RANT: New laws mean little without test cases

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So NSW has a new strata commissioner, in the form of Angus Abadee who has been acting in the role since the turn of the year and was a policy adviser under Building Commissioner David Chandler when he was kicking butt and taking names.

With new laws coming into force in a few weeks it will be interesting to see what Mr Abadee does with them.

Maybe we’ve been given a taste already when, in his role as acting commissioner, he pursued the prosecution of errant strata manager Michael Lee to the point where NCAT banned Lee and his company Result Strata from ever operating in the sector again.

Angus also was a driving force behind the Strata Taskforce which was gathering up complaints from the victims of strata rorts and investigating the claims. He sounds like our kind of commissioner.

When the law changes from July 1, to give strata contracts the same protections as everyone else under federal consumer protection laws, he will have a new weapon.

But will he use it? Chances are his approach won’t be like David Chandler’s army swooping in on building sites and locking the miscreants’ gates.

Instead we, the victims, will have to lawyer up against huge companies with deep pockets and a konga line of KCs to fight their corners.

Who is going to run test cases on behalf of swindled strata owners, if only to establish a few legal precedents – because that’s how the laws get changed in strata?

Don’t forget that the laws on pets didn’t change until Jo Cooper challenged her building’s by-laws in NCAT and ultimately in the Court of Appeal. Then they changed for the whole country.

So welcome, Commissioner Abadee. You’ve spent the last six months taking names: now it’s time to kick some butt on behalf of the owners who can’t afford to hire a raft of lawyers every time they are ripped off.

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11/06/2025 at 4:33 pm #79925 Reply | Quote
Jimmy-T
Keymaster
Changing strata law is a start but our new Strata Commissioner needs to use the financial heft of the State to run test cases and establish precedent.

[See the full post at: RANT: New laws mean little without test cases]

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11/06/2025 at 7:56 pm #79935 Reply
Ziggy
Flatchatter
Just out of curiosity, Jimmy, what part does our new strata commissioner play in the day to day running of a strata scheme? For instance, here are the new rules for strata committees:
- requiring committee members “to exercise [their] functions with honesty and fairness, with due care and diligence and for the benefit, as far as practicable, of the owners corporation”;
- requiring committee members “to comply with the [Act] and the regulations under the [Act]”;
- requiring committee members “to not behave in a way that unreasonably affects a person’s lawful use or enjoyment of a lot in the strata scheme or the common property”;
- requiring committee members to undertake training – committee members “who [fail] to complete the required training will cease to be a member of the committee”; and
- to lower the threshold to remove an office bearer at a general meeting to a simple majority (currently a special resolution).
Is it still up to owners to go through the drawn out process of mediation then NCAT to prove their SC is breaking some/all of the above?

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11/06/2025 at 8:03 pm #79940 Reply
Jimmy-T
Keymaster
Chat-starter
Ziggy wrote:

Is it still up to owners to go through the drawn out process of mediation then NCAT to prove their SC is breaking some/all of the above?

Yes. There may be a “Strata Taskforce” but there are still no StrataKops. That said, the Tribunal has the power, when faced with a seriously dysfunctional strata scheme, to impose a statutory strata manager without receiving a request to do so.

That said, if a committee bullies owners, doesn’t let them speak at meetings, belittles them and is secretive BUT the bills get paid, the lights stay on, the repairs are made and the lifts keep running, then the Tribunal is unlikely to do anything.

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