Ms Henning has expertise in the law of evidence, criminal process, human rights and law reform. Her teaching and research areas coincide but her research tends to focus on law reform in the criminal justice and evidence arenas. Her research has resulted in major reforms to the law of evidence and sexual offences in Tasmania and she was a principal advisor to the government on reforms to abortion laws. Currently her research and law reform interest are human rights law, specifically the enactment human rights instruments at a State and Federal level.
Career Summary
Qualifications
BA (Tas Uni - 1974); Dil Lib (TCAE - 1975); TTC (Ed Dept Tas 1975); LLB Hons 1 (Tas Uni 1984); M Phil Crim (Cambridge 1991); Admitted as a Barrister and Solicitor of the Supreme Court of Tasmania and the High Court of Australia (1986).
Present position
Senior Lecturer in Law, Law School, University of Tasmania, from 1997
Prior positions
Lecturer in Law, Law School, University of Tasmania, from March 1989 - 1997;
Assistant to the Law Reform Commissioner of Tasmania, the Hon. H.E. Cosgrove Q.C. and Officer of the Policy and Legislation Division of the Justice Department of Tasmania, 1988-1989.
Barrister and Solicitor, with Messrs Piggott, Wood & Baker, 1985-1988.
Membership of Academies and Other Learned Societies
Fellow of the Cambridge Commonwealth Trust (1991 - present);
Honorary Associate Member of the Centre for Criminology and the Social and Philosophical Study of Law, University of Edinburgh, (August - December 1995);
Member of the Australian and New Zealand Society of Criminologists (1989 - 2004);
Member of the Australasian Law Teachers’ Association, (1989-present).
Membership of Government and Government Associated Law Reform Committees
Member of the Board of the Law Reform Institute of Tasmania (2001 – present);
Member of the Australian Law Reform Commission Advisory Committee on the Review of the Uniform Evidence Acts (2004 – 2005);
Member of Uniform Evidence Law Reform Committee (1989-1996);
Member of the Child Witnesses Law Reform Committee (1989-1992);
Member of the Mental Element in Crime Law Reform Committee (1989-1992);
Consultant to the Tasmanian Justice Department Sexual Assault Task Force;
Tasmanian representative on the Reference Group for the Model Criminal Code;
Member of the Board of the Tasmanian Commissioner for Review;
Member of the women’s advisory group to the Tasmanian Attorney General;
Tasmanian editor of the Criminal Law Journal;
Sub-editor of the Journal of Law and Information Science.
Units Taught
LAW422 - Evidence 1989 – present (co-ordinator of the unit); awarded a Teaching Merit Certificate in 2006
LAW615 - Criminology 1989 – present (co-ordinator of the unit ); awarded a Teaching Merit Certificate in 2007
LAW423 - Civil and Criminal Procedure 1991 – present (co-coordinator of the unit)
LAW225 Criminal Law A and LAW226 Criminal Law B
1989 – 1991; 2006 – present
LAW696 - Professional Conduct 1994 – 2005
LAW634 - Human Rights – 2008
Unit List
Research Interests
In 2006 the ARC College of Experts nominated Ms Henning as an internationally recognised 'expert of international standing' who is eminently suited to assess Federation Fellowships proposals.
Ms Henning has researched in the fields of evidence, criminal law, criminal procedure, sentencing and human rights. The two-volume text Litigation I & II co-authored with C Cameron and J Hunter deals extensively with Australian criminal process and evidence laws. It is the prescribed or recommended text in 16 Australian university law schools. In 2006/2007 the Tasmanian Government funded Ms Henning to coordinate a human rights consultation for the Tasmanian Law Reform Institute. Ms Henning wrote the Issues Paper for the consultation and implemented a number of new TLRI initiatives to encourage community participation in the consultation. The consultation resulted in the largest number of original submissions to the TLRI of any project undertaken to date. Following the consultation Ms Henning wrote the Final Report for the Government. Her research interest in human rights is reflected in two 2008 papers – a conference paper presented in Oxford in March 2008 on drug law enforcement, harm minimisation and human rights and a paper spoken to at the HREOC/ UNSW Gilbert and Tobin Centre of Public Law Roundtable on Lessons learnt from the Tasmanian Human Rights Consultation. Further with Prof Jill Hunter, Assoc Prof Jeremy Gans and Prof Kate Warner, Ms Henning is currently writing a book for Federation Press on human rights and criminal process.
