Untitled Note
Mon, 2/28 3:03PM 1:29:03
SUMMARY KEYWORDS
westlaw, research, legal, case, questions, essay, law, database, class, group, find, materials, search, log,
legislation, minutes, moodle, tasks, exercise, library
02:08
Okay, good evening, everyone. It's great to be back here with you tonight. A little bit a little bit
going on at moment here in New South Wales and in Queensland and I hope that no one is
impacted by the floods that are happening in northern New South Wales and southeast
Queensland. For those of you overseas you might have seen some of the images. I've got
family and friends in southeast Queensland so it has been a bit of a difficult time but I hope
everyone's safe and well, and it's nice to be back here with you tonight. All right. So today, as
foreshadowed with changing the track a bit and classes one to four on legal concepts. So those
introductory legal concepts for the course. And from tonight's class, tonight's class and
tomorrow night's class, what we're looking at is an introduction to legal research. So let's just
go through our overview of class five. So the first thing that I'm going to do is I'm actually going
to take you through details of the research log and the essay questions. So we'll talk more
about these in a moment. But the research log and the essay comprise the other two elements
of assessment for the course. And I'm going to take you through those in a bit more detail what
you can expect, where you can find some sample assessments when these will be available.
excetera then we're going to talk a bit about why legally focus research is important. So how it
differs from other types of research. There might be some similarities with the research that
you've had to undertake for other degrees. But why is so important that you're able to locate or
had the skills to locate for example, things like legislation and case law in addition to those
other types of materials like journal articles and books, which are useful for legal study, then
we're going to look at the types of materials used in legal research. So once again, coming back
to legislation, case law and then other secondary materials, what sort of databases you should
be using when undertaking legal research. And then we're going to work through a couple of
exercises. And these will be done in small groups. And yeah, they're just they're not they're
from the guide to legal research, which is one of the things to look out for tomorrow night's
class, but I do like to kind of get you get you started on these for what to expect. It might seem
a little bit like oh, okay, what's that about? It's in some ways. It's another language legal
research. is kind of learning how to deal with legal research legal citation is learning how to
speak another language. And so we'll get through a couple of introductory exercises, then we'll
have a sum up and what to expect tomorrow. And finally, questions are always encouraged.
But don't please no questions about the legal concepts quiz, as the assessment has been
released, so it's not really appropriate for us now to talk about these in class. Some of you have
completed it. Some of you haven't completed it yet. So no questions on those but if you do
have any questions about the research log, or the essay, or any of the things that we talked
about, please do pop your hands up, because it's very likely that others have those same
questions as well. All right, let us get started. So let's talk a bit about the research log and the
researcher saying so, the research log is essentially a diary of your research, and it asks you
once, so, tomorrow night we'll start with the researcher say tomorrow night at 730. So just after
class, the research essay questions will be released. Now, there are three questions but within
one of the questions you can choose your a different topic. So there are kind of five questions
to choose from overall. And these explore different areas, Australian law and Australian legal
issues and encourage you to think critically about the law and those issues. So the researchers
say the questions are released tomorrow night, and your essays will be due on Friday, the
eighth of April.
07:04
The essay link, so the amount of words for your essay is 1600 words and I will know as you may
have seen for some of your other courses that is pretty short. So this is meant to be a sorry,
just gonna have a drink while I remember the word I'm looking for. It's relatively simple,
researchers say for you very targeted, researchers. Thank you. So those questions will be
available on Moodle tomorrow night. And in addition to reading through those questions, you
should read that document in conjunction with the research log. Because the research log is
based on the question that you end up choosing is essentially a diary of your research or a
preliminary diary as the preliminary research that you're going to and that you've undertaken
for your essay. There'll be a number or a specific number of resources that you need to find
and the specific type of resources that you need to find as well. And so you need to the first
thing you do is you should read the essay questions, decide on a question and then look in the
research log document on Moodle, as there'll be an updated log, and that will tell you the
details of what you need to do for your research log. So what resources you need to find what
the number of resources you need to find and the details that you need to include in that
research log. And then your research log is due on Friday, the 18th of March and the word limit
is 900 words. So as I said when you the two documents are released tomorrow night so the
essay questions and the research log instructions. Please download both read them together
and carefully. And there are also examples of past submission for both assessments already on
Moodle and they can be located here. So this is under the assessment outline and Submission
section on Moodle. Hang on one second. I'm just going to turn my lights on
09:44
Sorry everyone, it looks quite right. You can see me okay, but then I it's actually very dark
outside. So apologies for that delay. Okay, so if you do want to get a sense I can appreciate
that having just spoken that oh this this was searched diary you have to do and then you've got
to research writing research as I can appreciate that that might feel a bit abstract. So do have a
look at the samples of past successful assessments. You'll have the details of what is required
when both are released tomorrow night. But these examples provide you with just a kind of an
illustrative example of what a research lab looks like and what you need to do there. And then
what your research essay will ultimately look like as well. Now, note, these are just examples of
past assessments. They're not the assessments that will be used for the purpose of this turn,
but they're just there to kind of give you a bit of additional additional guidance. So we will be
working on research skills in tonight and tomorrow night's class. And then we'll be working on
race on legal writing in class on Saturday, the seventh of March so that is also our final class for
the term too. So I remembered that night and tomorrow night tomorrow night is our final
evening class. And then we break for about a week and a half until Saturday the 12th of March.
