FNS50217 - Legal Principles in Property Law for Accounting Diploma

This assignment delves into the legal principles governing property law within the Australian legal system, which comprises both statutory and common law. It highlights the system's role in regulating property rights, responsibilities, and interests, referencing key legislation like the Real Property Act 1900 (NSW) and the Property Law Act 1958 (Victoria). The assignment also touches upon the constitutional doctrine of separation of powers, the tort of negligence in property disputes, and the roles of federal courts such as the High Court of Australia. Furthermore, it emphasizes the interplay between enacted laws and judicial interpretations (common law) in resolving property law issues, providing a comprehensive overview supported by relevant academic references.

Legal Principles in
property Law

The Australian legal system comprises of statutory and common law and the property law
of it is referred to as a system of law which regulates as well as prioritises the rights,
responsibilities and interest of the individual provided under property law in context to the
things. These things may be in the form of property or the right to ownership or possession of the
object. There are different legislations in each of the jurisdiction of Australia such as in New
South Wales, there is Real Property Act, 1900, in Victoria, there is Property Law Act, 1958 and
many others. It is governed by both the common and statutory law of Australia (Sheehan &
Glinka, (2018)). There is a constitutional doctrine which is known as separation of powers which
means that each of the three line of division which is legislative, executive and judiciary are
independent and have separate powers and no other division can interfere in the working of
other. The legislative enacts the laws, executive puts law into operations while judiciary interpret
it and all work independent of each other.
There is a basic principle of law of tort which is negligence which is applied in the case
of dispute relating to property. It is basically a breach of the legal duty by the defendant which
have caused harm or injury to the plaintiff due to breach. For example, X has leased its property
to Z and Z is duty obliged to keep the premises in proper condition but it failed to do so and
when X comes to inspect it, there is an accident which results in causing shock to X due to
negligence of Z. So Z shall be held liable for the same. There are mainly four principle federal
courts which includes High Court of Australia, Federal court, Federal Circuit Court which deals
with the disputes relating to property laws (Babie, (2017)).
The laws in Australia are mainly enacted by the legislative body which has sole power to
enact law and these laws which are framed are mainly interpreted by the judges and their
interpretation is known as common law. Both have same and equitable relevance and are applied
in the disputes which relates to property laws (Dixon, (2019)).

REFERENCES
Books and Journals
Babie, P. T. (2017). A Never-Ending Story: Torrens Title in South Australia and the 2015-2016
Amendments to the Real Property Act 1886 (SA). U. of Adelaide Law Research Paper,
(2017-26). 6.
Dixon, W. M. (2019). The Personal Property Securities Act 2009 (Cth) in
operation. Commercial and Personal Property Law: Selected Issues [3rd Ed.], 349-370.
Sheehan, J., & Glinka, C. (2018). Compulsory acquisition of private property rights for
densification in Australia. In Compulsory Property Acquisition for Urban
Densification (pp. 166-172). Routledge.