Process of a bill through parliament, and the VLRC... they're quite formulaic answers so once you've learned how it works, you can literally just spit out the answer at whenever you need to. Usually in the exam the VLRC is a pretty small mark question, though, so if you don't know it too well, I wouldn't worry too much. What I found worked for me was to write it out as a flow chart with diagrams and arros going everywhere. Or failing that, write it out in point form. Legal is basically just rote learning.
Anyways, the process of a bill through Parliament (you may want to double check in your book or with your teacher):
Someone comes up with the idea, and it goes to the MP. The bill is drafted, and if it's for the State Parliament, it goes through certification to check that it matches with the Charter of Human Rights.
Then it'll go to the first reading, where they announce the bill and read out the short title... copies of the bill get distributed to each MP so they can go read it and they come back in a few days to do
The second reading. This is where they read out the long title and the purpose and so on and they may have a preliminary debate/discussion/vote on the bill. If they like the bill the way it is they can go straight to the third reading, and if not, they'll go to
committee of the whole. this is optional. during this, the speaker leaves the house and a chairperson is elected. parliament is no longer in session, it is in committee, and during this they discuss and debate the bill clause by clause til they come up with a solution which they all vote on. then they call the speaker back in and have
the third reading. it's more of a mere formality, where they formally record the vote.
then, wash rinse and repeat through the other house, usually the upper house, and then if it goes through that it'll go off to the Queen's Rep to sign. Then there's proclamation... which is where they announce the existance of the bill, which is now a law/act of parliament.
Victorian Law Reform Commision:
-independant but government funded organisation
-connected to the government through the attourney general
-the AG/general public, etc will tell the VLRC to go research something that needs changing (if not through the AG originally, the VLRC must seek permission before going ahead to research)
-uses members of the community in forums and also calls in experts for their opinions on said topic, then writes a report to give to the AG and makes report available to the general public.
-make mention of roughly how long reports take to write (quite a while!)
-give a recent example of one of their projects
-IMPORTANT: the VLRC CANNOT change the law, it only makes recommendations
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