Copyright in the High Court of Australia

S1Tl3/l/SH 1 19/2/88

MR R.D. GILES± QC: May it please the Court, I appear with
my earned friends, MR J.L.B. ALLSOP, and
Mr J.P. WALLACE, for the applicant. (instructed
by Harrington Maguire & Co).

MR G. RUNDLE: May it please the Court,in that matter I
appear for the respondent. (instructed by

Lane & Lane).

MASON CJ: Mr Giles.
MR GILES: Your Honours, the proposed appeal concerns two

matters. The first, which we submit is a matter
of general application and general importance, is
whether if the determination of a body, having the
power to affect the rights of people, is found to
have been made in breach of the rules of natural
justice. It automatically follows that the person
affected by that determination has a right to
damages.

MASON CJ: But that question is not yet involved in the
proceedings, is it?

MR GILES: It is in the sense which I explain now, Your Honour,

we submit. It is involved for this reason that,
at first instance, Mr Justice Needham found that
the applicant's determination was void and went on
as if it followed automatically to declare that the
respondent was entitled to damages for wrongful
revocation of his appointment as a practitioner.

MASON CJ: Well, he directed an inquiry as to damages.

MR GILES: And he directed an inquiry but he did make that
declaration -

MASON CJ: The Court of Appeal did not treat that as a
determination of entitlement to damages, did it?

MR GILES: Well, Your Honour, they did in this sense.
The learned president who, on this issue, was in
favour of the applicant, considered that there
should have been no inquiry because there was no

question of damages to be inquired into. So
His Honour therefore did determine in favour
of the applicant that, implicitly, there should
have been no declaration of a right to damages.
The majority, Mr Justice Mahoney with whom

Mr Justice Priestley agreed, determined that point in the sense that they said, "Well, damages may
arise in a number of possible ways". His Honour Mr Justice Mahoney speculated - that is my word, of course, "speculated" - and said, "But whether
or not that is so, as a matter of fact and law,
is a matter for the master to decide".

SlT13/2/SH 2 19/2/88
Macksville
Now, what we would submit that amounted to

was the majority of the court below really declining
to deal with the complaint that no declaration of a
right to damages should have been made because it
was implicit in that that there may be, at the…

Grounds of appeal

[14] The appellant contends that the primary judge erred in finding that the respondent had discharged the onus of establishing the matters required under the relevant provision.

[15] It was submitted that his Honour failed to give adequate weight to the evidence of the second witness, and that the findings of fact were not reasonably open on the material before the Court.

[16] The respondent, for its part, submits that no error is disclosed, and that the conclusions reached were well within the range of outcomes available to the primary judge.

Consideration

[17] It is convenient to deal first with the question of construction, as the resolution of that issue informs the remaining grounds advanced by the appellant.

[18] For the reasons that follow, we are of the view that the appeal should be allowed in part and the matter remitted for further determination.

Continue reading Macksville and District Hospital v Mayze

Details

AGLC: Macksville and District Hospital v Mayze [1988] HCATrans 25
Case: [1988] HCATrans 25
Decision Date

CaseChat Overview and Summary

This matter came before the High Court of Australia on an application for special leave to appeal. The applicant, Macksville and District Hospital, sought to appeal a decision of the Court of Appeal concerning the consequences of a breach of natural justice. The respondent, Mr Mayze, had been a practitioner at the hospital, and his appointment had been revoked. Mr Mayze contended that this revocation was made in breach of the rules of natural justice, and the primary judge had found in his favour, declaring the revocation void and directing an inquiry into damages.

The central legal issue before the High Court was whether a breach of natural justice by a decision-making body automatically confers a right to damages upon the person affected by that decision. The applicant argued that the primary judge erred by proceeding to declare an entitlement to damages without proper argument or determination of that specific issue. The Court of Appeal had also, in the applicant's submission, failed to definitively resolve the question of entitlement to damages, with the majority leaving it for a master to decide.

The applicant's submission was that the primary judge's finding of a breach of natural justice did not, as a matter of law, automatically lead to a right to damages. They contended that the question of entitlement to damages was a separate and distinct issue that had not been adequately argued or determined at first instance. The applicant sought to appeal on the basis that the courts below had not properly addressed this crucial point, leaving the applicant without a clear resolution of the legal consequences of the alleged breach.

Orders