Legal websites from a NSW perspective

Many legal websites are unreliable. Below are listed three websites that have reliable information, but also have other positives and negatives for the Australian (NSW) user.

First: www.austlii.edu.au where thousands of Australian law students spend a great deal of time. The simple design theme allows ease of navigation and minimal bandwidth usage. Unfortunately there has been a recent trend in Austlii to include every possible database of decided cases. This has added to the quantity of information available. This has extended to administrative decisions by government tribunals. As such the website is not as user friendly as it once was for the uninitiated, but after several visits the path to the correct resource becomes second nature. 

Second: www.lawlink.nsw.gov.au which is an example of your taxation money at work. The news items are nothing more than government propaganda and are almost uniformly worthless. It is too difficult to navigate to the key value proposition of the website: court lists. These should be accessible with much greater ease.  On the other hand, credit must be given for the speed at which judgment of the Supreme Court and Court of Appeal are posted. But overall this is not a particularly user-friendly or attractive website.

Finally: www.supremecourt.gov is the excellent US Supreme Court website. Given the higher political edge to decided cases in the US, due to its focus on constitutional issues and value judgements, the website is aimed at those from all walks of life. The calendar on the homepage is unusual but functional, and allows taxpayers to monitor the work of the court. For Australians, when navigating this site, bear in mind that in the US judgements at appellate level are generally regarded as opinions.  This is a fossilised relic of English justice, where an appeal to the king would be decided by the “opinions” of his senior judges, with, in theory, the actual decision resting with the monarch himself. So the Judicial Committee of the Privy Council still operates.