Butler v Egg and Egg Pulp Marketing Board

114 CLR 185
[1966] ALR 1025

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(Judgment by: Menzies J)

Butler
v Egg and Egg Pulp Marketing Board

Court:

Judges: Taylor J
Menzies J
Owen J

Subject References:
Damages
Statute vested goods in marketing board
Producer sold to third party

Hearing date: 12 May 1966 (Melbourne)
Judgment date: 2 June 1966

Sydney

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Judgment by:
Menzies J

In my opinion this appeal should be allowed, notwithstanding that I am satisfied that in the circumstances the appellants are not entitled to any payment from the respondent for the eggs which they produced, which became the property of the respondent by vesting, and which they subsequently converted by sale to The Victoria Ltd The only right to payment in respect of vested eggs is "payment in accordance with this Act" (Marketing of Primary Products Act 1958 (Vict.)), see s. 17, and nothing has occurred to give rise to any obligation on the part of the respondent to make any payment for the converted eggs.

The order appealed against would, however, entitle the respondent to damages for conversion considerably in excess of its actual loss for, had the eggs which were converted been delivered to it by the producers, the Marketing of Primary Products Act would have created an obligation upon the respondent to make substantial payments to the appellants and presumably to incur other expenses in relation to the eggs.

Damages should, I think, be assessed not on the basis of the value of the eggs at the time of the conversion but upon the actual loss sustained by the respondent because the appellants converted the respondent's eggs instead of delivering them in accordance with the Act.

There is no hard and fast rule that the value of the goods at the time of a conversion is always the measure of the damages to be assessed for the conversion. Often the application of such a rule would produce an obviously unjust result-for example, if goods converted by a defendant had since been recovered by the plaintiff-owner. The true rule is, I think, that stated by Bramwell B. in Chinery v Viall ^[F4] , viz. that the plaintiff is entitled to recover no more than the real damage he has sustained. Not only is the principle of that case applicable here, but the facts of the case afford an instructive application of the principle. Punishment for non-compliance with the Act is within the realm of the criminal, not the civil, law.

It having been agreed that, if the appeal were to be allowed, the damages to which the respondent is entitled are $1,283.33 as against the appellant company and $916.67 as against the other appellants, I would allow the appeal and direct that damages in those sums should be entered for the plaintiff in the action.