Civic Workers Plus Pty Ltd v Hill [2000] VSCA 61

For the reasons which his Honour has stated I think that s.50(2A) of the Accident Compensation Act 1985 ("the Act") was intended to provide a comprehensive regime dealing with the costs of all actions brought to recover compensation under ss.98 and 98A of the Act. As the award of costs depended upon the relationship between the amount recovered by the claimant and the earlier offers of the parties, it was necessary to provide proxies if an offer was not made by one or both of the parties. In my view it would run counter to the clear intention of the legislature to construe s.104(11B) as not to deem a counter statutory offer to have been made if the only statutory offer was a deemed statutory offer created by s.114(11A). The temptation to sidestep Parliament's objective because of the difficulties created by the unfortunate specification of a date unknown to claimants as the starting point for calculating the time limit claimants must observe should be resisted. As Phillips, J.A. points out, like difficulties arise when the insurer does make an offer.

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