Melbourne Co-Operative Book Shop Limited

Topic

Melbourne Co-Operative Book Shop Limited

Instructions

Complete a law report case study of Melbourne Co-Operative Book Shop Limited (in Liq) [2015] VSC 69 (6 March 2015).

In this subject you will often consider common law cases and how they interpret and apply common law principles as well as how they interpret and apply statute law in the study of company law.

In doing this case study you will observe the judges legal reasoning and the application of the doctrine of precedent that you would have studied in Business Law. In addition to this you would have studied terms like “ratio decidendi” and “obiter dictum” and again you may observe the judgement applying these principles.

‘Ratio decidendi’ means literally ‘the reason for the thing having been decided.’ This is generally said to be the reason why a case was decided.

‘Obiter dictum’, means literally ‘a thing said by the way’. ‘Obiter’ is Latin for ‘by the way’ or ‘incidentally.’ A ‘dictum’ is something which has been said. This refers to other observations which are made by the judge in deciding the case but which were not necessary to decide it

In completing this case study task you will see how statements of law are applied to the facts of the case you are asked to consider. It requires critical and analytical thinking skill as you need to sift through the different aspects of cases and locate the key elements in them.

Further these critical and analytical thinking skills that need to be applied to various problem situations you will be asked to consider in research assignments, problem tutorial questions and exams in this subject.

In reading the designated case you will also acquire knowledge of certain legal terms and in some instances some key phrases – some legal jargon – and understanding of what they mean.

Before completing the Case Study:

Read the case as many times as you feel necessary to be enable you to identify the following:

  1. Legal terms and their meanings relevant to the case
  2. the major legal issues – area(s) of law in dispute
  3. the relevant law (cases and statutes) relied on by the judge in making his/her decision
  4. the actual decision of the case.

Write a 500 words summary of the case including:

  1. the relevant facts of the case
  2. the major legal issues
  3. the relevant law relied on by the judge(s) in making their decision
  4. the actual decision of the case.

Answer preview

The Melbourne Co-operative Book Shop Ltd run the RMIT Bookshop where it had about 40,000 members who used to pay a fee in exchange for a prerogative to buy books at a discounted price.  Nonetheless, when the organization was wound up there was a surplus of $280,000, which remained after the liquidator paid all the creditors. To understand where the surplus would go the liquidator sought direction from the court where she requested the court to allow her to pay the remaining funds to the RMIT University. The money to be paid to the university was for the assistance for disadvantaged University students, as well as for the provision of scholarships. This rationale was in accordance with the organizations constitution, which allowed the distribution of about 10% of the organizations excess each year for the purpose of charity that would be beneficial to RMIT university student.

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