THE TWENTY-FIFTH ANNIVERSARY OF THE COMMUNITY OF BELARUS AND RUSSIA. ACHIEVEMENTS AND OUTLOOKS

April 2,2021 marks the 25th anniversary of the signing of the Treaty on the Union between Belarus and Russia, which laid the foundation for integration of the two countries. The article analyses results of the twenty- five-year development of the Russia-Belarus relations and assesses their pros- pects with account taken of the events developing in Belarus in 2020–2021. Considering the activities of the Union State of Russia and Belarus, the author summarises two key historical periods in the association functioning and gives their analytical characteristics. The paper focuses on the main integration achievements of cooperation in spheres of the economy (interstate trade, mutual investments, joint ventures, industrial and high tech cooperation, cus- toms policy), defence (organising a common defence space, mutual armament supplies, manoeuvres), science and culture. The author also studies numerous issues that arise from time to time in the relations between the Russian Feder- ation and the Republic of Belarus (energy disputes, the Dairy and Meat Wars, etc.). Finally, the paper contains a detailed analysis of the development scena- rios for the Russia-Belarus relations on the immediate and mid-term horizons.

Do the Queensland Regulations Governing the Refund of Motor Vehicle Registration Fees Breach s 92 of the Commonwealth Constitution?

The federal system in Australia imposes inconvenience on people. One of these inconveniences arises from the fact that each State and Territory has its own vehicle registration regime. In contrast to other States in Australia, purchasers of vehicles from outside Queensland suffer from a particular burden in that they are denied a refund of the unexpired portion of vehicle registration fees. In this article it is argued that that denial is unlawful both as a matter of the interpretation of the applicable Regulations and because it infringes s 92 of the Commonwealth Constitution, which prohibits the imposition of protectionist burdens on interstate trade and commerce.

The effects of diesel price on regional trade in the USA

The abundant trade literature offers little insight on how diesel prices affect intranational trade. We fill this gap by calibrating a structural gravity model to recent U.S. interstate trade data. We discover that, for any distance, the elasticity of trade to diesel prices is much greater for low-valued commodities than for high-valued commodities. The general equilibrium result shows that a nationwide diesel price increase leads to heterogeneous decreases in trade across distances from the exporting state because of adjustments in multilateral costs and trade portfolio. Moreover, it increases the share of high-valued commodities in interstate trade.

Judicial Review of Legislators’ Motives

Are legislators’ subjective motives relevant to the constitutional validity of an Act? In the USA, an Act may be found to be unconstitutional because legislators were motivated by a desire to discriminate against religion or interstate trade. The High Court has rejected such an enquiry in cases concerning ss 92 and 116 of our own Constitution. This article examines how, with substantially similar constitutional protections, the courts of these two countries have arrived at opposing views on the relevance of ‘motive evidence’. The High Court can avoid recourse to motive evidence because, when compared with its US counterpart, it applies a clearer test in the religion cases, and a more nuanced approach to proportionality testing in the interstate trade cases. This is the preferable approach.