Now on your timetable. It looks as though you have class for that whole day from nine to four.
But that's not actually the case. Let me explain what we're going to be doing on that day. So
from 9am to 11am Sydney time class will run with all of us together like it is now on collaborate
and you would have been able to see in the Collaborate main broom before you came in here.
You would have been able to see the links or class seven. So, this is that is going to be that
alert 9am till 11am session is going to be the formal part of the class and so attendance is
mandatory and we're going to be looking at legal writing in more detail. So what makes a good
legal research essay? Then, after that time, the remainder of the class will go from 1130 to four
o'clock, you're invited to meet with me for a research consultation. Now this isn't mandatory,
but I really really do encourage it. It's a great way to just have a chat about your research topic.
And ideas and the time is there. So I really encourage you to make a research drop in time
hopefully on that day. So how do you do this? After tomorrow night's class in the class seven
sections on Moodle, there will be a wiki where you can add a good my computer just told me to
update because there's critical updates. Not yet. Not today confused so I'm gonna put that off
for a few minutes. Okay. So under the class seven section tomorrow night when the research
essay questions are released, there will also be a wiki released so under that class seven
section, and when you go in, you'll see the list of available time slots and you can add in your
name there. You don't have to put in your essay question yet. But I would encourage you to do
that before the consultation. And you can also indicate whether you'd like to have a group
consultation as well so that other people doing that question can join the group that can join
the consultation and we can all have a chat about the question and research ideas and those
types of things. Either is absolutely fine. You can set schedule an individual consultation or you
can have a group consultation. Both are fine. So just have a thing about which you'd prefer.
14:07
I will also so that is on Saturday, the 12th of March. Your research log is then due on Friday the
18th of March. So you will need to do a bit of work between when the essay questions are
released on the first of March when we have our legal writing class on the 12th. And if you have
an individual consultation, and then the research logs are due on the 18th of March. I will then
mark the research logs and get feedback to you. Very soon after the date of submission of the
research logs well ahead of the essays being due on Friday, the eighth of April. And I'll also
organize another dropping session. So if you do want to ask any questions about any more
questions about your researchers, after you receive the feedback on your research log, then I'll
be available for that. Okay, that was a lot of information. Does anyone have any questions?
Feel free to pop your hand up or put your question in the chat or anything like that. Pablo, go
ahead. Thanks a lot. Yeah, so I was wondering is it possible to do a like single dropping but then
also the living listening and the group dropping one? No, it's best to have to come with targeted
questions, rather than rather than kind of listening on other presentations, peel feel free to
book a session and come to that session and that's where you can address a gap by asking any
questions that you wish to do so. Okay. Other questions?
16:07
How long is the consultation? Yeah, great. So the consultation is about 15 minutes. Generally
15 minutes is the right amount of time for both a group consultation or a an individual
consultation. But I do have some time I can play. I can push a few levers for example to make
sure that that there'll be enough time. So at the moment for both types of consultation the
amount of time is 15 minutes, but there is a bit of a an opportunity there's a bit of I can play
around with the time a little bit. Okay. Other questions? Anything you're not sure about?
