Date: Thu, 1 Apr 2004 17:58:52 +1000

From: Harold Luntz

Subject: High Court of Australia on economic loss

The High Court of Australia today decided Woolcock Street Investments Pty Ltd v CDG Pty Ltd [2004] HCA 16 <http://www.austlii.edu.au/au/ cases/cth/high_ct/2004/16.html>. By a majority of 6:1 it held that a subsequent purchaser of a commercial building was owed no duty of care by the engineer who designed the foundations of the building allegedly defectively. The joint judgment of four members of the majority carefully confined the decision to the pleaded facts and the few inferences that could be drawn therefrom. It was able to decide the present case "without determining whether doubt should now be cast upon the result at which the Court arrived in" Bryan v Maloney (1995) 182 CLR 609. It also found it unnecessary to consider the overseas authorities. The other three judgments, particularly the dissenting one of Kirby J, range more widely.

Harold Luntz,
Professorial Fellow,
Law School,
The University of Melbourne,
Victoria, 3010,
AUSTRALIA.

Phone: +61 3 8344-6187
Home phone: +61 3 9387-4662
Fax: +61 3 9347-2392

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