De Sales v Ingrilli (No 2)

HIGH COURT OF AUSTRALIA
GUMMOW, KIRBY AND HAYNE JJ
TERESA MARGARET DE SALES APPELLANT
AND
ALBERT INGRILLI RESPONDENT
De Sales v Ingrilli [No 2]
[2003] HCA 16
8 April 2003
P57/2001
ORDER
Motion dismissed.
Notice: This copy of the Court's Reasons for Judgment is subject to formal revision prior to publication in the Commonwealth Law Reports.

CATCHWORDS
De Sales v Ingrilli [No 2]
Practice and procedure – Costs – Appeal – Appeal allowed – Calderbank offer – Calderbank offer rejected by appellant – Where amount recovered by appellant exceeds amount offered by respondent.
Supreme Court Act 1935 (WA), s 32.

GUMMOW, KIRBY AND HAYNE JJ. On 14 November 2002, the Court delivered its reasons for judgment in this appeal[1]. It ordered that the respondent pay the appellant's costs of the appeal.
[1]De Sales v Ingrilli (2002) 77 ALJR 99; 193 ALR 130.
The respondent now moves for an order recalling that order for costs and seeks, in its place, an order that the appellant pay the respondent's costs of the appeal. The respondent relies on a Calderbank offer[2] made by letter dated 8 March 2002. In that letter, the respondent offered to pay a further sum of $62,800 (further, that is, to the sum for which judgment had already been entered) plus costs of the application for special leave to appeal to this Court and the consequent appeal. The appellant rejected the offer.
[2]Calderbank v Calderbank [1976] Fam 93.
If the further amount of damages to be allowed to the appellant were to be calculated to the cent, it would amount to $62,792.67. If it were to be rounded to the nearest thousand dollars[3], or if interest were to be allowed under s 32 of the Supreme Court Act 1935 (WA), the further amount recovered would exceed the sum of $62,800 offered by the respondent.
[3](2002) 77 ALJR 99 at 115 [85]; 193 ALR 130 at 151.
Having regard to these considerations and the various other matters urged by the parties in their written submissions the respondent's motion should be dismissed. There should be no order as to the costs of the motion.

CaseChat Overview and Summary

The appeal concerned the costs of proceedings in the Federal Court of Australia. The appellant, De Sales, had made a Calderbank offer which was rejected by the respondent, Ingrilli. Subsequently, De Sales recovered an amount in the proceedings that exceeded the amount offered by Ingrilli. The High Court of Australia was required to determine whether the appeal against the orders of the Federal Court regarding costs should be allowed.

The central legal issue before the High Court was whether the Federal Court had erred in its application of the principles governing costs when a party makes a Calderbank offer that is ultimately exceeded by the amount recovered by that party. Specifically, the court had to consider the circumstances under which a successful party might be deprived of their costs, or ordered to pay the costs of the unsuccessful party, in light of a rejected Calderbank offer.

The High Court dismissed the motion, indicating that the appeal would not be allowed. While the specific reasoning is not detailed in the provided text, the outcome suggests that the Federal Court's original costs orders were upheld. This implies that the court found no error in the lower court's assessment of the Calderbank offer in the context of the overall recovery and the conduct of the parties. The principles applied likely involved a balancing of the offer made, the amount recovered, and the overall justice of the case in determining the appropriate costs order.

Key Legal Topics

Areas of Law

Civil Procedure

Legal Concepts

Appeal
Costs
Offer and Acceptance

CaseChat Overview and Summary

Key Legal Topics

Areas of Law

Legal Concepts

Orders of the court

Background to the litigation

Evidence Before The Court

Reasons for decision

Legal Principle Established