Alright, well, let's keep going. As always, you can ask those questions tomorrow night or you
can email me and if it's something I think will be useful for O'Brien I will pop a message in the
Course Announcements forum. Oh, yes, they are. Yes. All of the thanks, Stan. That's a really
good question. So all of those, both the logs and the research essays, all of those were HD
examples. Okay. Okay, let's then get into legal research. And so the questions that we're
asking here are the following. And some of these are a little bit tongue in cheek and I will be
very honest with you as we go through this but I really there is enormous benefits in developing
strong legal research skills because to address that first question, you simply can't get away
with proper legal research just by Googling it. So the first question I've got here is why can't we
just Google it seriously? Don't you ever just start off by googling it? Why is legal research
important? Why is developing skills for legal research an important aspect of a degree in law
what qualities do the authors of the reading for this evening crikey a all identify as being
important for legal research? And what tasks might require legal research skills? So look, let's
address that first question. Why can't we just do Google it seriously? Don't you ever just start
off by googling a question? And the answer is Google is an enormously useful tool for research
to a certain extent, and I will totally admit that most questions I have I start off by googling it
even though my doctor wishes I wouldn't. But even the research I did so for example. I
published this book in 2020. I'm really proud of it. It is it has the most meticulous research in it.
It was the culmination of years worth of archival research, and I'm really thrilled with how it
ended up but I have to admit, for every person I wrote in this book, I did start off just by
Googling them. I'm going to admit that but then I supplemented that don't need that for you.
I've always got my little always got my little props in this class. But then I come into that with
strong research skills that I knew to you that I that I developed and that I could use in other
areas, too. So I might Google a person just to see. So I would Google one of the people I wrote
about in my book, just to say when they're well known Was there much about them on the
public record? Did they have an Australian dictionary of biography entry, for example, but then,
I would also look in legal databases. I've been looking Trove which is an enormous catalogue of
newspapers and Australian libraries. I was searched for them in the National Archives. So yes,
starting off googling things. There are real strengths to doing that. But you have to be able to
supplement that with strong legal research skills across other platforms. So why it's important
to develop these skills is because law is constantly changing. Even when I was writing about
historical law
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there was often things that I might not find it the first time I looked for it, or I would develop
further information or further understanding of an area so that I would know to use different
research skills or that I know it would know that all I need to look for that case. So all I need to
look at that person or that legislation, and I needed to know how to do that. So for those who
don't look at historical research, though, law students in law, legal practitioners need to acquire
good research or capability, because the law is changing constantly. Knowing where to find
new developments is the most useful knowledge a student obtains as part of their law studies.
So legal research is about both a finding out relevant information but they also continually
developing your skills. And this leads us to some of those important qualities flag or search,
and you may feel like you have these already, which is fantastic. And this will just help you
reframe those skills for your legal study. So some of the qualities that are important for legal
status research, doggedness and patients when your research is going really well, it's an
amazing feeling. And I mean, you would, you'd know that's like think about when you're
researching a holiday, and you discover like the most Oh, God, what a terrible example to use
during a global pandemic. Think about a historical time when you've been researching a
holiday and you find this most amazing place that you can't wait to go to it's like that feeling of
discovery. It's wonderful. But when research isn't going well, it can be really hard and I know
this feeling really well too. You start to hit dead ends you can't quite find anything new to cover
your ideas. about the topic. So you require that doggedness and patience. You need to be
methodical so you need to make notes keep records. Keep records of your search terms, what
search terms you used what you found, so you know that you're finding everything you need or
that after you've done a search, you can safely say, Okay, from my skill set on the basis of my
skill set from doing these searches, I'm reasonably confident that I found everything I can in an
area. That's the point that you need to get to. You need to be able to think creatively, if
needed, and you need to develop a research strategy. So I Okay, I'm going to go to this
database first. And I'm going to look up XYZ I'm going to then going to go to this database and
then this database, etc. As I said beforehand, please do feel free to jump in with any questions.
