Crispin Hull

The High Court yesterday overturned nearly 900 years of legal reasoning.

It overturned what lawyers know as the rule in Rylands v Fletcher.

Gasp. Lawyers and law students will be mortified. It would be like saying to a mathematician that Pythagoras’s theorem is wrong, or to a musician that Beethoven’s Fifth was written by Mozart, or that accountants should revert to single-entry accounting.

The rule, put simply, is if you bring anything dangerous on to your land you are strictly liable for any damage resulting from its escape, even if the escape was not your fault. It has applied to water, chlorine, wild animals and a host of dangerous and unnatural things.
Continue reading “1994_03_march_rylands”

The people of Old Red Hill have a difficult public-relations job. There are 73 residences in an area bounded by Mugga Way, Morseby Street, Arthur Circle, Monaro Crescent and Flinders Way. The blocks are huge, the houses large though some are run down, and the trees are splendid.

It is gracious living from another age.

That, however, is its heritage value. It was designed like that by Walter Burley Griffin and now attracts tourist buses. The people who lived there helped found the nation.

The area is like an endangered species of dwelling-scape. There is nothing quite like it anywhere: easy to kill off; impossible to recreate. But jealousy makes public sympathy scarce.
Continue reading “1994_03_march_redhillb”

Red Hill residents called yesterday for a key Assembly committee to delay its decision on allowing medium-density housing in the old area of the suburb.

They said it would be wrong for the committee to make a finding until the Australian Heritage Commission has determined their nomination of Old Red Hill for entry on the register of the national estate; the ACT Heritage Council has finalised its citation for the Interim Places Register; and Professor Ken Taylor has conducted his study of the area for the National Trust and the University of Canberra.

Old Red Hill is bounded by Mugga Way, Monaro Crescent, Flinders Way and Morseby Street.

The Old Red Hill Preservation Group says medium-density housing in the area will spoil an essential part of Canberra as a planned city.
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The man shot in the legs at Dickson pool last year just before his assailant crashed into the Jolimont Centre later killing himself, was not fit to be a public servant and should have been sacked for rigging a pool cleaning contract, according to the Disciplinary Appeal Committee.

The committee said the man, Geoffrey Patrick McGibbon, had put up a “”front man” to get a cleaning contract at Civic Olympic Pool. The front man, Alex Stevenson, did not have a clue how to clean a pool and tender documents were “”like Latin” to him.

Mr McGibbon had used pool employees to partly perform the contract without telling his boss, and that the contractor had employed Mr McGibbon’s wife without Mr McGibbon telling his boss.

The committee also attacked the credibility of a Liberal candidate for the ACT Legislative Assembly.
Continue reading “1994_03_march_poolman”

The Royal Life-Saving Society is satisfied with the management of the Dickson Swimming Pool, according to its president, Justice Terence Higgins.

The pool’s manager was found unfit to be a public servant by a disciplinary appeal committee a fortnight ago over events surrounding his running of the Civic Olympic Pool.

The manager, Geoffrey McGibbon, ran the Civic pool for 18 years as a public servant in the ACT Administration before self-government.

Mr McGibbon is executive director of the ACT branch of the Royal Life-Saving Society of Australia. The society has a contract with the ACT Department of Sport for the management of the Dickson Pool.
Continue reading “1994_03_march_poolman2”

A former public servant, Geoffrey McGibbon, is to appeal to the Federal Court against a finding by the Disciplinary Appeal Committee that he should be dismissed from the Public Service.

Mr McGibbon is manager of the Dickson Pool. He was shot in the legs at Dickson pool last year just before his assailant crashed into the Jolimont Centre later killing himself.

The committee found he had put up a front man to get a cleaning contract when he was manager of the Civic Olympic Pool (a public service position in the ACT Administration) and had used pool employees to do work that should have been done under the contract, and that he had not disclosed that his wife had been employed by the contractor.

Mr McGibbon said yesterday he had not been represented at the hearing because of a confusion over notification of hearing dates. He defended his solicitor, Michael Higgins, who had been criticised by the committee. Mr McGibbon said Mr Higgins had given notice to the committee that he was unavailable on the hearing date, but the committee had continued the hearing.
Continue reading “1994_03_march_poolman1”

A groundwell of resentment about urban in-fill and planning had been under-estimated by ACT politicians and it would become a major issue at the next election, according to the chair of a group of 19 resident-action groups.

The groups were concerned about dual-occupancy, townhouse development and housing at the Tuggeranong homestead site. They have formed a group called the Save Our City Coalition under the chair of the Canberra Conservation Council.

The president of the council, Jacqui Rees, said ACT politicians had not tapped the level of distress by people affected by changes to the Territory Plan allowing for second houses to be built in gardens of existing houses and then for the title to be split and sold off.

Most ACT politicians “”think it is a few loudmouths, but it is not”, she said. “”They do not recognise the depth of distress. They have not tapped it. That’s why they are coming to us. It’s going to be a major election issue.”
Continue reading “1994_03_march_planelct”

The pharmaceutical industry is heavily research-based. It costs around $200 million for a company to produce a new drug and get it approved by the US Federal Drugs Administration. That is the major barrier. After that approval in other countries usually follows, though it is not routine, nor cheap. In Australia, the Federal Government’s Therapeutic Goods Administration rigorously evaluates new products before approval.

Australia is about 2 per cent of the world pharmaceutical market.

The marketability and financial return for the new drug will depend on many factors, the most significant being the difference between the new treatment and the old in effectiveness, side-effects, ease of administration, price and acceptance by patients, pharmacists and doctors.

The high price of producing a new drug is mainly in the cost of failures. It is an uncertain business. Some companies can get several quick hits and other might languish with failures. So there are often there are corporate shake-ups, mergers and break-ups.
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In the Middle Ages witches used to tell fortunes and prescribe cures for ills demanding only that the patient “”cross my palm with silver”.

All of the fortune-telling and part of the cure prescriptions were nonsense, but some made sense. For example, witches prescribed thyme-leaf tea for colds and flu. Nowadays, pharmacists prescribe various pills which contain the active ingredient thymol, C10H13OH2.

The range, purity and accuracy of prescriptions have grown exponentially since the Middle Ages. And so has the amount of silver crossing palms.

In the Middle Ages, governments persecuted the witches. Now they join in the business of drug prescription, and rightly so. Without intervention, drugs would be denied the poor and research incentives for drug companies would disappear.
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The scene is the Erindale Centre in Tuggeranong last Thursday night. About 100 people are playing competition squash and volleyball.

In the room normally used by the squash people for a few drinks and supper after a hard game, seven people sit on plastic chairs listening to someone talk. Seven people. It could be a class in esoteric Japanese silk painting, or a class in Galbraithian economics. It is not. In fact it is a public meeting and information night about appeal rights under the new Territory Plan.

It is hard to get people interested. It was the same during the consultation process before the plan became law last November. People are not interested unless it directly affects them. Then they get very active. They suddenly wake up to find their neighbourhood is being changed.

This is happening in Canberra now, five months after the plan became law. People are putting in development proposals under the new plan and neighbours are getting worried.
Continue reading “1994_03_march_perma”