD graduation ceremony at UQ last week.

The TC Beirne School of Law 3 Minutes Thesis (3MT®) was held Friday 12th July. Three Minute Thesis (3MT) celebrates the exciting research conducted by PhD students. Developed by The University of Queensland, the exercise cultivates students' academic, presentation, and research communication skills. The competition supports their capacity to effectively explain their research in three minutes, in a language appropriate to a non-specialist audience.

UQ Law Professor Heather Douglas has given evidence at the parliamentary inquiry into proposed laws to decriminalise abortion in Queensland, Amendment Bill 2016 and Inquiry into laws governing termination of pregnancy in Queensland, on 13 July 2016. Professor Douglas told the public hearing that there was often a link between domestic violence and abortion.

In June this year the UQ Pro Bono Centre released the Pro Bono Values Project. The report, What does pro bono publico mean to lawyers? details the findings of the Centre’s first empirical study into the personal values and motivations of lawyers who do pro bono work in Queensland, Australia. 

On Thursday 23 June, the Law School welcomed a visit by a delegation of PNG judicial staff, including Sir Salamo Injia, Chief Justice of the PNG Supreme and National Courts of Justice.

Radio National’s Paul Barclay speaks with an expert panel including UQ Law Professor Graeme Orr, Stephen Mills (University of Sydney and former speechwriter to Labor PM Bob Hawke), Professor Darren Halpin (Australian National University) and Paula Matthewson (political columnist and former media advisor to John Howard in the early 1990s) on money and politics.

Professor Nicholas Aroney spoke recently on the failure of the Australian federal government’s Reform of the Federation White Paper.

Law students from the UQ Pro Bono Centre have been invited to make several presentations through the High Schools Program recently.