Zimmerman v Perkiss (No 3) [2022] NSWDC 635

District Court New South Wales

Medium Neutral Citation: Zimmerman v Perkiss (No 3) [2022] NSWDC 635 Hearing dates: 15 December 2022 Date of orders: 15 December 2022 Decision date: 15 December 2022 Jurisdiction: Civil Before: Gibson DCJ Decision: (1) The plaintiff to pay the defendant's costs of these proceedings on an indemnity basis. Catchwords: COSTS - successful defendant in a preliminary hearing on the issue of serious harm (s 10A of the Defamation Act 2005 (NSW) seeks an order for costs on an indemnity basis - plaintiff seeks orders for each party to pay their own costs or alternatively for costs to be assessed on the ordinary basis - role of the concerns notice provisions in relation to settlement discussions - plaintiff failed to reply to correspondence from the defendant during the concerns notice period and to the defendant's subsequent Calderbank offer - whether the plaintiff was goaded into suit by reason of the defendant's publication in circumstances warranting a variation of the usual costs order - whether special costs order necessary because of the "test case" nature of these proceedings - indemnity costs order made for the whole of the proceedings Legislation Cited: Defamation Act 2005 (NSW), ss 10A, 12A, 40 Defamation Act 1974 (NSW), s 7A Defamation Act 2013 (UK), c 26, s 1 Uniform Civil Procedure Rules 2005 (NSW), rr 20.26, 20.27, 28.2, 42.1 Cases Cited: Calderbank v Calderbank [1975] 3 All ER 333; [1975] 3 WLR 586 Cush v Dillon; Boland v Dillon (2011) 243 CLR 298; [2011] HCA 30 Georges v Georges [2022] NSWDC 558 Lazarus v Deutsche Lufthansa AG (1985) 1 NSWLR 188 Newman v Whittington [2022] NSWSC 249 Ritter v Godfrey [1920] 2 KB 47 Trkulja v Yahoo! Inc LLC (No 2) [2012] VSC 217 Zimmerman v Perkiss [2022] NSWDC 448 Zoef v Nationwide News Pty Ltd (No 2) [2017] NSWCA 2 Category: Costs Parties: Plaintiff: Katie Zimmerman Defendant: Kim Perkiss Representation: Counsel: Ms M Hall (plaintiff) Mr J O'Connor (defendant)