A party who elects for trial by jury in Queensland defamation proceedings under s 21 of the Defamation Act 2005 (Qld) can unilaterally abandon that election without a court order. The opposing party may then seek trial by jury under UCPR r 475(1), under which the test is whether the proceeding could appropriately be tried by jury — not whether it could more appropriately be tried by jury. In assessing document volume, courts should not uncritically accept the total number of disclosed documents or pages without considering duplication and the likelihood that the volume of truly relevant documents will contract as trial approaches.
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