BUS503 PRINCIPLES OF COMMERCIAL LAW ASSESSMENT TASK 2_ASSIGNMENT 2017 DUE DATE: Friday 5 May 2017 (midnight) (Week 9) TOTAL MARKS: 30 marks (30% of overall assessment) WORD LIMIT: 2000 words...

BUS503 PRINCIPLES OF COMMERCIAL LAW
ASSESSMENT TASK 2_ASSIGNMENT 2017
DUE DATE: Friday 5 May 2017 (midnight) (Week 9)
TOTAL MARKS: 30 marks (30% of overall assessment)
WORD LIMIT: 2000 words
SUBMISSION: Electronically in Black Board under the Assessment tab. Ensure that you include a cover page with your name, the name of your tutor and day and time of your tutorial.
Brett is a first year student at USC and is studying Leisure and Event Management. Annie and Brett are in the same Business law and Ethics class (Brett thought the course might be too hard and left it ‘til his last year). Annie is quite keen on Brett. She thinks his clothes are a bit dated and he seems a bit sleepy but generally she likes him.
Annie knows that Brett works at the Tavern. She decided to have her 18^th birthday party there and hoped that Brett would be on duty … and he was. Brett thinks Annie is nice but he’s rather more interested in her friend Candice, who is a bit older, she’s 19.
On the night of the party, Brett was the manager on duty. It was a long and busy night and Brett had to help behind the bar because one of the bar staff had called in sick. At around 11:00 pm, David, who is employed at the Tavern as a ‘glassie’ (someone who picks up glasses from the tables) approached Brett, who was tending the bar, and told him that someone had been sick near the main door.
“Have you cleaned it up, then?” yelled Brett over the noise of the party.
“Yeah, yeah,” said David “But it’s an awful mess.”
Brett thought he’d better go check but just then Candice came up to the bar to order. Brett nudged past the other bar attendant to serve her and completely forgot about the ‘awful mess’.
Annie could see Brett smiling at Candice and drank more tequila. By the end of the night Annie was very intoxicated. About 1:00am, she was ready to head home. She stumbled toward the main door and in a final attempt to gain Brett’s attention turned to wave him goodbye. She slipped on the ‘awful mess’ and fell on her back with a thud. Annie was wearing the latest fashion in stilettos – shoes with two inch platforms and 5 inch, very narrow heals. As she fell the right heel of her shoe broke away from the sole causing a particularly twisted, heavy fall. It turns out that someone had spilt cream from the birthday cake onto the vomit on the floor creating a doubly slippery surface, according to forensic investigations.
Annie sustained a fracture to her lower back and will need surgery. She will have to lie in bed for some months in order to recover. She’ll have to give up her part-time job at Safeway for at least six months. Fortunately no one else was injured. It was reported that the mess was seen and avoided by others at the party.
Annie’s interest in Brett has turned sour. She wishes to sue Brett in Negligence. Advise her.
You are asked to ignore any questions of vicarious or occupiers’ liability. Confine your discussion to a consideration of Brett’s personal liability in Negligence.
ASSIGNMENT GUIDELINES
The following guidelines are based on a review of common errors made in assignments. Students are asked to read these guidelines carefully as they will be taken into account in marking your papers.
The information to follow is presented under the headings of:

• Content and analysis
• Structure and style.
• Referencing
• Formatting
• Assessment criteria.

CONTENT AND ANALYSIS
Your work in this task is assessed according to three main criteria. These are:

• Knowledge of relevant business law and ethical principles and sources
• Analysis and reasoning to generate conclusions
• Structure, written expression and presentation

In order to demonstrate knowledge of the law for this assignment, you need to state the relevant legal principles accurately and reference them appropriately by citing case law and legislation.
In order to demonstrate analysis and reasoning, you need to apply the relevant legal principles to the facts of the case study in order to reach a conclusion.
You need to adopt a logical structure (you may use headings), avoid spelling and grammatical errors (see further under ‘Structure and Style’ below) and present your arguments in a coherent and convincing manner.
Note that the use of footnotes, or endnotes, is the preferred method of referencing for legal writing (you can use the ‘insert’ function in word).
The following guidelines stem from the criteria stated above:

