Kirby Moot
The Annual Michael Kirby Contract Law Moot Competition is hosted by Victoria Law School at Victoria University (VU).
About the competition
Mooting is the oldest form of legal training for law advocates. At many universities, mooting competitions can be selected as an elective unit in your undergraduate law degree.
The Kirby Moot demonstrates VU’s strong industry connections. It is a fixture in the legal calendar and has strong support from the County Court of Victoria, members of the Victorian Bar, various law firms and practical legal training institutions. Law professionals are invited to judge the rounds and provide feedback to students.
2025 competition
We are pleased to announce that the 13th Annual Kirby Contract Law Moot will run Monday 22—Thursday 25 September 2025.
Location
This year's competition will be conducted in-person at Victoria Law School, 295 Queen Street, City Campus with the Grand Final appearing at the Federal Court of Australia.
Registration
Registration costs $850 (incl. GST) per team. Only one team per university will be eligible to register.
Key dates
Event sponsors
Past competitions
Past winners
Michael Kirby Justice Oration
Established in 2010, the annual Michael Kirby Justice Oration provides a platform for leaders within our community to share their experiences, deep understanding, knowledge and reflections on issues of justice.
2025 oration - Tilman Ruff AO
Tilman Ruff AO (b. 1955), infectious diseases and public health physician, was a founder of ICAN, the International Campaign to Abolish Nuclear Weapons, which was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize in 2017.
Ruff's parents were German Christians who were shunted from Palestine to Egypt and back to incarceration in Palestine before coming to Australia, where they were again interned until 1947. They settled in Adelaide, where Tilman Ruff was born.
As a student of science and then medicine at Monash University, Melbourne, he formed an Amnesty International group. Graduating in 1980, he joined the International Physicians for the Prevention of Nuclear War, of which he later became co-president. He was the founding chair of ICAN and remains involved with the operation.
In 2015 he and Malcolm Fraser wrote an article for the Age newspaper titled '2015 is the Year to Ban Nuclear Weapons'. Ruff is an international medical adviser to the Australian Red Cross, for which he recently wrote on the humanitarian impact and implications of nuclear test explosions in the Pacific region.
He is a member of the World Health Organisation's expert panel on Hepatitis B for the Western Pacific region and an Associate Professor at the Nossal Institute for Global Health at the University of Melbourne.
Topic: Nuclear weapons - current status, consequences, risks, pathways to elimination, in a broad context of justice and rights.
On the eve of this year the Nobel Peace Prize was awarded to Nihon Hidankyo for its "efforts to achieve a world free of nuclear weapons and for demonstrating through witness testimony that nuclear weapons must never be used again"
