Cockburn & v Gio Finance Ltd

The Court of Appeal of Western Australia considered an application by the appellant, Cockburn, to vacate a hearing date that had already been fixed. The respondent, Gio Finance Ltd, did not consent to the application to vacate.

The central legal issue before the Court was the appropriate practice and procedure to be followed when an application is made to vacate a hearing date that has already been fixed, particularly where consent from the other party is not forthcoming.

The Court refused the application for adjournment. It applied established principles regarding the management of court time and the need for certainty in hearing dates, noting that vacating a fixed hearing date requires strong justification and that the court's discretion to grant such an adjournment is not to be exercised lightly, especially in the absence of consent from the opposing party. The Court implicitly found that the grounds presented by the appellant were insufficient to warrant the disruption of the court's schedule.