/

/

United States legal-change intelligence across legislation, regulation, and case law. Separate data plane, same Zoe spine.

Platform

Legislation
Cases
Ask Zoe
Recently analysed

Company

Pricing
API
X
LinkedIn
Instagram

Jurisdictions

Federal
Supreme Court

District of Columbia

© 2026 Zoe. All rights reserved.

Zoe is a legal information platform. Always consult the official source for authoritative text.

Section 48 - Magistrates Court (Civil Division) Rules 1998 - Defence — Zoe

Legislation Cases Absurdities Ask Zoe Graph Pricing

Home/Legislation/Magistrates Court (Civil Division) Rules 1998/48

TASIn ForceRegulation

Magistrates Court (Civil Division) Rules 1998

48Defence

Start here

Get a plain-English read of 48

Turn the raw legal text into a practical explanation grounded in Magistrates Court (Civil Division) Rules 1998.

View in full context

### 48 Defence > > (1) A person intending to defend an action is to – > > > > > > (a) [*\[Rule 48 Subrule (1) amended by S.R. 2013, No. 69, Applied:04 Sep 2013\]*](/view/html/inforce/2013-09-04/sr-2013-069#GS35@EN) file a defence in an approved form within 21 days after service of the claim commencing the action; and > > > > > > > (b) serve the defence on all other parties to the action. > > > (2) A defence may be filed at any time before default judgment is entered.

Previous section47Admissions Next section49Objection to jurisdiction