DISTRICT COURT OF QUEENSLAND
CITATION:
House v Anglo Coal (Callide Management) Pty Ltd & Anor (No 2) [2016] QDC 317
PARTIES:
GLYNN MARTYN HOUSE
(plaintiff)v
ANGLO COAL (CALLIDE MANAGEMENT) PTY LTD (ACN 009 666 200)
(first defendant)and
WORKPAC PTY LTD
(ACN 111 076 012)
(second defendant)FILE NO:
212/14
DIVISION:
Civil
PROCEEDING:
Claim
ORIGINATING COURT:
District Court at Brisbane
DELIVERED ON:
9 December 2016
DELIVERED AT:
Brisbane
HEARING DATE:
On the papers (written submissions)
JUDGE:
Dorney QC DCJ
ORDERS:
It is ordered that:
1. The plaintiff pay the first defendant’s costs of the proceeding against it to be assessed.
2. The plaintiff pay WorkCover’s costs of the proceeding against the second defendant on the standard basis from 19 August 2014.
CATCHWORDS:
Costs – separate orders under separate legislation
LEGISLATION CITED:
Personal Injuries Proceedings Act 2002 s 56
Uniform Civil Procedure Rules 1999 rr 679, 681, 702, 705, sch 4
Workers’ Compensation and Rehabilitation Act 2003 s 316
COUNSEL: R A Myers for the Plaintiff
G F Crow QC for the First and Second Defendants
SOLICITORS: Shine Lawyers for the Plaintiff
Swanwick Murray Roche Lawyers for the First and Second Defendants
Introduction
On 29 November 2016, after giving judgment, I ordered that all parties have leave to file and serve written submissions on costs by 4.00pm on 6 December 2016.
As a result, the defendants filed their costs submissions on 2 December 2016.
By an email communication from the plaintiff’s solicitors to my associate on 7 December 2016 (notifying, also, the solicitors and senior counsel for the defendants), the court was informed that the plaintiff’s instructions were to agree to the defendants’ submissions on costs and to the orders proposed by the defendants (contained in paragraph 6 of those submissions).
Legislative background
Although I intend to make orders for costs in the general terms sought by the defendants, and supported by the plaintiff, I will briefly state the legislative grounds for doing so.
The plaintiff’s proceeding against the first defendant is regulated by the Personal Injuries Proceedings Act 2002. Section 56 of that Act deals with costs in cases involving damages “awards” of not more than amount equal to the upper offer limit. As submitted by the defendants, in circumstances where a plaintiff’s case is dismissed, that provision is not engaged as the court does not make any award of damages as all. Accordingly, the appropriate order to be made, pursuant to the Uniform Civil Procedure Rules 1999 (“UCPR”), is that costs follow the event [r 681(1)], where the event here is the judgment.
With respect to the second defendant, since the Workers’ Compensation and Rehabilitation Act 2003 (“WCRA”) has been engaged by this proceeding, s 316(2)(b) is applicable. This requires the court to order that the plaintiff, where, he is as here, unsuccessful, pay “the insurer’s costs on the standard basis from the date of the final offer.” The date of that final offer was 19 August 2014.
Orders submitted as appropriate
The actual orders which these submissions contend for are, respectively, that:
(a) The plaintiff pay the first defendant’s costs of and incidental to the action, together with outlays, to be assessed on the standard basis.
(b) The plaintiff pay WorkCover Queensland’s standard costs together with outlays to be assessed on the standard basis from 19 August 2014.
Rule 702(1) of the UCPR states that, unless the UCPR or an order of the court provides otherwise, the costs assessor must assess costs on the standard basis. Hence, it is unnecessary to refer to the relevant basis if it is to be the standard basis, unless, perhaps, the statute requires reference to the basis, as the WCRA seems to require.
In Schedule 4 of the UCPR, “costs of the proceeding” and “assessed costs” are defined for Chapter 17A to be as r 679 states. In r 679: “costs of the proceeding” are defined to “mean” costs of “all” the issues in the proceeding and “includes” three specific kinds of costs; and “assessed costs” are defined to mean “costs and disbursements assessed under” Chapter 17A. In turn, r 705(2)(b) refers specifically – though incidentally – to “disbursements claimed in the costs statement” (which itself is to be in Form 60A that refers to both “disbursements” and “outlays”).
Thus, the orders that I make take those particular concerns into account.