AMPOLEX LIMITED v PERPETUAL TRUSTEE COMPANY (CANBERRA) LIMITED [1996] NSWCA 15

AMPOLEX LIMITED v PERPETUAL TRUSTEE COMPANY (CANBERRA) LIMITED

SUPREME COURT OF NEW SOUTH WALES — COURT OF APPEAL

MAHONEY P 16 May 1996

[1996] NSWCA 15

Mahoney P. This is a matter which comes before me as a single Judge on a notice of motion.

The circumstances in which it comes before me are unusual. A good deal of the material on which I am asked to act has been placed before me either in the form of a large collection of documents contained in a file or by statements from the bar table. That is not to be complained of. I refer to it because the matter has gone back and forth between counsel for the purpose of ensuring that I am fully acquainted with the position which constitutes the background of the present application.

Stated briefly the position is as follows. There is a proceeding before Rolfe J which has been in the course of hearing for some twenty days or more and which counsel inform the Court is likely to proceed for another four or five months.

A witness, said to be a most important witness in the case, a Dr Power, is being cross-examined in the course of the proceeding before Rolfe J.

In the course of cross-examination of the doctor, an issue arose as to the — I use the neutral term — availability of documents. It was sought in one way or another to have the available documents from which Dr Power could be cross-examined and no doubt from which other inferences could be drawn in the course of the proceeding.

The result of the submissions in relation to the matter has been that the Judge has made an order that the documents here in question should be tendered in evidence. I use the word 'order' in a neutral sense and subject to what I shall say. (What occurred is set forth in pp 1782 and 1783 of the transcript of the proceedings in the matter before Rolfe J).

The result of that order, if it be such, would ordinarily be that the material would be admitted in evidence before the Judge and would in due course be available for inspection by cross-examining counsel and other counsel in the proceeding.