Raise your hand champagne within the chat. All good. Okay. So let's talk about the three
different types of tasks you're most likely to encounter during your LLM studies. There are
three tasks and all phase. The one that you're most likely to undertake is the middle one and
essay but let's talk about the other two first. So you may receive in the course of your studies,
you may receive a problem scenario, and you'll be asked to find relevant legislation and case
law in order to create a hypothetical response to that scenario. So for example, you might be
told that Abby wants to sue Jeff, or Abby and
25:09
Joseph
25:11
guessing a divorce, advise Abby on what she needs to do to obtain a divorce from Joseph. So
you would need to identify the relevant divorce legislation. What rare thing what is legally
required, what process is required? excetera. So that is what's known as a problem question or
hypothetical when you're given a scenario and asked to identify relevant legislation and case
law and apply that to the scenario. The next type of task is an essay which is what we do in this
course, with an essay, you may need to put forward a position or argue a position on a
particular legal topic, which will require you to find relevant relevant legislation, case law and
secondary legal materials to help shape your fonts and your opinion overall. Sorry. That is what
is required from the laws 8213 essay. You'll be you'll be you'll have a selection of questions to
choose from you pick one, and then you're being asked to put forward a position so argue one
way or another, your position on a particular legal topic, whether you agree with what the
question is saying or not. And you'll have been asked to find relevant statutes, case law and
other secondary materials to support your response. And then finally, another test that you
might get is you'll You may receive a task that asks you to, to argue what the law should be. So
you may be asked to make for example, a submission to a law reform body or right even if you
don't submit this submission to a law reform body, you may be asked to suggest what the law
should be in a particular area. So if you're required to do something like that, you'll need to find
out what the current law is. Find out what people have said about that law, and find out other
options for that law. And what what should be done in the circumstances. So these are the
three main tasks that you'll be doing as part of your LLM. Now, the most, as I said beforehand,
the most the dominant one, the one that you'll be doing the majority of the time is an essay is a
research essay. In some of the readings. So in crikey in the crikey reading, and in the module,
you're presented with a number of strategies for research and these include the Sharpe model
or the MIRAT model. And things basically come down to getting used to identify facts,
determining the legal issues involved with searching these the legal issues and evaluating the
results. Most of the time, though, with these particular type of strategies, these are more
targeted towards responding to problem questions. So something basic like this is good
because you can use it for the purposes of both AI researchers say have a say you've got a
researcher say or slower form submission. You could also use that for a complex question.
These are the models they're best left for problems scenarios. A simpler model like this. So
you're determining the issues, the searching the issues, and then reaching a conclusion. This is
a much simpler and easier strategy to adopt for things like your legal research essays. So in as
is noted in the credit cube reading, legal research really is about developing skills and building
up your information literacy and information literacy in law.
29:59
means things like knowing what information is required to solve a problem, and being able to
access appropriate tools, including locating primary and secondary sources of law, which we'll
come to in a minute. You need to evaluate the suitability of that material, use the material and
come to a conclusion on that particular issue. So let's come to the legal the specific legal
materials then and this is covered quite well in the video and in the module, as well. So primary
materials are essentially case law and legislation. They are direct sources of law. So when you
are looking for when you work, was undertaking research for the majority of legally based
tasks. The first thing you should be doing is seeing if there is a statute and or case law that can
be applied to that issue. But then secondary material is also enormously helpful. Legal
dictionaries and encyclopedias can provide you with basic definitions of your topic, and give
you ideas on what you should use as your search terms. Journal articles are great because they
provide analysis they provide different opinions on Sorry, there are just some children
screaming outside my window. Just let them walk behind okay. They did not like my take on
legal encyclopedias clearly. Okay, so journal articles. They are great. So I in my video, I showed
you one of my journal articles, they they provide a scholarly analysis provide scholarly analysis
of a particular area and they can give you ideas for problems with the law have particular
strands of research that you should look at, etc. And then legal textbooks are also really useful
as well because they may provides you with a basic introduction to a complex area. They're
often written by academics and practitioners who have a really good understanding of the law
and the best places to start your investigation of an area so I'm going to pause there, and I'm
going to pose this question to you. When you Google, when you Google, a question, you'll often
get back these types of results, so you'll be able to locate this type of material. But why is it
that you Joseph, Joseph, do you want to jump in here for this question, or was that that was an
act was that an accidental head? Sorry to put you on the spot. So my question to you is and
please feel free to pop up your hand or put your question your your in the chat for each of
these resources. Why is it the case that you do need to use some caution when considering
these materials? What is it about the nature of each of these materials? That means you do
need to take a more critical eye. Megan, thank you. Oh, thanks.
33:49
just catching up with the technology. We all know, Wikipedia. Anyone can really could pay their
entry in so you don't know. Yeah. writing it, sort of what the agenda is behind that. YouTube
videos. Again, anyone can put a video up you don't know why they want to shoot you. And I'm
not 100% Sorry, as I say this in my videos. But there's a popularity thing attached to that in
terms of people that watch it pushes it up to the top so it's not necessarily Yeah. Use paper
articles look good, but so much in history tells us that it gives you the view of someone at a
point in time and often payments are backed by particular. You know, like the owner, Dr.
What's what ends up in there? So it's not necessarily actual account of what and then there's
all internationalization that goes on summaries of cases and other developments or
involvement websites. I think the only thing I'd say about this is that you know different law
firms have, you know, they're all vying for the same work. So it might be that one law firm, sort
of dog law firm for the way they did it on what they just might set off sorry.
