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Legislative Assembly for the ACT: 2003 Week 8 Hansard (21 August) . . Page.. 3078 ..

MR STANHOPE (continuing):

Section 36 (5) also does not apply to part 3.1 of the Civil Law (Wrongs) Act 2002, which deals with death caused by a wrongful act or omission. Section 36 (6) states that section 30 also does not apply in relation to the period mentioned in section 30B (2), which is the special provision in relation to children concerning claims relating to health services.

MS DUNDAS (6.20): I put on the record that I am also opposing this amendment, as moved by the Chief Minister. It is a consequential amendment to the clauses we just voted on and I am still unhappy about those, too.

MS TUCKER (6.20): I move amendment No 1 circulated in my name [see schedule 6 at page 3094]. This amendment amends Mr Stanhope's amendment No 8.

The point of this amendment is to give the court power under exceptional circumstances to hear a case in the interests of justice. The strength of our legal system is that it focuses on justice and on equity. While the statute of limitations rightly limits people's options in most circumstances, there are occasions, such as the Voyager incident, where the truth of a situation emerges very slowly.

With fairly short and impermeable barriers in time, as this bill establishes, the incentive will always be there to limit costs by stringing plaintiffs or potential plaintiffs along until the matter is closed. In that situation, under this amendment the interests of justice and the exceptional circumstances would open the possibility for action to be taken.

MS DUNDAS (6.21): Mr Speaker, as I just said, I would have preferred the new clause to be entirely defeated, but I do commend Ms Tucker for this amendment. It only seeks to undo the harsh restriction in the limitation periods for adults and minors that the government seeks to incorporate into the Civil Law (Wrongs) Act. It also seeks to provide a general discretion to the court to waive limitations in exceptional circumstances in the interests of justice.

Because there is the requirement of exceptional circumstances, I cannot see this provision being used so often. But it significantly increases uncertainty for insurers. I think the benefits to particular individuals could far outweigh the slightly greater risk to insurers that would arise from this amendment. So I am happy to support it. I think it is a good amendment and I hope the Assembly also supports it.

MR STANHOPE (Chief Minister, Attorney-General, Minister for Environment and Minister for Community Affairs) (6.22): Mr Speaker, the government opposes the amendment. The argument is, of course, the same as the argument which related to the amendment proposed earlier in relation to extending the statute of limitations as it applies to adults.

These are difficult issues-there is no doubt about that. A deliberate decision has been taken by the government to reduce the statute of limitations applying to adults to three years. Acknowledging the different circumstance or situation in which children find themselves, the government has taken a deliberate decision to reduce the statute of limitations applying to children for straight-out injury cases to six years from the date of the incident that caused the injury; and in cases where symptoms do not appear for some time, six years from when the symptoms first appear but no more than 12 years from the

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