VIC Sources of Law question regarding case law

[adav6638]

Hi,
I'm still a relatively new law student and when citing case law in assignments and exams I've been sourcing them basically through Google and Google Scholar since many are repeated a lot in my units (I.e the amount of times we've learnt about Donoghue v Stevensons!) so it is easy to cite these cases but is there any official case law website or archives to access more? Some websites do have many cases such as Australian Contract Law.com.au but not many and theyre basically contract law, not criminal or civil law. What about having access to up to date cases that happen each and every day in the local magistrate courts? Can we cite these in our assignments and exams? How would the assessors search for these cases that they are not aware of?

Thank you for any advice.

 

[Rod]

Never quote a Magistrates' Court case in an exam. They have very little precedent value.

Your Uni will provide access to law databases - typically Lexis Nexis and Westlaw.

You will very rarely get marks for quoting cases not in your syllabus.

 

[Tim W]

Two separate mindsets to consider.

One, use the resources that your university provides.
No law academic is interested in your fancy pants self-discovered
knowledge if you can't tell us the authorities for the propositons we're examining you on.
As a law student, your function is to learn, not to innovate.

Two, don't ever answer questions from F&F that start start with words like
"Hey, you're a law student, can I ask you a question about...."

And while we are about it - maybe don't use this board
as a go-to for your self conducted defence(s) in the Magistrate's Court.

(oh, and it's "Stevenson" in the singular)