35:22
No, no, that was right, Megan, those were all really good responses to each of these. So there is
value to each of these resources. Yeah. Francesca, thanks for that as well. There's value to
each of these resources. Wikipedia can be great for an overview of just really quick overview of
a particular issue a can. If you find that a case has a Wikipedia page, often you'll be able to get
a really good summary of what happened in there just by clicking on that link. But as we know,
Wikipedia can be edited by everyone it can be. And so it's not the it's not the most scholarly of
sources. The same with YouTube videos. They there's no kind of review of their accuracy. And
therefore you can't say that what you were guessing is the absolute is an absolutely correct
account of the law in that video, newspaper articles. Newspaper. So I've mentioned in my area
that I so I work in predominantly intellectual property law, but newspapers mix so there are a
bunch of different types of intellectual property that's commonly right patents, trademarks, etc.
Newspaper articles, mix up those types of IP all the time. And so they'll sit so there'll be a case
about copyright. And so they'll there'll be a newspaper article discussing a case on copyright.
And they'll make they'll say all such and such try was seeking to trademark XYZ, when that
wasn't the case at all, so that the journalist may actually mix up the different legal actions. And
then finally, summaries of cases and other developments on law firm websites. Again, these
can be really useful for getting a quick read on a difficult case very, in a very short amount of
time. But you shouldn't rely on them purely because again, they're not scholarly. So they
haven't been through any kind of external process of review to check their content that that
they are correct excetera whereas for example, we've something like a peer reviewed journal
article, something that you find in the Melbourne University Law Review or the Adelaide Law
Review the Sydney Law Review, so many of the law journals that you're going to find on the
databases we're going to talk about, those articles have been what's known as peer reviewed.
And that means that generally it's a minimum of two peer reviewers who don't know who the
author is who will sit down and read that article makes suggestions for changes, and the author
then has to do that and then they will be published. I can appreciate for some of you, you're
probably some of you just them like oh my goodness, I know what peer review is and so I
apologize for that. But just to reiterate that it is an external scholarly function that makes them
a that makes things like journal articles a reliable source for your study. So let's go through
some of the types of databases and then we'll go on to our activities. So the first to know is the
Federal Register of legislation. Okay. I've got a little question posed here, from this list. What
types of material doesn't this database have looking at what is listed here? What is something
that we've been talking about so far? That his database doesn't include?
39:30
39:30
If you want to pop it in the chat, but something reading here, cases, yeah, cases common law.
Good, good. So the Federal Register is legislation is great because it has an extensive it's an
extensive database of current and historical federal legislation, statutory rules, regulations, etc.
antastic. It doesn't have secondary sources either mail us great. So it doesn't have case law
doesn't have secondary resources like journal articles, and it also doesn't have state legislation.
You have to go to the kind of state equivalence of the Federal Register of legislation to access
state legislation, or the territory equivalent for the AC T and Northern Territory. Now
somewhere where you can find all of that information is oscillate. So the Australasian sorry, I fo
par, the typo there that is the Australasian Legal Information Institute. Eisley contains current
and historical legislation, regulations 20 in time legislation, so what legislation looks like at a
particular date? It contains case law tribunal decisions, a huge range of materials at a cost at
the Commonwealth state territory levels. It doesn't it only includes unreported judgments. So
for example, you can't find a big Commonwealth law report or the Australian law report of an
RT of adjure sorry, you can't find the common law, Commonwealth law report version of a high
court case on asleep, but you'll be able to find an enormous amount of other information. It's
it's it I think I mentioned obviously previously, it revolutionized access to legal materials in
Australia. There was no beyond going to a library like going to the State Library. There was no
way to freely access legal materials before obviously came along in the mid 1990s. So Asli is
the great database to use, as well. And as just to point out there, just to really write it contains
huge numbers of case law. Legislation, and even things like tribunal Decisions, decisions of the
patent office, trademarks, office, etc. So it's a fantastic resource, and it also includes journal
articles, etc. It is free to use Yeah, you could go to os li.edu dot aging right now, type in a
search term, and you'd be able to find something it's free to use. Now, the next couple of
databases though, that's a great question Melis because the next couple of databases that I'm
going to talk about have to be accessed through the UNSW library because they're subscription
databases. So Asli is free to anyone. But for the next couple of databases, I'm going to talk
about the you are able to access these as a UNSW students and you'll need to access them
through the UNSW library. So the first one is Lexis Advance. And this has again, access to a
range of cases legislation and secondary materials, and then Westlaw. Au. Again, it has access
to legislation, case law, some secondary sources, and also the big legal encyclopedia the laws
of Australia. Now confusingly, there are a few different types of Westlaw available. The one that
you should focus on for now is Westlaw AU. And there are actually two different types of
platforms that you can use the older platform and the new platform this is a screenshot of the
new platform. Please use the new platform for your research, you'll still be able to find the
same material, but eventually we'll be phasing out the old platform. So best to get used to the
new platform at the start. i Okay, and then we've been talking about different types of law
reports, and case law. And we had a couple of questions around this in our previous car classes
going through what particular case citations meant. So, at a database like obviously, you can
find an enormous amount of what are known as unreported judgments.
