Akram Karam v Palmone Shoes Pty Ltd

[2012] HCASL 148

AKRAM KARAM

v

PALMONE SHOES PTY LTD & ANOR

[2012] HCASL 148
M61/2012

1. The applicant is a former employee of the first respondent.  He was injured by reason of exposure to chemicals in the course of his employment.  He recovered damages for that injury.  But one aspect of his claim, in relation to a cancerous condition, failed before T Forrest J.  The Court of Appeal dismissed an appeal in relation to that claim.  This Court refused special leave to appeal from the orders of the Court of Appeal.

2. The applicant commenced proceedings against the respondent in the Magistrates' Court at Melbourne seeking weekly payments and payments for medical expenses associated with the cancerous condition.  The applicant applied for summary judgment against the respondent.  Magistrate Wright refused that application.  The applicant then sought judicial review of Magistrate Wright's decision by way of certiorari.  The first respondent applied to the Supreme Court of Victoria (Daly AsJ) for summary dismissal of the review proceedings.  The application succeeded.  Macaulay J dismissed an appeal.  He considered that the learned Magistrate had not fallen into jurisdictional error, that there was a serious question to be tried in the proceedings heard by him, that there was no error of law on the face of the record and that there was no procedural unfairness.

3. The applicant proceeded to the Court of Appeal of the Supreme Court of Victoria (Nettle and Osborn JJA).  Although the applicant was on notice of the hearing date, he did not attend.  The Court of Appeal decided that Macaulay J's order was interlocutory, that leave to appeal was needed, that leave would only be granted if Macaulay J's order was attended by sufficient doubt, and that, if wrong, it would be productive of sufficient injustice to warrant the grant of leave, and that in substance Macaulay J's order was correct and not productive of injustice.

4. The applicant's application for special leave to appeal to this Court in relation to discretionary decisions on matters of practice and procedure reveals no ground on which an appeal would have any prospect of success.  There is no balance, thought or judgment underlying the decision to make the application.  The application does nothing but indicate afresh the inordinate extent to which the applicant has been wasting the time of the Victorian courts.

5. The application is dismissed.

6. Pursuant to r 41.10.5 we direct the Registrar to draw up, sign and seal an order dismissing the application.

J.D. Heydon
13 November 2012 V.M. Bell