2015 Harold Ford Lecture

"Trusts and Statutes" presented by Chief Justice French AC

Date: 20 May 2015

What may broadly be described as the law of trusts covers the relevant doctrines of equity and statutes which provide for the supervision of trust relationships, qualify equitable principles, and which may give rise to new categories of trust relationships or things called 'trusts'. The interaction of statute law and equitable doctrine as in many areas of interaction between statute law and the unwritten law raises questions about 'coherence' which direct attention to Atiyah's question: All lawyers of course know that large areas of both the common law and the statute law are a shambles, but is it one shambles or are there two?

Download a copy of Chief Justice French's speech here.