Wende v Horwath (NSW) Pty Limited [2008] NSWSC 1241

New South Wales Supreme Court

CITATION : Wende v Horwath (NSW) Pty Limited [2008] NSWSC 1241

HEARING DATE(S) : 12 November 2008

JUDGMENT DATE : 28 November 2008

JUDGMENT OF : James J

DECISION : 1. Summons dismissed. 2. Plaintiffs to pay defendant's costs of the summons.

CATCHWORDS : Legal practitioners — assessment of costs — Legal Profession Act 2004 s.384 and s.385 — appeal from assessment panel whether global approach to assessment by panel — whether sufficient reasons given by panel

LEGISLATION CITED : Legal Profession Act 2004

Herbert Wende (First Plaintiff) PARTIES : Margaret Wende (Second Plaintiff) Mark Lloyd (Third Plaintiff) Horwath (NSW) Pty Limited (Defendant)

FILE NUMBER(S) : SC 10517/08

COUNSEL : JL Sharpe (Plaintiffs) SF Hughes (Defendant)

SOLICITORS : Leitch Hasson Dent Solicitors (Plaintiffs) Heidtman & Co (Defendant)

IN THE SUPREME COURT OF NEW SOUTH WALES COMMON LAW DIVISION

JAMES J

FRIDAY 28 NOVEMBER 2008

10517/08 HERBERT WENDE & 2 ORS v HORWATH (NSW) PTY LIMITED

JUDGMENT 1 HIS HONOUR: This is an appeal and an application for leave to appeal pursuant to ss 384 and 385 of the Legal Profession Act 2004 ("the Act") against a decision of a panel of costs assessors who made a determination of the costs payable by the plaintiffs to the defendant under costs orders made by courts. The plaintiffs in the proceedings in this court are Herbert Wende, Margaret Wende and Mark Lloyd. In this judgment I propose to refer to the plaintiffs as "the Wendes". In some of the documents which were admitted into evidence these parties are referred to as "the Berghofen parties". The defendant in the proceedings in this Court is Horwath (NSW) Pty Limited, which I will refer to as "Horwath". 2 For the purposes of the present appeal and application for leave to appeal a volume of nearly 200 pages described as an "evidence book" was admitted into evidence. The evidence book contained copies of some of the documents brought into existence in the course of the protracted disputes between the Wendes and Horwath. It is unnecessary, in order to decide the present proceedings, for me to go into all the details of these disputes but some account is required by way of a background.