Chami v Lane Cove Council (No 2)

Land and Environment Court

New South Wales

Medium Neutral Citation:	Chami v Lane Cove Council (No 2) [2015] NSWLEC 1206
Hearing dates:	27 May 2015
Date of orders:	15 June 2015
Decision date:	15 June 2015
Jurisdiction:	Class 1
Before:	Moore SC
Decision:	See orders at ( …….) and directions at (….) below
Catchwords:	APPLICATION TO REOPEN
Legislation Cited:	Civil Procedure Act 2005 Environmental Planning and Assessment Act 1979 Land and Environment Court Act 1979 Uniform Civil Procedure Rules 2005
Cases Cited:	Autodesk Inc and Another v Dyason and Others [No 2] [1993] HCA 6; (1993) 176 CLR 300 Chami v Lane Cove Council [2015] NSWLEC 1003 Pollock v Hicks [2015] NSWCA 122 Ross v Lane Cove Council [2012] NSWLEC 1364 Single v Van Motman [2015] NSWLEC 1133
Category:	Procedural and other rulings
Parties:	Sarab Chami (Applicant) Lane Cove Council (Respondent)
Representation:	Counsel: Mr R Ross, agent (Applicant) Mr S Griffiths, solicitor (Respondent) Solicitors: N/A (Applicant) Pikes and Verekers Lawyers (Respondent
File Number(s):	10398 of 2014

Judgment

Introduction

1. SENIOR COMMISSIONER: On 6 May 2015, Mr Ross, in his role as agent for Ms Chami, filed a Notice of Motion seeking changes to a number of matters that had been required to be undertaken by Ms Chami as a consequence of determinations set out in my preliminary determination in this matter (Chami v Lane Cove Council [2015] NSWLEC 1003 – hereafter referred to as Chami v Lane Cove).

2. On the return date set for that Notice of Motion, 15 May, I advised Mr Ross, consistent with the approach of treating him as Ms Chami's agent as a self-represented litigant (see, for example, [31] and [88] of Chami v Lane Cove) that she would need to make an application for leave to reopen the proceedings.

3. This procedural advice is consistent with the approach of courts to self-represented litigants as recently summarised by Gleeson JA in the Court of Appeal in Pollock v Hicks [2015] NSWCA 122 (at 91 – 95).

4. Although, at an earlier mention on 15 March, Mr Griffiths, solicitor for Lane Cove Council (the Council) had suggested that I could and should require Ms Chami to be represented by a lawyer, I then indicated to Mr Griffiths that I considered that such a suggestion, if pursued by me, would be entirely improper. I did, however, indicate to Mr Ross on that occasion that it might be prudent for Ms Chami to consider seeking legal representation if she wished to pursue an application to reopen the proceedings.

5. The matters that were discussed in Ms Chami's affidavit sworn on 5 May 2015 (read in the further Notice of Motion proceedings that are the subject of this judgement) were confined to matters relating to the balcony area at the western end of the uppermost level of her dwelling and to the undercroft level at the rear of the first habitable level of the dwelling (proposed amendments to Schedule 1 of Chami v Lane Cove as set out in…