Lovegrove & Cotton
Construction Law & Planning Law Weekly Bulletin
Monday 07 July 2014
“Don’t Expose Yourself: Safeguards Against Misuse of Confidential Information” (Australian Readership) By Justin Cotton, Partner, Construction and Practitioner Advocacy, Lovegrove Smith & Cotton, Construction and Commercial Lawyers
Commercial contracts between parties need to deal concisely with the rights and responsibilities in “confidential information”. This week Justin Cotton, partner and head of practitioner advocacy, looks at the need to provision for the possibility of a ‘rainy day’ where relationships come to an end and there is then a need to assert property rights in information. This is more far reaching that just intellectual property, and the article examines the sorts of features that should find their way into a confidential information agreement.
Slab Heave – When the Earth Moves Beneath your Feet (Victorian Readership) By Jarrod Gutsa, Construction Lawyer at Lovegrove Smith & Cotton
Slab heave has been found to be a significant problem in Melbourne’s western suburbs. So what causes slab heave? And who is liable? Jarrod Gutsa discusses the answers in this article
How Duplication is Killing Australia’s Construction Industry (Australian Readership)
153 people have shared this piece on Sourceable and there are eight insightful comments by industry luminaries in the Sourceable commentary slot. Excerpts from some of the comments are as follows: “another great article…the whole building certification system needs a shake-up”…“red tape and bureaucracy in general is killing the construction industry. It takes longer to prepare, submit, and approve paperwork then it does to actually do the work.”… “It feels like when a OH&S rep comes on-site today, it’s not to improve safety, but to find a way to close the job”.
Note this comment by Professor Clay Anderson “the ‘system’ is fractured by 3 levels of government and further fragmented by 7 different jurisdictions each with it’s own political agenda governing 13 different types of Local Government broken down into 565 areas across Australia….each in turn with their own rules”. To read the article and the on point comments click here and scroll through the eight comments attached to the Sourceable article.
15 Keys to Best-Practice Building Regulation (Australian Readership), Building Reform: What Tasmania Can Learn from Japan (Australiasian Readership) and Building Regulatory Reform (International Readership) Introduction By Justin Cotton, Partner, Construction and Practitioner Advocacy, Lovegrove Smith & Cotton, Construction and Commercial Lawyers
Law reformers and agitators for law reform in Australia are descending upon building regulations like “seagulls on a chip”. What with Tasmania reviewing its Building Act, the unhappy press about ACT legislation and the reform agenda in Victoria, it is critical that those with involvement in the best practice building control concern themselves with holistics and best practice law reform. The two below articles on Sourceable: “15 Keys to best practice building regulation” and “building regulatory reform” warrant more oxygen. As Tasmania is currently embroiled in a review process the article “Building Reform: What Tasmania can Learn from Japan” also warrants a rerun. Note a couple of comments in the Sourceable commentary slot on the article “an interesting series of concepts that I can’t fault and considering the issues noted have merit, sadly the issues of the current Tas building legislation are much deeper and without reform the whole regulatory process is verging on total failure…….are buildings and the way they are occupied different in Melbourne than they are in Adelaide – no so why should a company that owns in various states have to manage things differently due to specific state legislation”.
What are your thoughts folks? If you could be kind enough to take the time and incorporate some of your views with regards to best practice building control then pop them into the commentary column in the Sourceable article to “add fertiliser” to the important conversation.
As this week’s bulletin focuses on best practice, regard should be had to the Centre for Best Practice Building Control. Browse at your leisure and if you wish to add articles on point to the library then send us a copy.
Lovegrove Smith & Cotton’s E-Library is a free online resource of articles, which puts a wealth of information at your fingertips. The articles in the E- Library have been written by lawyers and a number of them have been published in the Australian, The Age and the Herald Sun. Some of the articles date back to the 1990’s.
