Stay granted in leaky building case against James Hardie

Thursday, 23 March 2017

James Hardie has appealed the decision that the claims could be brought as a representative class action.

A High Court decision has put limits on advertising for plaintiffs to join a leaky building class action case.

A group of owners of leaky buildings was last year given the go-ahead to take a class action lawsuit over deficient cladding.

They said James Hardie and Studorp were negligent in the design and manufacture of Harditex and Titan board cladding systems and products.

The court judgment gave the plaintiffs a limited time, of up to 10 weeks, to add more building owners to the class action.

But the decision was appealed by James Hardie, which argued the owners' cases should not be seen as representative of other cases.

It sought a stay of execution of the judgment relating to advertising of the court's decision that the case could be brought as a class action, while it appeals the ruling.

In the High Court in Auckland, Justice Rebecca Ellis said the terms of the stay would not prevent less formal publication of the proceedings, with a view to identifying potential plaintiffs who could opt in, in the event James Hardie's appeal did not succeed.

'In fact, it seems to be that the plaintiffs will, as a result of the appeal, end up having considerably more time to rally their forces than if my judgment were simply to take immediate effect on its terms.'