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The difference between reported judgments is that these are published in one of these
authorized Law Reports. These are seeing what is published in these law reports is seen as the
most important cases of that course. Sorry, most important cases of that court in any given
year, and they end up in the formal Law Reports. But with the expansion of the internet and
technology, what that meant was that we could get access to a whole range of judgments that
previously we wouldn't we were not able to, they just simply were not publicly available. So
databases like obviously like LexisNexis au and Westlaw Ray you now have a noun provide
access to cases that would never have been published in these law reports. But an it but
decided law in Australia. So it's important to be aware of when you are be aware that for
example, when you were looking when you were going to cite a case of the High Court, you
should cite the reported version of that case, as published. In the Commonwealth law reports,
because that is the version that has been reviewed and approved by the High Court of
Australia. And it's the same for all of these Law Reports. That is the approved authorized
version of that case. And so that's why when you were looking for cases, you should make sure
that if there is a reported version of that case, you are citing the reported version, because you
are citing the authorized version, the version the court has authorized now, what we're going to
do is we're going to do a couple of exercises and we are going to do these in groups. Okay, so
the exercises that we're going to do are two exercises that are contained in the Guide to legal
research notes and exercises which is under the week three class six section on Moodle, but
I've got both of these extracted in the slides. And you can find these in the slides on Moodle.
Okay, so not one second. Okay. All right. So this is the first exercise and I'm going to give you
10 minutes to do this exercise. So what I'm going to do is I'm going to allocate everyone into
groups. See what that looks like? I'm going to do that. Okay. All right. I'm going to allocate you
into groups. And I would like groups 124 to undertake this exercise using Lexis Advance, and I'd
like groups five to eight to undertake this exercise using Westlaw. So, I'm going to read through
the groups now. And I'm going to tell you, which group you are in. Okay. So Bernie, Brenden,
Cynthia and Joseph, you're in group one, so you should be using Lexis Advance, Dong way.
Megan, Natalie and Nate. And last but not least, Pablo. You are in group to Lee Stella, Audrey
and one year, you're in group three. And Aaron Melis swam young. And you want to have you
are in group four. So if you were in one of the groups that I just mentioned, you should be using
Lexis Advance.
49:35
Anushree Francesca Shuji. Johan you're in group five. Ester? Gene You are sorry Jenny Sam
Xander. You're in group six. I am housy Jawad and Roby, you're in group seven. And last but not
least, Mary, Shirley, Carly, and Z. You were in grade eight. And so if you're in one of the groups
that I just mentioned them, you should use Westlaw. Au. What I would like you to do, cameras
and microphones on please introducing yourselves, and then answer the following questions.
These are also located in the Guide to legal research. What is the name of the case at this
citation? What is the case of bouts? How did you find that out? And in which case was this
decision most recently applies, and then be ready to discuss your findings when we return to
the main room if anything comes up in your groups, please do reach out to me via the private
chat. You can message me directly. I will also be available via the public chat as well. If you
have any questions. It's 640. It's sorry, it's 654 here, I will bring everyone back to the main
room at 705 Sydney time. Does anyone have any questions?
51:14
Oh, I'm concerned. That it just raised okay, it just reset the groups because some people live.
So actually I will leave it up to you when you get into your groups to decide whether you want
to use Lexus or Westlaw. So ignore everything I just said about the allocation because the
group's just reset. I'm launching breakout groups now. Introduce yourselves cameras and
microphones on decide which database you'd like to use and then complete the legal research
tasks. Alright, launching new now you can get in touch with me via the chat and I'll also
message you around about the time then to starting breakout groups. Now
53:36
are we going to use quick when are we going to use Lexis Advance or or Westlaw? Oh my slow.
Yes. Yeah, well, thanks. I know I was I was initially in group one. I was supposed to be using
Lexis Advance, but I'm happy to use Westlaw, but I don't care. So how and again, does anyone
know how to access to the UNSW library catalog or do we have to just go through is the guide
to the legal research.
54:17
Mostly going through at UNSW library right now.
