The manner in which the retrial is to be conducted
19 As noted, Mr Duncan seeks orders that the retrial be conducted on the papers on the basis of the evidence adduced at trial and without either party being entitled to lead further evidence. Mr Duncan submitted that the following matters supported orders to this effect:
(a) Addenbrooke had put its case fully in the trial at first instance and had not been precluded from adducing any admissible evidence. It should not be permitted now to amend or enlarge its case in a retrial and thereby improve its position;
(b) the only error established on the appeal was the omission of the trial Judge to consider all aspects of Addenbrooke's case and his "failure to consider some of the evidence said to have been given" in the trial;
(c) the overarching purpose expressed in s 37M of the FCA Act, especially having regard to the availability of the trial record, the ages of Mr Denis O'Neil and Mr Duncan (both are said to be of advanced years) and the prospect of the matter being finalised more quickly if the remaining claims are determined on the papers;
(d) the advantage which the trial Judge on the remittal would have in being able to see the witnesses give their evidence is diminished in this case because it will be necessary for the Judge to take account of the circumstance that Addenbrooke's witnesses will, by reason of the previous cross examinations, be better prepared;
(e) the circumstance that the Full Court had not determined Mr Duncan's Notice of Contention meant that, unless the retrial was confined in the way for which he contends, the issues raised by that Notice may never be addressed.
20 Addenbrooke opposed the orders sought by Mr Duncan and submitted that the manner of the trial should be left to be determined by the new trial Judge. Both parties accepted that it would be within the power of the trial Judge to give directions as to the manner in which the retrial should proceed. Mr Duncan's submission was that the existence of that power should not dissuade the Full Court from making the order he seeks.
21 Several of the parties' submissions went to the present power of the Full Court to hear and determine Mr Duncan's application concerning the manner of the conduct of the retrial. Mr Duncan noted that we had concluded our reasons by saying that we "would hear from the parties as to costs and as to any consequential matters" (see also the reasons of Dowsett J at [291]), and that Order 9 made on 16 May 2017 contained a grant of liberty to apply. He submitted that his application of 30 May 2017 was of a kind which the Court itself had contemplated and, further, sought orders of a kind which were "supplemental" in the sense discussed by the Full Courts in Caboolture Park Shopping Centre Pty Ltd (in liq) v White Industries (Qld) Pty Ltd (1993) 45 FCR 224 at 234-6 and Remington Products Australia Pty Ltd v Energizer Australia Pty Ltd [2008] FCAFC 47; (2008) 246 ALR 113 at [17]-[20].
22 Addenbrooke, on the other hand, submitted that the Court was now functus officio and that the order sought by Mr Duncan could not be regarded as supplemental or as encompassed by the term "consequential matters". It noted that the parties had during the appeal hearing made submissions on the question of whether the remittal for a retrial should be to the trial Judge or to another Judge and emphasised that this issue had been determined adversely to Mr Duncan. Addenbrooke's alternative submission was to the effect that Mr Duncan was seeking a reopening of the appeal and no proper basis had been shown for such a course to be allowed. In particular, Addenbrooke submitted that the Court's willingness to hear submissions on "consequential matters" extended only to matters of a procedural kind and not to matters which would have the effect of altering the operation of orders already made.
23 In our view, it is not necessary presently to resolve these questions. That is because we consider that Mr Duncan's application should not succeed in any event.
24 It is appropriate to keep in mind our reasons for remitting the matter for trial by another Judge. We concluded that the trial Judge had not addressed the whole of Addenbrooke's claim of misleading or deceptive conduct, in particular, its non-disclosure case, and had not made any relevant findings as to why it was that Mr Duncan and the Cascade directors wanted to remove the Obeids from the Project, at [454]-[455], [463]. Later, we said:
[513] In summary, we consider that Addenbrooke's submission that the Judge did not deal with the whole of the misleading or deceptive conduct claim against Mr Duncan should be upheld and that this Court cannot conclude that, had the whole claim been addressed, the outcome at trial would have been the same. …
[514] …
[515] We do not propose to make any declaration that Mr Duncan engaged in misleading and deceptive conduct. This is so because we are persuaded that the Judge failed to consider and determine Addenbrooke's case of misleading and deceptive conduct, as a whole. That case consisted of the positive misleading case and the nondisclosure case taken together. They cannot be separated. Indeed, on Addenbrooke's case, the reasons for not disclosing the true position concerning the Capital Raising necessarily gave rise to the misleading representations actually made.
[516] We should not attempt to consider and resolve that combined case. Even the conclusions arrived at by the Judge as to what Addenbrooke would have done had it known merely of the Obeids' interest may well have been different if the non-disclosure case had been considered by him.
[517] The facts in issue on the combined case are too many and complex for this Court fairly to make findings of fact to inform the legal result. We would for that same reason not undertake the fact finding task pressed by Mr Duncan's Notice of Contention.
[518] In our opinion the whole misleading and deceptive conduct case ought to be tried again and, because of the credit based findings made by the Judge on the more confined case, that trial should be before a different Judge.
