Powers of Attorney 4th ed

Australia Title

Powers of Attorney 4th edition remains the only text that provides a current, detailed and dedicated treatment of Australian law surrounding powers of attorney. It is not confined to Australian law, though, but uses law from the principal common law countries to contextualise our law, and to provide guidance where Australian law may be lacking. The prevalence of powers of attorney — particularly of the enduring variety— makes the work increasingly important over time, especially in view of Australia’s ageing population.

Features

• Defines the concept, characteristics and classifications the law adopts for powers of attorney
• Compares and contrasts powers of attorney with other related relationships known to the law
• Highlights the importance of issues of capacity, for both principal and attorney, to the validity or otherwise of a power of attorney
• Catalogues the basic elements, specifically the formalities that go to substantiating a power of attorney
• Explains the nature and parameters of the authority and the scope and means of varying it
• Investigates the extent to which the legal approach to construing an attorney’s authority follows conventional approaches to construing other written documents, and explains how the courts have, from early times, promulgated and applied a strict approach to construction
• Examines the statutory backdrop for an attorney’s authority 
• Analyses the intra-agency relationship, specifically the duties owed by attorneys to their principals (including all-important fiduciary duties), and the rights attorneys may have against their principals. 
• Gives an overview of how the curial jurisdiction at law has been broadened by statute
• Explains the means whereby attorneyship can terminate and the moment the termination takes effect

table of content

Part I Power Defined

1. Conceptualising Powers of Attorney

2. Powers of Attorney Distinguished from Other Legal Relationships

Part II Power Created

3. Capacity of Principal and Attorney

4. Creating a Power of Attorney

Part III Power Delimited

5. Authority of Attorney

6. Construction of Attorney’s Authority

7. Scope of Attorney’s Authority Under Statute

Part IV Power Impacted

8. Relations between Principal and Attorney

9. Relations with Third Parties

10. External Supervision of Attorneys Part V Power Ended

11. Termination of Attorneyship

12. When Termination Takes Effect