Mistrina Pty Ltd v Australian Consulting Engineers Pty Ltd

Mistrina Pty Ltd and another party (the appellants) appealed to the Court of Appeal of the Supreme Court of New South Wales against a decision concerning misleading or deceptive conduct. The dispute arose from representations made by Australian Consulting Engineers Pty Ltd (the respondent) regarding the structural integrity of a building. The appellants alleged that these representations were misleading and caused them loss.

The Court of Appeal was required to determine whether the respondent had engaged in misleading or deceptive conduct in contravention of the Australian Consumer Law. Further, the court had to consider the appropriate measure of damages for loss of opportunity arising from such conduct, and whether the loss claimed by the appellants was caused by the respondent's conduct and was not too remote.

The Court of Appeal found that the respondent had engaged in misleading or deceptive conduct. The court reasoned that the respondent's representations, when viewed in their entirety and in the context of the information available to the parties at the time, were misleading. The court applied principles relating to causation and remoteness in assessing damages for loss of opportunity, concluding that the appellants had established a causal link between the misleading conduct and their loss. The court also considered the appropriate method for quantifying the loss of opportunity, which involved assessing the value of a chance that was lost.

Consequently, the appeal was allowed with costs, and the cross-appeal was dismissed with costs. The previous orders were set aside, and judgment was entered in favour of the first appellant for $2,265,556 and in favour of the second appellant for $1,105,000.