A judge determining a serious injury application for pecuniary loss damages must engage with the whole of the evidence to determine whether the applicant has sustained a permanent loss of earning capacity of 40 per cent or more; it is not sufficient to treat the absence of a specific answer from a medical panel as determinative. Medical panel written reasons are admissible as expert opinion evidence under ss 55 and 79 of the Evidence Act 2008, though their admission on the basis of resolving ambiguity or providing context to certificates of opinion is doubtful where the certificates are not themselves ambiguous. Expert evidence that conflicts with a medical panel certificate on one issue may still be relied upon insofar as it bears on a question not foreclosed by the panel's opinion.
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