In 1997 she obtained a large ARC grant to undertake empirical research on sexual assault trials in the Tasmanian Criminal Court. In 2001 she obtained a Linkage Grant to investigate the operation of rules of evidence and procedure in quasi-judicial tribunals. In 2003 with Prof K Warner (principal CI), she was successful in obtaining a Linkage Grant to evaluate suspended sentences. Most recently (2008), she has applied for a Discovery Grant with Gail Lugten and Rachel Baird to investigate the enforcement of fisheries offences in Southern and Pacific Ocean Coastal States. Her success with other competitive grants includes a grant from the Commerce and Law Strategic Fund, a Law Foundation Grant and research funding from the Justice Department of Tasmania.
Her research has resulted in reports to the Tasmanian government, books, articles in refereed journals, chapters in books and conference papers. She has reported to the Max Planck Institute and the German Government on Australian laws relating to video-recording of police interviews. A significant impact of her research has been in the enactment of major reforms to the criminal law and law of evidence. These reforms resulted directly Ms Henning’s research and recommendations and have produced laws considered to be world’s best practice. Her publications and research have also been cited in primary textbooks, articles and in reports and discussion papers of Law Reform Commissions in other jurisdictions.
There has been a strong law reform focus in much of Ms Henning’s work. A major proportion of her research output has taken the form of consultant and government reports including reports on human rights law, the law of arrest in Tasmania, the physical punishment of children and trial judges’ directions to juries. Ms Henning is a Board member on the Tasmanian Law Reform Institute; a member of the Australian Law Reform Commission Advisory Committee on the Review of the Uniform Evidence Acts; Tasmanian editor of the Criminal Law Journal; Sub-editor of the Journal of Law and Information Science. She is frequently consulted by the Tasmanian Legislative Council and members of the Tasmanian House of Assembly in relation to reforms to the Tasmanian Criminal Code and the Tasmanian Evidence Act. She was also consulted by the Tasmanian Attorney General in relation to reforms to the law relating to abortion and assisted the Government during the passage of the reforms through Parliament.
Ms Henning is currently joint supervisor to four post-graduate students, one of whom has recently been advised that her thesis will be awarded a PhD. A fifth post-graduate student of whom Ms Henning was sole supervisor, was awarded her PhD in 2006, graduating with a double A and receiving a Dean’s Commendation Award for excellence in post-graduate research.
Teaching
Ms Henning co-ordinates the Evidence and Criminology units. She has been awarded teaching merit certificates for both. She is concerned to encourage active learning by students. The learning process in these courses is designed to this end. She also co-cordinates Criminal Procedure, and has lectured in Criminal Law and Professional Conduct. In 2008 she contributed to the Human Rights course.
Selected Publications:- Henning T, 2007, 'A Charter of Rights for Tasmania', Final Report No 10, Tasmanian Law Reform Institute, pgs. 258
- Henning T, 2001, 'Beyond ‘Beyond Reasonable Doubt’: Wrong Decisions in Sexual Offences Trials', Australian Journal of Law and Society, pgs. 1-41
- Hunter J, Cameron C and Henning T, 2005, 'Litigation I: Civil Procedure', Lexis Nexis Butterworths, Sydney
- Hunter J, Cameron C and Henning T, 2005, 'Litigation II: Evidence and Criminal Process', Lexis Nexis Butterworths, Sydney
- Henning T, Blackwood J, 2003, 'Tribunals power to control their own procedures and the requirements of procedural fairness', Australian Journal of Administrative Law, pgs. 5 – 33
Full Publication List Current and Supervised Project/s:
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