Legislative responses to COVID-19
See the information table at this new page.
CALC Online Conference 2022
See the conferences page for information about this conference.
This information includes the following:
- the call for papers,
- the conference program (when available) – the response to the call for papers was very pleasing indeed, many thanks to all who submitted proposals,
- material related to the 2022 CALC ordinary general meeting (when available), and
- nominations and candidate information for positions on the CALC Council 2022-2024.
General meeting, Council, and elections
A general meeting of CALC will occur on day 1 of the online 2022 CALC conference, 18 July 2022.
CALC members can now email the following to CALC's Secretary Ross.Carter@pco.govt.nz:
- nominations for CALC Council positions -- email these by the deadline of midnight 12 June 2022 New Zealand standard time:
- notice of any special resolutions to be moved by a member (rather than by Council) -- email these by the deadline of midnight 5 June 2022 New Zealand standard time.
The requirements for nominations, or for notice of special resolutions, are set out in an email sent to all members by CALC's Secretary on 18 April 2022.
CALC elections for 2022 will be conducted electronically, and so by personal electronic vote only. The Constitution and election rules are available at calc.ngo/constitution-and-rules.
Upcoming events
Statute Law Society Lecture, 11 May 2022
Determining the Matter: Statutory Interpretation and Devolved Legislation -- The Supreme Court's recent decision in the Rights of the Child Reference [2021] UKSC 42, on the lawfulness of the Scottish Parliament's bill to incorporate the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child into Scots law, raises important questions about the construction of both devolved legislation and Westminster legislation.
Speaker: Denis Edwards, Barrister. Formerly Lecturer in Law, University of Strathclyde and Assistant Professor of Law, City University, Hong Kong. Vice Chair of the Statute Law Society. Attendance: Tickets to attend in-person at UCL Laws (Bentham House, Endsleigh Gardens, London WC1H 0EG) are limited for this event. Options are available to attend online via zoom. Please choose the correct ticket when making your booking.
What goes where? ALRC webinar 24 May 2022
A comparative discussion of the legislative puzzle -- As the Australian Law Reform Commission (ALRC) moves forward with its current inquiry into the simplification of corporations and financial services legislation, it is turning its attention to regulatory design and the hierarchy of laws. Relevant questions include: How should the statutory and regulatory framework be designed to support complex areas such as financial services? Where should the law be located to achieve coherence and navigability? If the law needs detail to function, whose job should it be to provide it? Join the ALRC as it hosts a panel of international experts from Hong Kong, New Zealand, Singapore, and the UK to discuss these and related issues.
TUESDAY 24 MAY 2022 AT 4.30PM AEST
2.30PM AWST, HKT, SGT | 6.30PM NZST | 7.30AM BST
For a flyer, click here.
To register for this free webinar, click here.
2022 IAL Palermo Conference: 14-15 October 2022
The IAL Conference 2022 will try to set the parameters for this research looking at other disciplines, such as law and linguistics that may help legislative drafter who wants to know how a piece of legislation has performed and the extent to which its goals have been achieved. The conference is expected to be held virtually and on-site at the University of Palermo. The programme will be posted in due course. For more information, click here.
RSS feeds
RSS feeds have been set up for this webpage -- see the footer block below.
To set up an RSS feed, copy the URL for each feed into an RSS reader, as follows:
- The Loophole: calc.ngo/rss/loophole.xml
- The Newsletter: calc.ngo/rss/newsletter.xml
- Conference papers: calc.ngo/rss/papers.xml
- Conferences: calc.ngo/rss/conferences.xml
- Employment: calc.ngo/rss/employment.xml
- What’s new: calc.ngo/rss/whats-new.xml
Past events
Statute Law Society event -- Annual Lord Renton Lecture, 25 November 2021, 6pm UK time
What makes good statute law: a judge's view
Speaker: Lady Arden of Heswall, Justice of the Supreme Court
chaired by The Hon Mr Justice Garnham, Chairman of the Statute Law Society
An on-demand recording of this lecture is available at this link:
Statute Law Society Annual Lord Renton Lecture - YouTube
Recordings of Legislative Drafting Webinars
On demand recordings of 2 webinars in the iLegis and Penn Law series Bicontinental Perspectives on Legislative Drafting are available at these links:
- The Ethics and Politics of Legislative Drafting - YouTube
- Legislation as an Interdisciplinary Challenge Using Environmental Law as an Example - YouTube
Recording of Rule of Law and Subordinate Legislation Webinar, 29 September 2021
Time: 29 September 2021, 6-7 pm (UK time)
Speaker: Sir Jonathan Jones, KCB QC, former HM Procurator General, Treasury Solicitor and Head of the Government Legal Services.