25 In summary, we considered that the trial Judge had not considered and determined Addenbrooke's case of misleading and deceptive conduct as a whole because he had not considered its claim based on non-disclosure; that the separate elements of that claim (the positive misleading statements and the non-disclosure) could not be separated; that the Full Court itself could not determine those matters on the basis of the findings of fact made by the trial Judge because those findings may well have been different if the Judge had considered the non-disclosure case; the multiplicity and complexity of the facts in issue on the combined case made it inappropriate for the Full Court to make findings of fact to inform the legal result especially given that many will require credit based findings, and that the retrial should be before another Judge because of the credit based findings already made by the trial Judge without consideration of the whole of Addenbrooke's case.
26 We consider it reasonably plain that we intended that the new trial Judge would hear and determine the whole of Addenbrooke's misleading or deceptive conduct case on the basis of the pleadings and evidence before that Judge and be able, in the usual way, to make the findings involving an assessment of the witnesses' credibility.
27 In short, we contemplated that, subject to the directions and control of the new trial Judge, the retrial would be of a conventional kind. We did not intend to circumscribe the scope and manner of conduct of the retrial, other than by confining the issues to be addressed.
28 As counsel for Addenbrooke submitted, it is not to be expected that, in circumstances in which the Full Court considered that it could not carry out the task of completing the trial on the papers, it would nevertheless impose that task on the new trial Judge. On the contrary, we expected that in the new trial, the Judge should have the advantage of seeing the evidence given as an aid to making the credit based findings.
29 Several of Mr Duncan's submissions assumed that the Court had not considered the manner in which the new trial was to be conducted. That assumption is not borne out by our reasons. The passages set out earlier indicate that we considered that the retrial should be before another Judge because the trial Judge had made credit based findings in respect of one part of Addenbrooke's case which could not be separated from the part he had not addressed. That meant that there would be a real apprehension that the trial Judge might not bring an open mind to the consideration of the remaining aspects of Addenbrooke's case. In effect, we were concerned that Addenbrooke should have a trial of the whole of its case before a judge who had not already formed adverse views about the credibility or reliability of its witnesses.
30 Counsel for Mr Duncan sought to draw support from the way in which we had dealt with that part of his Notice of Contention which concerned damages. This point, although raised for the first time in the written outline of submissions in reply, was given some prominence in the oral submissions.
31 The submission was that we had "refused to resolve [the] controversy" raised by the Notice of Contention concerning damages; that the issue "ha[d] been sent back to a trial judge" to be tried with the other issues in the retrial; that the correctness or otherwise of the Contention turned on the evidence presented in the trial; and that in the event that other evidence was presented in the retrial, the Contention would never be determined by reference to the evidence in the first trial on which it was based.
32 In our opinion, this submission should not be accepted.
33 Mr Duncan's Notice of Contention claimed that the trial Judge should have made the following findings concerning damages:
(a) Addenbrooke had not proved that it suffered loss caused by the misleading or deceptive conduct it alleged because the true value of the shares as at the date of acquisition was more than nil, and Addenbrooke had not proved that value;
(b) the enactment of the Mining Amendment (ICAC Operations Jasper and Acacia) Act 2014 (NSW) which had cancelled EL 7406 (and two other exploration licences) without compensation was the true cause of the decline in the value of the shares in Cascade purchased by Addenbrooke and that this was an independent or extrinsic cause of Addenbrooke's loss;
(c) Addenbrooke's claim for damages in respect of the contravention of s 12DA of the Australian Securities and Investments Commission Act 2001 (Cth) was an apportionable claim so that his liability should be reduced to reflect his responsibility for the loss or damage claimed having regard to the responsibility of concurrent wrongdoers.
34 Contentions (a) and (b) were addressed at [657]-[659] of our reasons. We rejected the contentions saying, at [662], that it would not be appropriate to conclude that the trial Judge should have dismissed Addennbrooke's claims because it had not proven in any event a loss which could be attributed to Mr Duncan. Later, we said:
[668] We accept that, on the evidence, the assessment of Addenbrooke's loss would have been difficult. Nevertheless, that is often the circumstance confronting a court … We would not conclude that, despite the difficulties, the Judge could not have made any assessment at all.
[669] In our view, it would not be appropriate for Addenbrooke's appeal in relation to Mr Duncan to be defeated on the grounds which we would uphold on the basis that damages were not proved, nor capable of being proved. We are not persuaded that a reasoned assessment, even if attended with some difficulty, could not have been made by the Judge. This issue ought to be tried with the other issues which are to be retried.
35 One of the reasons which we gave for this conclusion was the absence of finding of primary facts resulting from the Judge's view that it was unnecessary for him to consider the questions of causation and damage. We noted at [666], however, that "if issues about disclosure were the effective cause, or at least one cause of the [White Energy Company Ltd (WEC)] decision, it would have been open to the Judge to conclude that there was a causal link between the nondisclosure of which Addenbrooke complained in [the] proceedings, on the one hand, and a diminution in value of the Cascade shares resulting from the WEC decision, on the other."
36 In these circumstances, the submission that the Court (by the reasons of the majority) had "refused to resolve [the] controversy" raised by the Notice of Contention is not soundly based.
37 It is true that we did not address the apportionment issue and said that the issue ought to be agitated in the retrial. However, we do not understand that to be the subject of Mr Duncan's present submissions and (understandably given its nature) his counsel did not refer to it on the hearing of the present application.
38 For these reasons, we would decline to make the orders sought by Mr Duncan in the interlocutory application lodged on 30 May 2017.