Christine Deborah Anderson v The Council of the City of Lismore

In Christine Deborah Anderson v The Council of the City of Lismore, the plaintiff, a pensioner, sought relief from the NSW Supreme Court against the sale of her property by the defendant council after a decade of unpaid rates. The Local Government Act of New South Wales empowers councils to sell the property of ratepayers who fail to pay rates for five or more years, but also provides a discretion to waive these rates for pensioners. The Council of the City of Lismore had a policy of not exercising its power to sell the land of pensioner ratepayers who have not paid rates except in exceptional circumstances. The plaintiff, who had not paid rates for ten years, was denied procedural fairness when the council sold her property without informing her of the alleged exceptional circumstances or providing her an opportunity to make submissions as to why the policy should not be departed from.

The court was required to determine whether the council's policy created a legitimate expectation that the plaintiff's property would not be sold unless in exceptional circumstances, and if so, whether the council's failure to inform the plaintiff of the alleged exceptional circumstances and provide her an opportunity to make submissions constituted a breach of natural justice. The court also needed to decide on the appropriate remedy if a breach of natural justice was found.

The court found that the council's policy did create a legitimate expectation that the plaintiff's property would not be sold without exceptional circumstances. The court held that the council's failure to inform the plaintiff of the alleged exceptional circumstances and provide her an opportunity to make submissions constituted a breach of natural justice. The court noted that decisions contrary to natural justice are retrospectively void ab initio, and while relief in such cases is discretionary, the circumstances of the current case, including the plaintiff's illness and the absence of manifest prejudice to the second defendant, did not warrant declining relief. The court ordered that the sale of the plaintiff's property be set aside and that the council pay the plaintiff's costs.