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Earthquake rockfall nuisance

In Young v Attorney General [2022] NZCA 391 the Court of Appeal on 23 August 2022 dismissed an appeal by Steven Young against the High Court judgment that the Crown was not liable to him in nuisance/trespass in relation to rocks that fell onto and remained on his Redcliffs property in the earthquake(s) on 22 February 2011.  He claimed about $7M.  The rocks came from Mr Young’s property (72%) and neighbours’ properties (28%).  The Crown acquired the neighbouring properties in red zone offer(s) between 2012 and 2015.  Mr Young rejected any Crown red zone offer(s).  By the time the Crown acquired the neighbouring properties the Young property was already worth very little by reason of the previous rockfalls and zoning of property.  The Court held that the Crown has met any liability to abate the nuisance by offering to pay Mr Young $2M in 2015 plus enabling him to keep insurance proceeds in 3 houses on the site.  The order that Mr Young pay costs and disbursements of $329,093 to the Crown in the High Court was also confirmed.

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Council Insurance Leaky Building

In Napier City Council v LGMFL [2022] NZCA 422 the Court of Appeal allowed an appeal by the Council on its ability to recover from its insurer (“Risk Pool”) for its contribution of $12.355M to settle a leaky building claim about Waterfront Apartments.  The Waterfront plaintiffs claimed about $20M of which $16.2M comprised costs of remediation.  The relevant insurance policy excluded cover for claims about weathertightness.  The insurance policy did cover non-weathertightness defects.  Contrary to the High Court decision the Court of Appeal decided that the exclusion removed cover only for Council liability from weathertightness defects.  The Council could recover from Risk Pool for non-weathertighness defects.  The dispute was sent back to the High Court for it to apportion the settlement between weathertight and non-weathertight defects and to determine whether the settlement was reasonable.  

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