Sexual harassment is persistent, prevalent and under-reported in Australian workplaces despite its legal regulation over many decades. The most recent survey data in Australia indicate that the majority of individuals who are subject to sexual harassment at work do not make a formal report or lodge a complaint. The opportunity for voice that organisational processes provide to those who experience sexual harassment at work is a particular focus, given the under-reporting problem. The paper also considers the impact of organisational processes on those who observe the inappropriate behaviour and/or the organisational response. Ultimately, this paper argues that organisations should reduce their reliance on individual complaints by expanding the pathways by which concerns can be raised or observed behaviours addressed that offer alternative voice mechanisms, with an emphasis on problem-solving and early intervention where this is appropriate. The paper also considers different communications strategies, such as approaches to training, the sharing of information about workplace incidents, and leadership on the issue within organisations.

The existing principles of quantification of damages for non-pecuniary losses deriving from breach of contract which are adopted by the courts or advanced in the legal scholarship appear to be arbitrary and founded on certain misconceptions. This paper proposes three different models for assessment based on the consequences of breach. When the performance is possible after the breach, the damages are equal to the value of an alternative subject matter if such is available from elsewhere. If there are no other sources from where the bargained-for subject matter can be obtained, then the amount of the damages is based on the value of a substitutive benefit which leads to attainment of the initial contractual aim. If the promisee has no interest in delayed performance, the damages are quantified with respect to a different non-pecuniary benefit which is commensurable to the one that was pursued with the contract initially.

This paper explores the development and operation of law and policy concerning the charging of overseas visitors for healthcare in England from the beginnings of the NHS to the present day. It highlights how this has been a highly contentious issue for decades, often linked with immigration policy, and is an area that still lacks comprehensive reliable empirical data to inform the debate. It explores and analyses the recent reforms to the NHS Overseas Charging Regulations introduced in 2015 and 2017. It demonstrates the problems in implementing the most recent regulations in an era of the ‘hostile environment’ and argues that the approach which has been taken can be seen as undermining the covenant of trust between patient and clinician and thus the fundamental principles of the NHS.

This paper argues that punitive, nominal, contemptuous, vindicatory, and disgorgement damages (commonly referred to as non-compensatory damages) can be collectively analysed as public interest damages because all these awards are justified by violations of public interests in addition to violations of the claimant's rights. To the extent they are awarded in the public interest, non-compensatory damages feature a distinctively public element in private law. In contrast to compensatory damages, public interest damages are justified by ‘non-correlative wrongdoing’, ie infringements of interests which are valuable to the community rather than to the claimant. This helps us to understand how public interest damages differ from traditional damages awards and why public interest damages should be treated as an exceptional remedy. In support of these claims, the paper offers an original analytic framework of reasons that justify damages awards.

Over the past two decades, there have been significant legal developments aimed at securing and enhancing the participation of vulnerable witnesses in criminal trials. Yet, there remains relatively little regard for the fact that many defendants, including those who are not deemed to be vulnerable, are unable to participate in criminal proceedings in a meaningful sense. This paper aims to address two questions. First, why should defendants have participatory rights and be capable of meaningful participation in criminal proceedings? Second, why has it proven so difficult to attain meaningful participation of defendants? It is contended that barriers to meaningful communication between the defendant and the court could be dismantled without great difficulty, but continue to exist because due regard is not given to the normative rationales for participatory rights and defendant participation.

This paper focuses on consumer-generated reviews (CGRs), which are an increasingly influential source of consumer information. In particular, the paper highlights specific problems associated with CGRs, which questions their role as a reliable information source. Flowing from this, the paper calls for closer regulatory scrutiny of review platforms, which play an important intermediary role in facilitating the provision of CGRs. To this end, the paper considers possible regulatory responses in the EU which may address some of the issues highlighted.

This paper highlights two recurring facets of the way UK courts approach the construction of patent claims: the adoption of methods typically applied to the interpretation of contracts and the recognition that immaterial variations not expressly claimed nevertheless fall within the scope of protection. Drawing on the normative implications arising out of Ronald Coase's paper on the problem of social cost, this paper argues that the patent system operates as a substitute for an explicit bargain between economically active entities operating in the market under which a duty is accepted by one party in return for acceptance of a burden of risk by the other. This perspective incorporates both the static costs and the dynamic benefits of the system and accords with the monopoly-profit-incentive theory most commonly advanced in support of the patent system. It is shown how the contemporary approach to claims construction is supported by the object of giving effect to the presumed intentions of the parties to this hypothetical bargain and that this underpins both the implication of terms which go beyond those expressly agreed to by parties to a contract and the construction of patent claims so as to embrace immaterial variations not expressly within their scope.

This paper examines the law on good character evidence in criminal trials through a discussion of the important but under-analysed case of Hunter, in which a five-judge Court of Appeal sought to clarify the law on good character directions to the jury. However, it is argued here that the judgment conflicts with the leading House of Lords decision in Aziz. The paper considers how the court misinterpreted the law and, in particular, the defeasible nature of the rule in Aziz and the impact of the Criminal Justice Act 2003. As a result, the circumstances in which a good character direction will be provided have diminished significantly. It is argued that this has important implications for the right to a fair trial, as good character directions act as a ‘backstop’ against miscarriages of justice. They also form a vital part of the ‘framework of fairness’ considered necessary, in lieu of reasoned jury verdicts, by the Grand Chamber of the European Court of Human Rights in Taxquet v Belgium. Accordingly, it is contended that Aziz rather than Hunter should be followed so that, where there is evidence of good character, a direction is normally provided as a matter of law.