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| Cow sculpture in the garden at Bear Cottage. |
Later this year Voiceless
will be hosting the Australian-New Zealand Intervarsity Moot on Animal Law (cleverly
named so it can be abbreviated thus: ANIMAL).
The aim is to provide law
students with the chance to develop knowledge in animal law while honing their
written oral and advocacy skills.
ANIMAL is open to all
Australian and New Zealand law students. It will be held at Bond University
over the weekend of 18-19 October. Individuals and teams are invited to
register. Questions and facts will be released one month before, at 9am on 15
September. Written submissions must be emailed on October 17.
You can view the draft
program here.
The program includes
optional question and answer forums with senior animal law academics and panel
discussions with legal experts in the field.
If you aren’t a law
student you can still attend as a spectator. Contact the organisers for more
information.
Speaking of the law
Newspapers have seized onthe story that a vomiting cat was the reason a footballer got off lighter thanhe could have for a speeding charge. There’s a lot of speculation as to whether
this was a legit or “dog-ate-my-homework” kind of excuse (though I am here to
tell you that dogs DO, occasionally, eat homework – as well as the odd mobile
phone)(and if you’ve not experienced a vomiting cat before, feline emesis can
be dramatic and terrifying).
But before you think that
the animal-in-distress excuse works, one of my clients had a French bulldog who
actually went into anaphylaxis on a freeway and the judge wasn’t lenient at
all.
Do professional
associations matter?
Professional associations,
those organisations we pay fees to, play different roles. This month the
Australian Veterinary Association is one professional organisation
participating in the “Associations Matter” study.
It’s a chance to provide
feedback about what the organisation is doing well and what could be done
better. We’re a big fan of professional associations here for a range of
reasons including advocacy and ethics, but an association is only as strong as
its membership and can really only help if we provide specific feedback.
