Sproats & Anor v North Queensland Training Services Pty Ltd

[2019] QCA 102

Queensland Court of Appeal

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Interrogate

Catchwords

1. Practice and Procedure
2. › Pleadings
3. › Striking out
4. › Defence and counterclaim
5. › Whether pleading should be struck out in entirety or only defective paragraphs
6. › Whether pleading prolix and incoherent
7. › Uniform Civil Procedure Rules 1999 (Qld), rr 5, 149(1)(a), 149(1)(b), 171
1. Appeal
2. › Leave to appeal
3. › District Court decisions
4. › Requirements for leave
5. › Whether reasonable argument of error requiring correction
6. › Whether appeal necessary to correct substantial injustice
7. › District Court of Queensland Act 1967 (Qld), s 118(3)
1. Practice and Procedure
2. › Costs
3. › Orders made without hearing submissions
4. › Whether costs order occasioned substantial injustice
5. › Whether party may apply to set aside order
6. › Uniform Civil Procedure Rules 1999 (Qld), r 667(2)
1. Appeal
2. › Standard of appellate review
3. › Exercise of discretion
4. › Strike-out applications
5. › Whether House v The King error shown

Quick Take

An applicant seeking leave to appeal a refusal to strike out a pleading in its entirety must show a real prospect of House v The King error in the exercise of discretion, not merely that another judge might have been more stringent. Where the pleading is intelligible and does not leave the opposing party in real doubt about the case to meet, the fact that it could have been considerably streamlined does not warrant striking it out in its entirety. A costs order made without hearing submissions does not occasion substantial injustice where the party retains the right to apply to set it aside under r 667(2).