Duhig [2025] QBCCMCmr 400 (11 November 2025)

IMPROVEMENT TO COMMON PROPERTY - whether the body corporate must absorb the cost of installing a fire-rated smart lock to the applicant's front door to replace a non-fire-rated version he installed with the permission of the former committee chairperson.

COMMITTEE COMPOSITION - whether two members of the committee should be removed from their positions and barred from serving for three years.

Act, ss 37(1)(c)(iv), 37A, 38D, 41B, 43(1), 46(3); Mixed Use Development Act 1993, ss 174, 177(1), 214A; Land Title Act 1994, s 49C(4).

• [1] Mr Hanson seeks three orders against his body corporate:

That the Body Corporate be directed to record and treat all levies issued to Duhig by the Community Body Corporate...as valid and payable liabilities, including special levies raised by the CBC EGM held 4 October 2022, the CBC AGM held on 20 December 2023, and the CBC EGM held on 25 March 2025.

That the Body Corporate be directed to reimburse Daniel Hanson (Lot 21) the $300 charge issued for the replacement of a door handle, on the basis that the charge was unreasonable and/or issued in a hostile or punitive context.

That Franklin Manoharan and Joe Joseph be removed from holding any committee positions in Duhig...for a period of three years.

• [2] Duhig is a member of Cathedral Place Community Body Corporate (the CBC), obliged to pay it contributions under the Mixed Use Development Act 1993 (MUD Act).[1] It has apparently been collecting contributions from its proprietors to pay the CBC's levies, but has not paid them because it disputes their "validity and enforceability...due to persistent financial mismanagement, unauthorized expenditure, lack of transparency, and procedural irregularities."[2]
• [3] Mr Hanson wants Duhig to pay the CBC's outstanding levies and record them as liabilities in its financial statements. With respect to the second issue, the Act does not prescribe the minutiae of the body corporate's accounting records. In fact, the Act does not contemplate a body corporate being a member of and paying contributions to another body corporate, so unsurprisingly it makes no arrangements for how the body corporate ought to record contributions levied by the CBC. The body corporate is required to keep "a receipt book, cash book, financial institution deposit book, contributions levy register, cheque book and register of assets" and "a proper statement of accounts",[3] but none of that clearly indicates how contributions owed to a principal body corporate ought to appear in Duhig's financial records.
• [4] Mr Hanson does not have standing to pursue the first issue. As mentioned, Duhig's obligation to pay contributions to the CBC arises under the MUD Act. The contributions are determined by the CBC and levied on its members, including Duhig.[4] If they are not paid, the CBC may recover them as a debt in a court of competent jurisdiction.[5] There is no direct role for the proprietor of a lot within a member of the CBC in that process.
• [5] While the proprietors of Duhig pay contributions levied by Duhig that partially go toward the CBC's levies, just as all of Duhig's liabilities must ultimately be met by its members, Mr Hanson does not challenge Duhig's levying of its proprietors. He insists that the money, now collected, must be paid to the CBC notwithstanding Duhig's misgivings about the CBC's entitlement to it.
• [6] That is properly a dispute between Duhig and the CBC. It is a dispute about the rights and obligations of persons under the MUD Act that the CBC or Duhig could raise with a referee under section 214A of that Act. But they have not done so. The CBC is apparently not pressing a claim to the contributions withheld by Duhig. It has not made an application to that effect and did not make a submission in response to the present application. I would not make orders purporting to resolve that dispute without the involvement of the party most affected by them.
• [7] While there is nothing explicit in the MUD Act to restrict the parties who might apply under s 214A:

Australian courts, notably the High Court in its judgment in the Australian Conservation Foundation case, have closed the door to the principle of open standing. The effect of the locus standi rule is to exclude some people from obtaining relief from the courts in declaring and enforcing the law in circumstances where others could obtain that relief. Neither Australian nor any other country of which I have knowledge has a completely open system in civil law in the sense that anyone can obtain a ruling from a court on any subject upon which the person desires a ruling...[6]

• [8] If the CBC wishes to pursue payment of the outstanding contributions it should make an application to that effect. That would allow the dispute to be decided between its protagonists.

• [9] Mr Hanson says he installed a smart lock on his front door with the permission of the former chairperson of the body corporate committee. It was subsequently found not to be compliant with fire safety requirements, so Mr Hanson purchased a fire-rated replacement and asked the building caretaker:

Would you mind contacting the repairer to confirm they are happy to install this lock and pass the inspection?[7]

• [10] After installation, Mr Hanson was sent an invoice by Duhig's body corporate manager for $300 for "replacement of lockset". He says he paid it "in good faith to avoid escalation". He now wants it reimbursed, arguing there was no body corporate resolution to recover the money from him, the body corporate is responsible for the maintenance of the door and does not usually recover the cost directly from other owners, and he may be being punished for his history of raising governance and compliance concerns.
• [11] The $300 consisted of:
  1. $55 to fill a hole in the door frame
  2. $40 to install a doorstop, and
  3. $205 to install the new smart lock.
• [12] The committee resolved to reimburse the first two amounts at a committee meeting on 14 August 2025. Only the $205 to install the fire-rated smart lock remains in dispute. At the same meeting, the committee voted down Mr Hanson's motion proposing reimbursement of half the $205.
• [13] The committee did not contest Mr Hanson's claim that no resolution was passed to issue an invoice for the $300. Nevertheless, Mr Hanson chose to pay it and must now establish why the body corporate is obliged to return it.
• [14] The body corporate must "properly maintain and keep in a state of good and serviceable repair...each door...in walls where a side of the door...is part of the common property".[8] That covers Mr Hanson's front door, which is in a wall separating lot 21 from the common property. As the boundary lies at the centre of the wall, the outside face of the door would usually be part of the common property.[9]
• [15] However, a proprietor who makes an improvement to the common property, such as by replacing a regular door handle with a smart lock, typically does so at their own expense and assumes the body corporate's maintenance responsibilities with respect to the improvement thereafter.[10]
• [16] Mr Hanson suggests the body corporate may be punishing him, contrary to the committee's obligation to act reasonably when making decisions.[11] But there is no evidence that the committee refused reimbursement in reprisal for unrelated issues, nor that the body corporate has absorbed similar costs for other owners. As noted, it is unremarkable for a proprietor to pay for their own improvement to the common property.
• [17] Owners require approval by resolution without dissent to make improvements to the common property.[12] Mr Hanson had at most the oral approval of a former committee chairperson. If the body corporate wished to punish Mr Hanson, it could have insisted that he reinstate his former lock unless he obtains approval by resolution without dissent for the new smart lock to remain. Instead, it only required him to meet the costs associated with his new lock.
• [18] I am not satisfied that the body corporate is under any obligation to absorb any costs associated with Mr Hanson's new fire-rated smart lock.

• [19] Mr Hanson argues that Messrs Joseph and Manoharan, who occupy the committee's executive positions, should be removed from the committee and prohibited from serving on it for three years. He describes various aspects of their performance that he considers unsatisfactory.
• [20] But the Act defines who is electable to the committee and the circumstances in which their position becomes vacant.[13] There is no lawful basis for removing and excluding committee members for the reasons argued by Mr Hanson. If proprietors feel any members have not performed appropriately, they will take that into account when voting in future committee elections.

[2] Submission of the Body Corporate Committee for Duhig.

[6] Lockhart J, Right To Life Association (Nsw) Inc v Secretary, Department of Human Services and Health and Family Planning Inc (Vic) [1995] FCA 1060 at [69].

[7] Email to John Strano, 11 December 2024.

[9] Land Title Act 1994, s 49C(4).

[13] Ss 41B & 43(1).