KOKL v KABLAR [1989] NSWCA 127

KOKL v KABLAR SUPREME COURT OF NEW SOUTH WALES COURT OF APPEAL

SAMUELS, MEAGHER and PRIESTLEY JJA 16 March 1989, 16 March 1989

[1989] NSWCA 127

Damages — quantum — no question of principle.

Samuels JA I think it can be fairly said that Mr Williams for the appellant has struggled with great courage and ingenuity to make a case where not even the vestige of one has been supplied to him by the events which have happened. His written submissions in particular are persuasive, but in my judgment disclose no grounds upon which we should intervene.

This accident took place in September 1980 and came on for trial in July 1988 before Associate District Court Judge James.

The grounds of appeal are these: first of all, it is submitted that the learned Associate Judge erred in failing to make a provisional estimate of the amount of each component of what is commonly regarded as one head of damage, that is to say, compensation for pain and suffering, loss of the amenities of life, loss of the enjoyment of life and any particular aspects of those detriments. In the present case it was contended by the plaintiff, the respondent, and accepted by the judge, that her depressive reaction to comparatively minor physical injuries had brought about a collapse of what had previously been a successful and stable marriage. It was suggested that some particular estimate of that loss should have been segregated from the total for the head which I have just described.

However, Mr Williams very candidly said that it might well have been that, below, counsel for the defendant had suggested that the judge should not make a separate assessment and he felt, therefore, unable to press that ground. But even so I have never in my experience encountered a suggestion that separate estimates should be made for each of the components, that is to say, for pain and suffering separately from loss of amenities and separately from loss of enjoyment, and that element itself segregated from the second of the three.