Jim Corkery

Executive remuneration under scrutiny: The cutting edge of the 'shareholder spring'

Jim Corkery et al. — Wed, 06 Feb 2013 17:35:24 PST

As profits and share prices in large corporations fell in recent years, the venerable argument that high pay levels must exist to attract the best people lost credibility. Disgruntled shareholders focussed on excessive levels of executive remuneration. They began to act in concert to discourage excessive remuneration. They voiced other concerns, too. The ‘shareholder spring’ had arrived.

The gender gap: A quota for women on the board

J. F. Corkery et al. — Wed, 06 Feb 2013 17:35:23 PST

Law schools and MBA programs have been yielding equal numbers of male and female graduates for 25 years. One would reasonably expect, then, that women would populate Australian boardrooms in large numbers. Yet, only 12% or so of directors are women in Australia and the US, and no more than 3% of public company CEOs or Chairs. Norway, France and Spain have acted to redress their imbalances. They say the only proven method of advancing women into boardrooms in large numbers and in timely fashion is to impose quotas.

In September 2012, the Credit Suisse Research Institute reported that public companies with at least one woman on the board handsomely outperform those with none. This is a game changing revelation. Prime Minister Gillard announced soon after that the Australian government is ‘committed to achieving a minimum of 40% of women in Australian Government Board by 2015’ A quota may be the best way of achieving this.

Dangerous sports and obvious risks - Anyone for cricket?

Jim Corkery — Sun, 07 Oct 2012 17:25:20 PDT

Dangerous sports contribute noble attributes to society and promote social cohesion. Cricket is a sport in point. It is capable, too, of being a dangerous sport, with athletes hurling the hard cricket ball at speeds in excess of 180 kph - or 100 mph. So cricket can be hazardous: cricket can injure. Should the law regulate for every risky situation and underwrite every recreational injury? Or should society tolerate, perhaps encourage, dangerous sports, because their benefits outweigh the costs?

Lawyering

Jim Corkery — Mon, 09 Aug 2010 23:29:23 PDT

Extract:

What use are lawyers?
There are some short and humorous answers to this. But lawyers are vital in society. They administer the mechanisms of the state. They draft our laws. From their ranks, they provide society’s law-makers and judges. They develop our law, by their arguments and reasoning. They make policy, by working out how our values should be expressed in our behaviour. They also represent citizens who are seeking justice, for dealing with the laws often needs expert help. In this sense, lawyers are in public service. They help us recognise and maintain our rights. And by this, they check those who are intent on oppression and tyranny.

A Carbon Tax - Onwards

Jim Corkery — Mon, 09 Aug 2010 23:29:22 PDT

Law studies are popular

Jim Corkery — Thu, 11 Feb 2010 14:45:04 PST

Extract:

About 20% of lawyers have a lawyer parent. Australian Chief Justice Sir Owen Dixon had a lawyer father. They would discuss cases in the evenings, Dixon bending to talk earnestly into the better ear of his nearly deaf parent. John ("Rumpole") Mortimer’s blind barrister father became the focus of the son’s celebrated stage and TV play 'Voyage Around My Father'. In the play, the father tells the son, who wished to be a writer; "You’d be better off in the law ... You’ll have plenty of spare time! My first five years in Chambers, I did nothing but The Times crossword puzzle ... No brilliance is needed in the law. Nothing but common sense, and relatively clean finger nails".

Because Parliament Can

Jim Corkery et al. — Thu, 07 Jan 2010 15:07:34 PST

Comment on the drafting of arbitrary taxation and the large variety of taxes levied in Australia at various levels of government. A carbon tax may be preferred to a 'cap and trade' emissions trading system.

Editorial

Duncan Bentley et al. — Wed, 18 Feb 2009 17:57:15 PST

[Extract]Tax reform is one of those marvellous terms that sounds visionary and idealistic, evoking thoughts of change and new deals.

The reality is grubbier. Grand theories are dissected and dismembered by various interest groups. Political reality creates alarming distortions that challenge the minds of administrators and tax professionals for years afterwards.

