Wikipedia:WikiProject Australian law/Policy

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This page is for the formulation and discussion of policy (such as naming conventions) for the WikiProject Australian law.


[edit] Case names

Should case names include citations (eg. a Commonwealth Law Reports reference)? Or should citations simply be listed within the article?

Citations inside the article. I suggest following the American example, with the added dot (i.e. Roe v. Wade) in the title, and then listing the citations in the first paragraph of the lead section. No need to reinvent the wheel. Ambi 07:40, 2 Feb 2005 (UTC)
agree. same name cases can be disambiged. Xtra 05:15, 3 Feb 2005 (UTC)

Here are a few conventions that I've adapted from the Australian Guide to Legal Citation (pdf, 759kb) that might be useful.

  • There's no need to have '& Anor' or 'Ors' in your titles, save the full name for inside the article
  • Within the article, the case name should be italicised
  • When a party is the Commonwealth, say 'Commonwealth'; when a party is a state or territory, say (eg) 'Victoria' rather than 'State of Victoria'
  • In criminal stuff, use 'R' rather than 'The King' or 'The Queen' (except where the crown is the respondent)
  • The 'v' between parties shouldn't have a full stop after it, but the Americans have already started using them, so for consistency we probably should too.

Of course, just because I use the AGLC doesn't mean everyone has to. Questions or comments anyone? --bainer 23:09, 3 Feb 2005 (UTC)

i like the aglc. a quality melbourne uni publication (being a biased melbourne uni student). following it is a good idea, but it is not the only naming convention available. (personally i do not like dots after "v"). Xtra 03:35, 4 Feb 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Final proposal

There doesn't seem to be too much of a problem here, the only issue would seem to be whether to have dots in the case names like the Americans have (ie. Dietrich v. The Queen as opposed to Dietrich v The Queen). Most Australian sources don't have the dot, but should we have it for consistency? For the sake of consistency, I say we should use dots, even though they look a little silly. If there's no opposition, I think I'll make this the policy. --bainer 08:52, 29 Mar 2005 (UTC)

I have made my comments above. I think dots look ugly. If you just want to do it to have consistency with the Americans, is this the common practice for all areas in wikipedia where naming conventions vary between countries? Xtra 09:03, 29 Mar 2005 (UTC)
I'm really not fussed either way. Ambi 12:27, 29 Mar 2005 (UTC)
I agree with Xtra. The dots don't look good. Since they are Australian cases, we should stick with the convention in Australia. --Yu Ninjie 07:50, 4 Apr 2005 (UTC)
I suppose the other argument is that anyone looking up Australian law will probably be using Australian conventions, and they'll probably come through a page like Category:Australian law or something like that anyway. It seems that people don't like dots then, so no dots will there be. I think that will make things much simpler anyway. --bainer 13:13, 4 Apr 2005 (UTC)

Hi, I know you guys concluded the issue a while ago, but I just joined this... I was editing some law articles just then, and for the main law articles, such as contract, Australian cases are interspersed with cases from other countries. For consistency, shouldn't we use the dot? Enochlau 11:33, 16 Jun 2005 (UTC)

Yes I noticed that too. It seems like those cases were mentioned from references in US textbooks, since all the citations follow American rules ('et al' instead of '& Ors', for example). As articles on Australian cases have been added, some of these citations have changed. It would probably be worth changing the rest. --bainer (talk) 22:09, 23 Jun 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Court names - "Magistrates' Court" vs. "Magistrates Court"; "Coroner's Court" vs. "Coroners Court"

We have an absurd situation at the moment whereby some Australian states' magistrates' courts' articles have an apostrophe in their title and some don't, and a corresponding mess in references to them in articles. There is a similar situation with reference to the coroner's courts. There should be a policy as to the names of these courts and the Federal Magistrates' Court. The situation is not helped by the punctuational sloppiness of the courts themselves. I quote an entry of mine on the Magistrates' Court of the Northern Territory discussion page from a previous discussion with another user, which was not satisfactorily resolved and in any case should be the subject of a policy:

"Magistrates Court" is just plain incorrect in any context whether or not the magistrates or their secretaries or the court staff or the court website designers are ignorant of that or not. What on earth is the relationship between the two words 'magistrates' and 'court'? You can't just use a plural in apposition like that, cf. men's toilet (not men toilet), veterans' association (not veterans association). If you think you can use it like that then explain why some magistrates' courts e.g. in England, in Hong Kong and in Victoria, use it, and what the distinction between these and the generic term for the Northern Territory courts is.GSTQ (talk) 07:20, 3 January 2008 (UTC)
  • My view is that as this is an encyclopedia, it must rely on the documents which source its articles. If the source states that the name of the court is "Magistrates" as in Federal Magistrates Court or as in "Coroner's" as in Coroner's Court of New South Wales, then this must be followed whether it is correct grammar or not. Kings Cross in Sydney is not spelt "King's Cross" nor is the Sydney Opera House known as "Sydney's Opera House". Should we also change Qantas to Quantas or EnergyAustralia to Energy-Australia with a hypen. At any rate, in the case of the Coroners Court, should it be Coroner's Court or Coroners' Court, as there are many coroners in the State. What happens to Magistrates Court, is it Magistrate's, Magistrates' or Magistrates's (which is acceptable in the Australian Style Manual published by the Australian Government)? If there is a doubt, it can always be referenced as "the Coroners Court, or sometimes known as a Coroner's Court". Assize (talk) 02:39, 10 January 2008 (UTC)

