BLAW30004: Competition and Consumer Law

30% 2000 word Assignment (in pairs), 70% 2hr+30mins Open Book Final Exam

2000 word partner assignment; you can pick whoever you want to partner with. It’s a relatively straightforward assignment that covers the consumer law content. Its difficult in that you don’t learn the required material until a week before its due, and you do need to think a lot about what the question wants. The best tip I can give is to focus on how the question is worded and what topic its asking you to respond on. Also try to write succinctly, the word limit is constraining.

The course is split into two main topics with Consumer Law covering the first half and Competition Law covering the second half.

The lectures are generally taken by both lecturers, with Rhonda going through the economic principles and reasoning behind the legal framework, and Arlen through the specific legislation. Lectures are NOT recorded, so make sure you take lots of notes!

If you’ve done BLAW10001 Principles of Business Law before, the first half of the course should be relatively familiar, which touch on topics like misleading conduct, and consumer guarantees. Even without the prior knowledge, these topics are quite straight forward if you understand how to apply legislation to facts.

The second half is more confusing… Competition Law focuses on a lot of economic principles, and if you’re not from a commerce background it makes it worse. Rhonda does run through economics 101 (those who know it are literally told they can have a break lol) and there are a lot of readings available on the LMS to help.

Tutorials help immensely so definitely attend those if you are having trouble with the content. I also suggest emailing Arlen if you don’t understand market definition because it links in with the rest of the course.

For our exam, it was 2hrs writing time, 30mins reading time. Question 1 (hypothetical) was compulsory, then you could pick between doing Question 2 (another hypothetical) or 3 (pick 3 out of 6 essay-type questions). You get introduced to both types of questions in tutes. For hypotheticals, you are asked to apply law to the given facts. For essay questions, you are asked to discuss a statement which requires more theory-based content (economic concepts, etc).

There was one practice exam which we went through together during the last lecture, and was a good indication of the difficulty of the exam. There is also a revision session a few days before the exam where Arlen takes questions. Make sure you come ready with questions! Arlen dismisses everyone after no one answers his call for questions.

To prepare for the exam, I suggest writing out answers to the practice exam and then compare them to Arlen’s answers, making sure you’ve addressed all the points Arlen made. If you have time, also do this for the tute work. Further, make a one page summary (as Arlen suggests) of all the topics. I found it super helpful during reading time.

None.

Arlen Duke, Rhonda Smith

This is a great subject to do if you have enjoyed other law subjects such as BLAW10001 Principles of Business Law. It is structured well and you can really show your knowledge and effort (which is definitely reflected in your marks).

Yes, 1 exam.

4 Out of 5

Australian Competition Law (2nd ed, 2013) (LexisNexis); and Consumer Protection Law in Australia (2nd ed, 2013) (LexisNexis) by Alex Bruce. Not very necessary. I never did the readings, and didn’t feel like I needed to do them. Only used the competition book to clarify a few areas, so I suggest borrowing from the library.

These were really important in consolidating the content, and Arlen gives great tips to help. Arlen gives an answer structure in an early tutorial, then for the rest just goes through the important points. I found he often missed important points, so make sure you speak up in tutes and ask whether what you thought was relevant or not. Or send him an email afterwards.

1x2hr Lecture, 1x1hr Tute

2015 Sem 1