North Shore City Council v Body Corporate 189855 and Ors - SC 28/2010

A The application for leave to appeal is granted.

B The approved grounds are:

(i)  Whether and in what circumstances a local authority which performed regulatory functions under the Building Act 1991 in relation to construction of a multi-unit residential development owed a duty of care to purchasers of units in the building to ensure that it complied with the building code.

(ii) Assuming such a duty exists, whether it extends to:

(a) Such persons who did not themselves at the time of purchase intend personally to occupy their unit(s) (investor owners); and

(b) Persons who subsequently acquired such units from the first purchasers after a claim for breach of duty to their predecessors had accrued; and

(c) The body corporate.

(iii) Whether the conclusions which would otherwise be reached are affected in circumstances where the Council declined to issue a code compliance certificate.

(iv) In light of the conclusions reached on the foregoing grounds, how these issues should be determined in the particular cases.

  13 July 2010

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Appeal dismissed,

Costs to the respondents

17 December 2010