Commonwealth Law Reports

The Commonwealth Law Reports (CLR) are the authorised reports of decisions of the High Court of Australia.^[1] The CLR are published by the Lawbook Company, a division of Thomson Reuters. James Merralls QC has been editing the Reports since 1969.

"Being the authorised reports, every judgment and headnote is checked by the judges of the High Court before inclusion in the Commonwealth Law Reports.

Each reported judgment includes a comprehensive headnote, written by an expert reporter, and approved by the High Court. Headnotes highlight the key issues of each case and include a summary of counsels’ arguments to the High Court. The Commonwealth Law Reports also include tables of cases reported, affirmed, reversed, overruled, applied or judicially commented on and cited, making it easy to find the precise information needed.

The online version has a full archive and includes PDF versions of the reports. It features links to FirstPoint to allow FirstPoint subscribers to quickly check the history and currency of a decision."^[1]

Citation

For lawyers, the Commonwealth Law Reports are the preferred source for decisions of the High Court of Australia. An example of proper citation is:

Commonwealth v Tasmania (1983) 158 CLR 1

This citation indicates that the decision of the Court in the case entitled Commonwealth v Tasmania, decided in 1983, can be found beginning at page 1 of volume 158 of the Commonwealth Law Reports.

An alternative citation, which is medium neutral, is:

Commonwealth v Tasmania [1983] HCA 23

This citation refers to the case entitled Commonwealth v Tasmania which was the 23rd case decided by the High Court of Australia in 1983.

Furthermore, there may be times when it is preferable to cite a case with reference to both the Commonwealth Law Reports, and the medium neutral citation, and that would appear as:

Commonwealth v Tasmania (1983) 158 CLR 1; [1983] HCA 23

This is known as parallel citation.

References