Yet where politicians with large political mandates or powerful personalities ignore consultation and the democratic process they often do so at their peril.

Editorial

Duncan Bentley et al. — Wed, 18 Feb 2009 17:55:30 PST

Retrospectivity

Jim Corkery et al. — Wed, 18 Feb 2009 17:54:20 PST

Editorial

Duncan Bentley et al. — Wed, 18 Feb 2009 17:53:31 PST

[Extract] Not since 1936 has there been such an opportunity for the reform of the Australian tax law. Voters have dampened the fervour for tax reform, with the defeat of the Coalition an dits consumption tax package at the last Federal election. Yet the push for change goes on unabated.

The rule of law

Jim Corkery — Wed, 18 Feb 2009 08:48:49 PST

Extract:

The term "King Hit" is well known in rugby league and ice hockey circles. It is, of course, not a practice in rugby union. Today, being "king hit" means to be hit heavily when you are not expecting the blow. You do not often rise quickly after being "king hit". The origin of the term concerns "the rule of law". Brilliant English Chief Justice, Sir Edward Coke felt the force of his King's fist in 1608 when he gave King James I the unwelcome news that "The king is not subject to men, but is subject to God and the law". James I thought he should not be subject to man made law. It was a revolutionary thought. Enraged, he felled Coke to the floor. Thus "king hit". James I claimed that his prerogative right was divine and that he, as monarch, was above the law, at least above the law made by other mortals.

Owen Dixon

Gerard Carney et al. — Wed, 18 Feb 2009 08:48:48 PST

Extract:
Dixon was a talented and later a dominant advocate. Australian Prime Minister Sir Robert Menzies, as a newly called barrister, was Dixon’s first ever pupil. Menzies described Dixon as the “greatest legal advocate of his time”.

Too Many Words

Duncan Bentley et al. — Wed, 18 Feb 2009 08:48:48 PST

[Extract]We are all pleased to see a writer of skill on any Bench. To find such a writer in the taxation courts is a greater pleasure. BJ McCabe has recently joined the Administrative Appeals Tribunal and threatens to produce the sort of clarity, precision and liveliness brought to that Tribunal’s tax decisions by Dr Paul Gerber.

Editorial for the Inaugural Issue

Jim Corkery et al. — Wed, 18 Feb 2009 08:48:48 PST

[Extract] The publication of this inaugural issue of the Revenue Law Journal comes at an interestiung stage in the development of Australian tax law. Australians are learning to live with capital gains tax and fringe benefits tax, though there are still many unsolved problems in these areas. Whatever their advantages creating equity or fairness, both taxes bring disadvantages: they incentive to save and invest, they discourage business activity, and they increase paperwork and red tape.

On Literalism , Rule of Law and Due Process

Jim Corkery — Wed, 18 Feb 2009 08:48:47 PST

The English courts and the rise of equity

Jim Corkery — Wed, 18 Feb 2009 08:48:47 PST

Extract:

Where did the Australian courts come from? On what system were they modelled? The answer is that the Australian courts were modelled on the English common law courts. They retain many of the English system’s characteristics. And what about this term "equity"? Equity (meaning fairness) was the name given to a "rival" or parallel court to the common law courts. This court and the system of law it spawned - also called Equity - began in England, springing from the office of the Lord Chancellor, the highest judicial figure in England.

Editorial

Duncan Bentley et al. — Wed, 18 Feb 2009 08:48:47 PST

[Extract]Change is exciting. Change is challenging. We find it especially interesting to contemplate the opportunities it brings while relaxing by the pool with a glass of good red wine.

We are less enthusiastic about it when it changes the changes that we are in the process of making. Australian business has to cope with that and more.

Deductibility

Jim Corkery — Wed, 18 Feb 2009 08:48:46 PST

David Roland Doublet

Jim Corkery — Wed, 18 Feb 2009 08:48:46 PST

It is with great sadness that we report the untimely death of our friend and colleague Professor David Doublet of the Faculty of Law, University of Bergen, Norway.