Assize's examples are not applicable to this situation. Kings Cross is a placename with a long history of being spelt with no apostrophe. The Sydney Opera House is a proper noun being used as an adjective. You could talk of the Melbourne Magistrates' Court in the same way. But you can't use a common noun like "magistrate" or "magistrates" in that sort of construction. Qantas and EnergyAustralia are also proper nouns with deliberate orthographical irregularities. Of course it is important to be faithful to sources. But if you're releasing an edition of the Iliad, you don't just facsimile the manuscript with all its lacunae, mistakes &c. You are being more faithful to your source by correcting errors and creating an intelligible text. You wouldn't use the fact that there's bad grammar on an Indian governmental website to reproduce that bad grammar in an encyclopaedia. Nor can you use that excuse for this situation. As for what number of each you use, the solution is simple. There are many magistrates sitting in each of the state courts, so they are magistrates' courts. There is only one coroner per state, so they are coroner's courts. As for the Australian Style Manual, what does it actually say? Of course the three forms Assize has used are all acceptable English words in the right context, but was it describing this context in particular? And what does it matter if it's published by the government? Just because it's governmental doesn't mean it's the same source as the legislation establishing the courts, even the federal courts.GSTQ (talk) 22:51, 10 January 2008 (UTC)

In fact there are, in Queensland in any event ,more than one coroner per state. There is a state coroner, but every magistrate can sit as a coroner, —Preceding unsigned comment added by 164.112.249.11 (talk) 00:39, 11 January 2008

      • Isn't "Federal Magistrates Court" a proper noun with a deliberate irregularity? Assize (talk) 02:10, 11 January 2008 (UTC)

Yes, I was being imprecise, there is more than one coroner in Queensland, but the Coroner's Court is named after the State Coroner. In the same way, the Prothonotary's Office in Victoria is named after the Prothonotary, even though there are many deputy prothonotaries around the state. "F... M... C..." (however punctuated) is a proper noun, but it is made up of common nouns which are purely descriptive (like the Sydney Opera House, for example). What is there to suggest that the form without the apostrophe is deliberately irregular? EnergyAustralia is obviously deliberate, because everybody knows spaces go between words, and it looks unusual. But "F... M... C..." without an apostrophe doesn't look unusual to most people because each of the individual words in the phrase is a real word, it's only when they go together in an ungrammatical construction that they're incorrect, which is why website designers and legislation transcribers can get away with it. It doesn't mean encyclopaedias should emulate the mistake.GSTQ (talk) 02:31, 11 January 2008 (UTC)

As a self-proclaimed grammar nazi, I regretfully conclude that "Federal Magistrates Court" is correct if the institution is actually called the "Federal Magistrates Court". It is not merely web designers who refer to it as such. The official documents and publications use the same nomenclature. After looking around the official site, there is no instance in which the apostrophe is included. If we were writing a story on magistrates' courts in general, then the apostrophe should probably be included. If other courts are officially called Magistrates' Courts, then that is what they should be called on Wikipedia. This may create a mess if you are working on several court articles at once, but the treatment should be consistent within articles. Paisan30 (talk) 06:32, 14 January 2008 (UTC)
  • It's somewhat outside the scope of this project to be renaming courts. --bainer (talk) 06:59, 14 January 2008 (UTC)
In response to Bainer's comment, what is being discussed is how the names of the courts should be correctly rendered, not what they should be named. Is what he means is that putting an apostrophe in where it is believed one was erroneously omitted is tantamount to renaming the courts? If it were, it would be wrong to do so, but that's the question this discussion is about. Is it a mistake, and should it be corrected? Bainer's comment appears to beg the question.
Regarding the legislation establishing the various courts, I've had a look at Aust.L.I.I. with the following results:
Victoria: Magistrates' Court
South Australia, Western Australia (from the governmental site, not Aust.L.I.I.), Queensland, A.C.T., Tasmania and Federal: Magistrates Court
I haven't checked the Coroner's Court legislation yet, and the N.T. Magistrates' Court is not given that name by the legislation. I recall Assize quoted from a proclamation or something on the relevant talk page which left out the apostrophe. I must say I am a bit mistrustful of the transcribers putting in all the right punctuation, I only have access to paper copies of the Victorian legislation and the federal legislation (which reflect the above results). I'd appreciate it if somebody could check the paper legislation for the other states and territory, but in default of that I suppose the Aust.L.I.I. transcriptions will have to be accepted as sources.GSTQ (talk) 22:55, 14 January 2008 (UTC)