Business law
1 Assessment Task – Tutorial Questions Unit Code: HI6027 Unit Name: Business and Corporate Law Assignment: Tutorial Questions Due: Week 13: by Friday, 16 October 2020, 11:59 p.m. Weighting: 50% of final overall mark Purpose: This assignment is designed to assess your level of knowledge of the key topics covered in this unit. Unit Learning Outcomes Assessed: 1, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8 & 9 Description: Each week students were provided with three tutorial questions of varying degrees of difficulty. The tutorial questions are available in the Tutorial Folder, for each week, on Blackboard. The Interactive Tutorials are designed to assist students with the process, skills and knowledge to answer the provided tutorial questions. Your task is to answer a selection of tutorial questions from weeks 1 to 5 inclusive and week 11 and submit these answers in a single document. Instructions: • Answer the following questions, citing relevant legal authorities (law and cases) in support of your answer. Answers not supported by any legal authorities will not receive any credit. • Legal problem-solving questions (Questions 2, 3, and 5) must be answered using the IRAC (Issue, Rule, Application and Conclusion) method taught in class. • Reference sources must be cited in the text of the report (either in-text or footnotes AND listed appropriately at the end of the assignment in a Reference List following the AGLC (Australian Guide to Legal Citation) style. • Plagiarism is borrowing the ideas or reproducing the work of someone else without acknowledging or referencing the original source. Please read the attached Academic Integrity Policy for further guidance. • All work must be submitted on Blackboard by the due date along with a completed Assignment Cover Page. 2 • Word counts for each answer are indicated after the question. Word count limits are strictly enforced. Anything over the word count will not be read by your lecturer. The questions to be answered are: Question 1 [from Week 1, 7 marks] Are ‘law’ and ‘justice’ one and the same thing? Discuss. (300 words maximum) Question 2 [from Week 2, 11 marks] While jogging around his suburb one morning, Pedro sees a speedboat parked outside a house. There is a sign posted on the boat’s windshield saying: “For sale $9,000, Text Andres on 0409876543. Direct buyers only!” A boat lover, Pedro calls the number advertised and leaves a voice message saying that he’s happy to buy the boat for $7,000. He also leaves his return number. Andres is busy all day, and only hears Pedro’s message the next morning. He calls Pedro back; he also leaves a voice message saying that Pedro’s price is too low, but he can get the boat for $8,000. That same day, however, another buyer sees the boat and makes a $9,000 cash offer to Andres on the spot. Andres takes the money, signs over the boat’s registration papers, and the buyer tows the boat away. Pedro passes by Andres’ house and sees that boat is gone. Panicking, he listens to his voice messages and hears Andres’ message for the first time. He calls Andres right away and told him in no uncertain words that he accepts his offer. Pedro now thinks he has accepted Andres’ offer so they now have a contract. When Pedro finds out that the boat has been sold to someone else, he gets very angry. He argues that he had already accepted Andres’ verbal offer, so he had no right to sell the boat to the other buyer. Does Pedro have a valid contract with Andres and he entitled to the boat? Explain with reference to all the elements of a valid contract. (Maximum 350 words) 3 Question 3 [from Week 3, 7 marks] Samuel Finley has two children, a daughter Lee and a son Keaton. Samuel has a lovely beach house in Palm Beach. Sam is terminally ill and has been told by his doctors that he has less than a year to live. Lee knows that Keaton is their father’s favourite child and that he had been named in the latter’s will to inherit the beach house. Lee knew that since their father did not have long to live and that he was 90 years old and starting to become mentally-weak, she could pressure him to transfer the Palm Beach beach house over to her even though Samuel may not totally understand what he was signing over. So, for four months, using pressure and threats, but more often with gentle but devious tactics, Lee succeeds in convincing Samuel to sign a transfer of property transferring the Palm Beach beach house over to her. As his last act, before he dies, Samuel wants to set aside the transfer of the beach house to Lee. Advise him of his legal position. (Maximum 400 words) Question 4 [from Week 4, 7 marks] Answer the following, citing relevant legislation and case law in your answer: a) What is the parol evidence rule, and what is the court’s reasoning in applying the rule? (Maximum 100 words) b) List and explain