On review of a judicial registrar's refusal to extend the validity of an unserved writ, the County Court set aside the determination and granted a further extension, finding good reason existed in the circumstances despite significant delays spanning nearly four years. The Court accepted that the complexity of investigating a medical negligence claim, the need to obtain expert opinions on breach and causation before serving proceedings, and the recently discovered incapacity of the second plaintiff collectively constituted good reason, particularly where the defendant had not adduced evidence of specific prejudice beyond the effluxion of time and the loss of a limitations defence. The Court emphasised that denying the extension solely to preserve a limitations defence that was unlikely to succeed would be contrary to the overarching purpose of the Civil Procedure Act 2010 (Vic), but ordered the plaintiffs to pay the defendant's costs of both hearings.
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