Dalton v Lawson Hill Estate Pty Ltd [2005] FCAFC 169

FEDERAL COURT OF AUSTRALIA

Dalton v Lawson Hill Estate Pty Ltd [2005] FCAFC 169

TRADE PRACTICES – misleading conduct – sale of vineyard and winery – misrepresentation by vendors of area occupied by vines – whether misrepresentation also made by selling agent – whether selling agent merely passing on information supplied, and known to purchaser to have been supplied, by vendors. TRADE PRACTICES – misleading conduct – sale of vineyard and winery – misrepresentation by vendors of volume of available bore water as 1800 gallons per hour – in support, vendors handed to purchaser an 'invoice' given to them more than two years previously by water drilling contractor referring to '1800 GPH' (1800 gallons per hour) – contractor had in fact orally informed vendors water flow from bore was 400 gallons per hour – 400 gallons per hour is approximately 1800 litres per hour – trial judge accepted that contractor had inadvertently written '1800 GPH' rather than '1800 LPH' and that if vendors had read the invoice at the time, they would have appreciated the error – whether contractor liable to purchaser as a result of vendors having handed over the invoice to them more than two years later – whether chain of causation broken.

Trade Practices Act 1974 (Cth) s 52 Partnership Act 1892 (NSW) ss 6(1), 10(1), 12

Yorke v Lucas (1985) 158 CLR 661 cited Butcher v Lachlan Elder Realty Pty Limited (2004) 212 ALR 357 applied John G. Glass Real Estate Pty Ltd v Karawi Constructions Pty Limited [1993] ATPR 41-249 distinguished Re La Rosa; Ex parte Norgard v Rodpat Nominees Pty Ltd (1991) 31 FCR 83 cited

JOHN MICHAEL DALTON v LAWSON HILL ESTATE PTY LTD

as trustee of the LAWSON HILL ESTATE TRUST

NSD 1928 of 2004

TOVEGOLD PTY LTD as trustee for O'BRIEN McGREGOR TRUST FUND v LAWSON HILL ESTATE PTY LTD as trustee of the LAWSON HILL ESTATE TRUST