Full Court Minute Books

Case S179/2013

Taylor v. The Owners - Strata Plan No 11564 and Ors

Case No.

S179/2013

Case Information

Lower Court Judgment

18/03/2013 Supreme Court of New South Wales (Court of Appeal) (McColl JA, Basten JA and Hoeben JA)

[2013] NSWCA 55

Catchwords

Statutes – Interpretation – Civil Liability Act 2002 (NSW) (“the CLA Act”) – Appellant brought claim under the Compensation to Relatives Act 1897 (NSW) for compensation for accidental death of her husband – Section 12(2) of the CLA Act directs the court to disregard “excess” earnings of a high-earning “claimant” but does not refer to earnings of the “deceased” – Late husband had earned substantially in excess of three times average weekly earnings – Whether a reference to “a deceased person’s” earnings can be read into section 12(2) of the CLA Act so as to disregard the deceased person’s earnings above the statutory formula – Whether additional words can be read into a statute where ordinary meaning of the text is not unreasonable or absurd.

Short Particulars

Documents

06/09/2013 Hearing (SLA, Sydney)

19/09/2013 Notice of appeal

24/09/2013 Submitting appearance (Fifth Respondent)

03/10/2013 Submitting appearance (Tenth Respondent)

11/10/2013 Written submissions (Appellant)

11/10/2013 Chronology (Appellant)

06/11/2013 Submitting appearance (Eighth and Ninth Respondents)

08/11/2013 Written submissions (Sixth Respondent)

08/11/2013 Written submissions (First to Fourth Respondents)

25/11/2013 Reply

07/02/2014 Hearing (Full Court, Canberra) (Audio-visual recording)

02/04/2014 Judgment  (Judgment summary)