the exceptions to the parol evidence rule. (Maximum 350 words) Question 5 [from Week 5, 11 marks] TermiFab is a steel fabrication business operating in Adelaide. The business is owned by Pedram. The business has a current 10-year lease of the factory where its manufacturing operations are run. Pedram has just been awarded a contract to supply steel frames that will be used in the building a commercial shopping centre in the Adelaide CBD. Under the contract, Pedram will start supplying steel frames to the shopping centre developer in 90 days. The construction period is estimated at 24 months, and Pedram is expected to supply steel frames for 16 of those months. Two months before the delivery date of the first supply of steel frames to the shopping centre developer, the South Australian Government compulsorily acquires the site of Pedram’s factory. The factory happens to be along the route of a new tunnel link system that the government will start building. 4 Pedram’s lessor advises him that he has to leave the premises within four months as provided by the lease contract. Pedram now has a massive problem: he must find new premises for his factory, and it might be another two to four months to establish the factory before it can start making steel frames. It is now clear that he cannot deliver the first supply of steel frames to the developer in time. Pedram comes to you for advice. You are expected to advise on whether his contract to supply the steel frames with the shopping centre developer can be discharged by frustration. You must cite relevant provisions of law and cases in support of your answer. (Maximum 650 words) Question 6 [from Week 11, 7 marks] When is it appropriate to bring a statutory derivative action (s 236)? Draw a flowchart for the steps to be followed in an application for oppression by a minority shareholder. What are other personal rights conferred on members by the Corporations Act? (Maximum 275 words) Submission Directions: The assignment will be submitted via Blackboard. Each student will be permitted only ONE submission to Blackboard. You need to ensure that the document submitted is the correct one. 5 Academic Integrity Holmes Institute is committed to ensuring and upholding Academic Integrity, as Academic Integrity is integral to maintaining academic quality and the reputation of Holmes’ graduates. Accordingly, all assessment tasks need to comply with academic integrity guidelines. Table 1 identifies the six categories of Academic Integrity breaches. If you have any questions about Academic Integrity issues related to your assessment tasks, please consult your lecturer or tutor for relevant referencing guidelines and support resources. Many of these resources can also be found through the Study Sills link on Blackboard. Academic Integrity breaches are a serious offence punishable by penalties that may range from deduction of marks, failure of the assessment task or unit involved, suspension of course enrolment, or cancellation of course enrolment. Table 1: Six categories of Academic Integrity breaches Plagiarism Reproducing the work of someone else without attribution. When a student submits their own work on multiple occasions this is known as self-plagiarism. Collusion Working with one or more other individuals to complete an assignment, in a way that is not authorised. Copying Reproducing and submitting the work of another student, with or without their knowledge. If a student fails to take reasonable precautions to prevent their own original work from being copied, this may also be considered an offence. Impersonation Falsely presenting oneself, or engaging someone else to present as oneself, in an in-person examination. Contract cheating Contracting a third party to complete an assessment task, generally in exchange for money or other manner of payment. Data fabrication and falsification Manipulating or inventing data with the intent of supporting false conclusions, including manipulating images. Source: INQAAHE, 2020 If any words or ideas used the assignment submission do not represent your original words or ideas, you must cite all relevant sources and make clear the extent to which such sources were used. In addition, written assignments that are similar or identical to those of another student is also a violation of the Holmes Institute’s Academic Conduct and Integrity policy. The consequence for a 6 violation of this policy can incur a range of penalties varying from a 50% penalty through suspension of enrolment. The penalty would be dependent on the extent of academic misconduct and your history of academic misconduct issues. All assessments will be automatically submitted to SafeAssign to assess their originality. Further Information: For further information and additional learning resources please refer to your Discussion Board for the unit.