I don't know many details about the specifics of the Australian Law, but the Californian one seems to be the precursor to all of them. As far as I know, through discussions over the past two years with Californians in various lighting forums, their law doesn't mandate CFL specifically, but rather is based on efficiency. However they have a number of requirements for fixtures to be outfitted with particular sockets to prevent the use of older bulbs and a magic calculation to figure out how much legacy lighting you're allowed to have based on how much new, etc...

Knowing enough details, CFL makes sense for me right now. The bulbs are plug-in compatible with the standard (but out-dated) Edison socket and provide measurable savings. The caveats are practically non-existent for us. I've never thrown out a CFL into the regular trash and have only ever had 3 die on me - all from the same box bought at Costco about 3 years ago. Recycling/collection of the bulbs is being done at quite a number of retail locations now. Around here, Ikea was the first.

CFLs are available in various color temperatures which for most people is what will make/break their use. I don't care too much about dimmers - I've got two of them right now that I'll remove when I change the fixtures to CFL. They're the only two fixtures in the house that are running incandescent. Actually, I also have two 50w GU10 halogens in my range hood which will be replaced with LED in a couple of weeks. The range hood has yet to be mounted though, so I haven't even use those lights yet.