Civil Liability Act 2002

A court cannot order the payment of interest on damages awarded for any of the following—

non-economic loss,

gratuitous attendant care services as defined in section 15 (other than gratuitous attendant care services to which section 15A applies),

loss of a claimant’s capacity to provide gratuitous domestic services to the claimant’s dependants (as provided by section 15B).

If a court is satisfied that interest is payable on damages (other than damages in respect of which a court cannot order the payment of interest under subsection (1)), the amount of interest is to be calculated—

for the period from when the loss to which the damages relate was first incurred until the date on which the court determines the damages, and

in accordance with the principles ordinarily applied by the court for that purpose, subject to subsection (3).

The rate of interest to be used in any such calculation is—

such interest rate as may be determined by the regulations, or

if no such rate is determined by the regulations—the relevant interest rate as at the date of determination of the damages.

For the purposes of subsection (3), the relevant interest rate is the rate representing the Commonwealth Government 10-year benchmark bond rate as published by the Reserve Bank of Australia in the Reserve Bank of Australia Bulletin (however described) and as applying—

on the first business day of January of each year (in which case the rate is to apply as the relevant interest rate for the period from 1 March until 31 August of that year), or

on the first business day of July of each year (in which case the rate is to apply as the relevant interest rate for the period from 1 September of that year until the last day of February of the following year).

Nothing in this section affects the payment of interest on a debt under a judgment or order of a court.