Land and Resources Tribunal

 PRACTICE DIRECTION No 10 of 2000

Disclosure of documents

1. Rule 5(3)(a)(i) of the Land and Resources Tribunal Rules 2000 provides that one of the issues that may be addressed at a directions hearing is the need for and extent of disclosure (of documents).
2. Legal practitioners and parties who are not represented by a lawyer should expect that, with a view to eliminating or reducing the burden of disclosure, the Tribunal:

1. will not order general disclosure as a matter of course, even where a consent direction to that effect is submitted; and
2. will mould any order for disclosure to suit the facts of a particular case; and
3. will expect the following questions to be answered:

1. is disclosure necessary at all, and if so for what purposes?
2. can those purposes be achieved:

• by a means less expensive than disclosure?
• by disclosure only in relation to particular issues?
• by disclosure (at least in the first instance – see (iii)) only of defined categories of documents?

3. particularly in cases where there are many documents, should disclosure be given in stages, eg initially on a limited basis, with liberty to apply later for particular disclosure or disclosure on a broader basis?
4. should disclosure be given in the list of documents by general description rather than by identification of individual documents?

3. In determining whether to order disclosure, the Tribunal will have regard to the issues in the case and the order in which they are likely to be resolved, the relevance and importance of the documents concerned, the resources and circumstances of the parties, the likely cost of the disclosure and its likely benefit, and any other relevant considerations.

Gregory J. Koppenol
President
29 August 2000