54:20
So how did you how did you get on?
54:24
Oh, you just taught us stop your library into Google. Yeah, and Google UNSW library and then
you log in with your student ID and password.
55:56
Okay, stop letting me login.
56:02
So when you visit my library and then you go to the database search, you just type Westlaw
Australia.
56:10
Now I can't even get in. It's telling me that it's having trouble logging me in. Sorry, we're having
trouble signing up. So we'll
56:23
go to this and to login with my set. Id won't let me. Yeah, does that Id it won't let me try 539 So
go to this and to login with my set. Id won't let me. Yeah, does that Id it won't let me try 539 So
I might have to rely on you guys because it's not letting me it's just really annoying. Might
actually messaged her
57:40
which case are we supposed to search?
57:45
It says there on the degree in the questions. It's a case project 1973 130 CLR 353. So probably
Google. So gender is what's the CLR stands for
58:07
from the no law reports.
58:10
Yet so 1973 130353 So maybe if you can put that into input
58:22
Yep. See l 1973. You're astounded Chase.
1:03:16
So when you went into when you were in the library, and you went into do you then Google or
try to Westlaw Australia you platform and then did you put in just 1973 one for your CLR 353 Is
that how you?
1:03:32
You just go to UNSW library and then click to the database and then just type Wessels Westlaw
Australia. You click on that website. Yeah. And then you type 1973 313 l 353. And then this
1:03:52
is it. Is that just the printed? mean? Do I just type that in?
1:04:00
1:04:00
On the slide, put the year first 1973 That's the year and then the volume 130 And then CLR five
three?
1:04:10
Yeah, no, no I'm sorry. I mean, I mean there but what I'm saying is very, very like type in
1:04:19
click onto cases. I don't know if you can see on the left side, there's like cases legislation on
cases. And then on the search box, you just type one nine some free. So
1:04:34
on my left I've got top viewer sent to details of cases.
1:04:46
So on the left hand side, you know Westlaw just split two that's We're only have a minute or
two Shally
1:11:41
CF MN and personnel contracting case. So there will be times when courts discuss cases or
refer to them cite them without applying, but certainly in the CF mn EU and personal contracts
in case the court did apply it there. Okay, 715. So what we're going to do now we're not going
to go for the next for the next exercise, we're not going to go into groups. What I'll instead ask
you to do is to give this a try by yourself. So for those who have the PowerPoints in front of
them, we're on page 24 of the PDF pack, or we might be we should be around page 20 for the
legal research Exercise number two Yes. Excellent. Francesca. Those are the questions. While
you're doing this, I'm also going to log out and log back in to hopefully cure my internet of this
problem. So I'm not going to allocate you to a group as I said, Pick one of the databases maybe
the one that you didn't use beforehand, just so you can get a sense of how to use some of the
new databases, some of the different databases that you can use, obviously, Westlaw au or
Lexis Advance, and then Francesca has kindly popped those three questions in the chat. Or
they Yeah, the three questions in the chat. For questions. Can you find a high court authority on
a person's entitlement to vote in a parliamentary election? What search terms did you use?
Which judges decided this case? And was any legislation considered in this case? And if so,
what legislation? Alright, I'm going to give you so it's 716. Now, I'm going to give you about I'm
going to give you five or so minutes I'm going to leave and come back in to try and cure my
internet was just give it a try. See what you can find and then we'll go through this when I come
back in. Alright, I will see you back here. In a Moment.
1:16:22
Are you have any question anyone using Westlaw? I'm asking you to provide legal sorry what
pending registration so I can't login? Because I had this error.
1:16:35
Um, so I saw that before Joe, I'm just checking. Can you hear me okay? Yes, I can. Oh, fantastic.
Yeah, because I had to log in via my iPad because my computer just apparently I should have
done that update. Okay, yes. So when you click through to Westlaw Do you get it a yellow
screen? And it has kind of name and ID on it?
1:17:00
Yes, I approved it. And this screen came up it says the registration key associated with Westlaw
sprint is pending validation.
1:17:08
Okay, okay, that's unusual. I think just try another database for now then. Okay. Yeah, great.
Okay, we'll come back in another minutes.
1:17:30
TerraForm will come back in another meter though. So just seeing how you got or what you can
find out oh, Aaron. Thank you. That's really helpful. Sorry. It's all always computer difficulties
come up at the worst time.
1:18:03
So just take another minute. or so. Okay, so let's come back together. And let's talk through our
responses. So how did you go? Did you find the name of a case if anyone wants to pop that in
the chat? If you found any cases if you want to pop that in the chat or pop your hand up to oh,
there we go. Fantastic. Thanks, Sam. Yep. Great. Fantastic. Yep, this is familia familia. Nice.