Recording: https://vimeo.com/showcase/8885191
Paper: click here.
Rules as Code 101 webinar recording
A recording of the AUSCL / CALC Webinar in September 2021 is now available in the Members' Area.
The recording is also available from LinkedIn, but only to subscribers to the AUSCL channel on LinkedIn.
Other CALC notices
Meredith Leigh appointed new First Parliamentary Counsel
Congratulations to Meredith Leigh on her appointment as the new First Parliamentary Counsel, Australian Government Office of Parliamentary Counsel.
Honours for 2 exceptional legislative drafters
CALC’s President, Geoff Lawn, says: “2 CALC members have been made a Dame Commander of the Order of the Bath in this year’s UK Queen’s Birthday Honours. These are our very own Brenda King, our Immediate Past President, and Elizabeth Gardiner, First Parliamentary Counsel in the UK OPC. This is such wonderful and well-deserved recognition of their many years of service, and it is great to see the work of legislative drafters recognised in this way. I have congratulated Brenda and Elizabeth on behalf of CALC.”
Congratulations to Peter Quiggin on his appointment as a Queen's Counsel
CALC members congratulate Peter Quiggin PSM on his appointment as a Queen's Counsel.
Hon Christian Porter MP, Attorney General for Australia, made the appointment announcement on 15 October 2020.
Mr Quiggin PSM is First Parliamentary Counsel, Office of Parliamentary Counsel. He has served as Australia’s First Parliamentary Counsel since 2004. Mr Quiggin was awarded a Public Service Medal in the 2008 Australia Day Honours List for outstanding public service in delivering the government's legislative agenda at a time of significant legislative change and in a number of critical areas.
Peter has also served as CALC's President from 2011 to 2017. As CALC members appreciate, Peter also showed outstanding leadership and service in that role.
Above is a recent photo of Peter with the banner that celebrates OPC’s 50th anniversary.
Pacific Toolkit: From policy to legislation
Congratulations to the Pacific Islands Law Officers' Network (PILON) and Australian Attorney-General's Department on launching this Toolkit.
The Toolkit is available for download here.
Cancellation of CALC Conference 2021 – Bahamas July 2021
CALC's Council has decided to cancel the 2021 CALC Conference that was to be held in the Bahamas in July 2021.
For more details, see Geoff Lawn's CALC President's report in the December 2020 CALC Newsletter at the Newsletters page.
Meeting of Commonwealth Law Ministers and Senior Officials
Colombo, Sri Lanka, 4-7 November 2019
CALC Conference 2019 -- Zambia, 1-3 April 2019
This Conference was held at the Avani Victoria Falls Resort, in Livingstone, Zambia, 1-3 April 2019.
Conference papers for Zambia, April 2019 are in the Members’ area (member log in access only).
Employment
For a more information about Employment opportunities and Contract drafters, please see the Employment page.
| Position | Closing Date | Information for applicants | |
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Legislative Counsel (multiple positions) -- Department of Justice, Government of Nunavut, Canada |
13 May 2022 | Website | |
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Legislative Counsel post, Legislative Drafting Department of the Portfolio of Legal Affairs, Cayman Islands Government |
6 May 2022 | Apply online | Post description (48 KB) |
|
The Office of the Attorney General, Ireland seeks the services of Five or more Legislative Drafters on a contract basis to commence in March/April 2022 for an initial 12 month contract with the option to be renewed, subject to drafting requirements, for up to three additional 12 month periods. Applicants must register with etenders in order to submit an application. The link to register can be found on etenders under supplier/company registration. The etenders system Id for ‘The Drafting of Primary & Secondary Legislation on behalf of the Office of the Attorney General’ is 206858.
|
17.00 GMT on Wednesday 02 March 2022 | Applications must be submitted via the etenders.gov.ie website. | Details in regard to the role (993 KB) |
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Legislative drafters and Legislation Services Consultant (3 posts) -- Legislative Drafting Office, Jersey |
4pm GMT, 28 July 2021 | ||
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Re-advertisement with clarification -- Establishment of an Open List Agreement for the Provision of Legal Drafters – Secondary Legislation Service – Northern Ireland |
first sift and go live date 14 September 2020 | Document (17 KB) | |
Services
CALC has a number of services that are provided for the benefit of members and legislative drafting offices.
These services include:
- advertising drafting positions
- the CALC online drafting advice service
- the CALC office organisation advice service.
For more details, please see the CALC Services Page.
Publications catalogue
Find papers and articles published in the Newsletter or Loophole.
Forum
The forum is only available for registered and logged in members.
Drafting manuals and other resources
CALC provides links to online drafting manuals and other resources.
Training
CALC provides links to information about various courses and training in legislative drafting.