• It is not enough to discuss the facts in a general way without reference to legal principle/s.
• It is not enough to state relevant legal principles without explicitly applying those principles to the facts.
• Statements of legal requirements/ principles must be accurate. Use of your own words is encouraged but must convey the substance (meaning of) the legal principle/s.
• Merely reproducing the facts given in the problem will not attract marks. This problem commonly occurs in written introductions, where it would appear that the writer is not sure where to start.
• Answers should include an introduction, analysis and conclusion (but not include these headings as such).
• The introduction should contain statements of:
• The legal terms given to the relevant parties on the facts
• The nature of the action to be taken by the party advised
• The party who must prove the action (burden of proof)
• The relevant standard of proof
• The elements of the action requiring proof.
• The analysis should state:
• The elements requiring proof (from the legislation) and interpretation of those elements (from legislation and case authorities as appropriate)
• An application of the legal requirements (elements) and their interpretation to the facts in question
• A consideration of legal remedies available to the injured party should the action be proven.
• The conclusion should contain:
• A summary of previous discussion and conclusion as to the likelihood of proof of the action. No new material should be included in this part of an answer.
• Accurate and full reference to cases and legislation must be used (see further below).

STRUCTURE AND STYLE
The following guidelines reflect the requirements of formal academic writing generally and those more specifically relevant to law.

• Executive summaries should NOT be included.
• Headings may be used.
• Headings using IRAC (ie the words issue, rule...etc) should NOT be used.
• Headings using ‘Introduction’, ‘Analysis’, and ‘Conclusion’ should NOT be used.
• Headings should reflect the legal issues raised by the problem.
• Avoid abbreviations- eg use ‘has not’ instead of ‘hasn’t’.
• Avoid informal language- eg use ‘Therefore..’ instead of ‘So..’ or ‘Well..’.
• Avoid use of emotive language- eg use ‘I argue.., “I would argue..’, ‘I assert.., or ‘I contend..’ instead of ‘I believe..’, ‘I feel..’ or even ‘I think..’.
• Be mindful that legal analysis is about logical argument based on principles as applied to the facts and not about personal responses- emotional or value-laden.
• Avoid use of ‘slang’ (or poor grammar generally)- eg use ‘should have’ instead of ‘should of’.
• An opinion may be stated but must be based upon an application of legal principle to the facts.
• Check spelling and grammar; use the spell and grammar checks available on computer.
• Full sentences, containing a subject, verb and object must be used.
• When beginning a sentence with a reference to a section of legislation use ‘Section..”
• When referring to a section of legislation mid-sentence use ‘s.…’.
• When referring to a court’s finding or judgement use, for example, ‘It was held in that case that..’ or ‘The court held that..’(Note third person and past tense used).
• When first referred to in a sentence cite legislation in full, and the full name of cases plus the year of reporting. For example;
• It was found in Smith v Jones XXXXXXXXXXCLR 98 that..
• Section 67 of the Town Planning Act 1987 (Cth) requires that…
• Subsequent references may be summarised or truncated to, for example;
• In Smith’s Case…
• The Town Planning Act…; or
• The Act…

• Care should be taken in the use of quotations and reproduction of sections of legislation.
• Generally a quotation should only be used when the author conveys her own very specific idea that you are referencing, or when the author conveys an idea in a manner that is convincing and that you can not adequately paraphrase.
• Reproduction of provisions of legislation should be limited to very brief sections or parts of sections and where possible should be paraphrased.

REFERENCING

• Although for your non-law courses you may be using the Harvard style of referencing, or that appropriate to another discipline, in law the most accepted style footnoting or endnoting.
• The law reference guide is the Australian Guide to Legal Citation (AGLC) (3^rd ed) and is posted with your assignment. There is a great deal of detail in this guide. For our purposes, please note the following and refer to further instruction in the lectures:
• Use footnotes or endnotes by using the ‘insert’ icon in Word and scrolling down to footnote or endnote. Footnotes will appear at the bottom of the page you are working on; endnotes will appear at the end of your work as it progresses (either are acceptable).
• Your note should contain references to cases and legislation.

• Accurate, complete references to cases and legislation must be given (and may be found in your text).
• References to legislation must contain the relevant section to which you are referring.
• References to either legislation or cases must NOT contain spelling errors.
• Case names and legislation should be presented in italics or underlined.
• Note that further instruction on referencing will be given in lectures.

FORMATTING

• An assignment cover page should be attached to your work.
• The name of your tutor and the day and time of your tutorial MUST appear on the assignment cover page.
• Appropriate margins should be provided on each page of your work.
• A copy of your paper should be retained for your reference.
• Use Times New Roman 12 font and 1.5 line spacing.

ASSESSMENT CRITERIA
As noted in the course outline and further explained above the assessment criteria for this assessment task are:

1. Knowledge of relevant business law and ethical principles and sources
2. Analysis and reasoning to generate conclusions
3. Structure, written expression and presentation.