Yeah. Ah, yes. Yeah. Fantastic, excellent. Everyone. Um, what search terms I can can say that
those are all very helpful. What were some of the search terms that you used in doing this
search
1:20:48
What did you put into the floral Lexus or our sleeve? I put in Oh, great. Excellent. Shirley.
Thanks. Gemilut. That Sam that looks really good. It's excellent night really good approach to
so I'm used honestly. And I put in votes Parliament Australia, and I got an enormous amount
back. All right, that leads up to the good strategy turn. So I then once I had put in those search
terms, I then actually had to go and specifically tailor my search a little bit more. Because the
Yeah, I just come up with so many results. So I had to go into the High Court database. And
even then, I found a whole range of resources, which I knew from having, you know, a bit of
knowledge in the era, I knew they weren't the most useful ones, whereas the ones that you
found were really useful. So for example, so were you able to identify which judge decided the
case that you which judges decided the cases that you found, were you able to get that from
the information that you found whether on Lexus or Westlaw or asleep fantastic, yep. So
Megan, yours was that classic kind of classic? Not knowing your case. Yours was the kind of
Megan's was the classic late 80s to all Yeah, I'm gonna actually no, I'm gonna say late 70s to
mid 80s. And say 80s for your case, Megan. Yeah. Megan, go ahead. Already said an accidental
head. Yeah. Id three wonderful, and then surely from the bench that you've described there.
Yours was around I'm going to say between 2010 and 2015. And one day, you will have this
random knowledge to explain to people at dinner parties. Fantastic. And then also around
whether there was any legislation considered in the case as well. So look, before because of my
technical difficulties, we haven't been able to do that quite as well as I would have liked to do.
But you did really well with fine with both of those tasks, finding that information, particularly in
the second exercise. In that short amount of time. Now on these slides that are about to
release on Moodle, you'll see that I had one additional Oh, okay, so, or Melis yours was kind of
made early. I'm going to say early to mid 2000s case in you're looking at that bench. So in the
research in the PowerPoint slides that will be released on Moodle at 730. You'll see that I also
had one of the things we were also going to do was do a just a practice research login tree and
so do download those slides because you can see how we were going to do that exercise. And
I've given you an example of what that research logon tree would look like as well. So we can't
do that just because of my color. Technical difficulties and also noting the time as well. But do
download the full PowerPoint slides when they're available in a couple of minutes. And you'll
see that you might want to have a think of how you would have done this this research log
entry for the case that you found. And then on the second to last page of the PowerPoint slides,
you can see that I've done an example of a research login treat for Roche and electoral
Commissioner, which was a 2007 a homelife 1999 Nice.
1:24:54
Yeah, which was a 2007 decision of the High Courts. Okay, so let's leave that there with the
technology has failed me tonight and I apologize for that. But legal research skills will not fail
you. Tomorrow night. What we're going to do is illegal research in practice. So I've written a
practice essay question, and what we're going to do is we're going to go through it. We're going
to strategize how we break it down. What look at what the question is asking what we need to
focus on in the question, and then how we go about searching for information for our question.
And so we'll be doing that in class tomorrow night. Please do take a look at the guide to legal
research notes and exercises before tomorrow's class if you have the chance to do so. And if
you have the chance to do so as well. He might think about answering going through
completing some of the exercises as well.
1:26:03
But you've got off to a really
1:26:04
1:26:04
good start from the sounds of it. You're already thinking about the different indicators, the
different databases used, differences between application and discussion and citation in a case
etc. So you're doing really well as discussed the researcher said questions and the updated
Research Log document will be released tomorrow at 730. Depending how we go for time,
though, I might actually release these while you're in class. So you can have a read through
start thinking about which question you might like to do and if there are any questions you'd
like to ask as well. All right. Finally, a reminder that the legal concepts quiz needs to be
completed by 4pm Sydney time on Thursday, the third of March remember to get the full 100
minutes that you're entitled to you need to log in by 2:20pm on Thursday, third of March to get
that full 100 minutes. Okay, everyone, let's leave it there. Thanks so much for your patience
with my technical views tonight. It works. Sometimes it works. It works more often than not.
We'll leave it there. Stay safe. And well. I'll see you tomorrow night. Thanks so much, everyone.
Have a good day. For those of you who are just getting started and good evening for everyone
else. Bye for now. Thank you for your patience. Everyone. South Korea