Changes to Senate voting laws and the particular case of Senator Bob Day make for an unprecedented constitutional tangle, and one that will change the make-up of the Senate.
Millions were spent supporting an extradition process to make the prosecution of Dragan Vasiljković somebody else’s problem.
AAP/Paul Miller
Ministers of religion who support marriage equality would be able to challenge the Marriage Act in the High Court. They would stand a good chance of winning.
Australia’s political representatives have the ability to legislate on a wide range of matters. Marriage is one of them.
AAP/Mick Tsikas
As the government hints the marriage equality plebiscite may be delayed until 2017, calls intensify for the parliament to legislate on the issue instead. So what is parliament’s role here?
Malcolm Turnbull has called for nationally consistent laws to enable convicted terrorists to be detained at the end of their prison sentence.
Dan Himbrechts/AAP
One Nation candidate Rod Culleton could win Western Australia’s final Senate position, but Section 44 of the Constitution suggests he is ineligible to take his seat.
A proposed new law is set to allow surrogate parents in South Africa to also take leave to care for their babies.
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South African law requires surrogate mothers to hand infants to their legal parents without undue delay. But it doesn’t provide leave for these parents to care for their infants. That is set to change.
An integrated reform blueprint for federal and state politics could comprise eight elements.
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Political funding in Australia is governed by different rules for state (some of which do not require disclosure) and federal governments. And both levels suffer significant weaknesses.
The UK has limits on expenditure by political parties and third parties, and doesn’t allow paid advertising in electronic media at all.
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The High Court regarded none of Bob Day’s arguments in his challenge to Senate voting reforms as having any merit.
Detainees on Manus Island are seeking an injunction to prevent their removal to Nauru or elsewhere until Australia’s High Court hears their case.
AAP/Eoin Blackwell
If a new High Court claim against Australia’s offshore detention regime succeeds, it will entirely undermine Australia’s inhumane practices in relation to “those who come across the seas”.
Informed critique of the courts and their work is essential to the proper functioning of a democracy.
AAP/Mick Tsikas
A “judicial activist”, it seems, decides cases in favour of a preferred (non-“mainstream”) litigant or interest, to reach a result that is inconsistent with a conservative worldview.
The High Court is unlikely to be sympathetic to claims of discrimination against the microparties in the proposed Senate reforms.
AAP/Lukas Koch
Parts of a High Court decision on the legality of offshore processing deal a crucial blow to the tired argument that what happens offshore is not Australia’s responsibility.