Mr. Dave Coleman:

There are two parts to it. Let us remove the word "State" and replace it with "defendant". In my experience, the multi-party action in the limited form we have it at present is one where one signs up the plaintiffs, they will sign up to the agreed questions between the plaintiffs and the defendants that are given to the court, and in so answering that binds the group. That is far more efficient than having 300 or 500 individual statements of claim and having to go through all the procedures before the court for each one, which creates a massive amount of work and effort to no avail because everybody in the room will know that the points to be decided are being decided in the main cases and that all other cases should be, in effect, stood up. I agree that considerable savings can be made by having this system.

When it comes to the State, and I hope I am not overstepping the mark, sometimes there is not much commerciality in dealing with these problems. In a typical medical negligence case the apology is given at the very end. In many other areas where the State is being sued through one of its arms, the circle the wagons opinion prevails until it has to give up. It is the wrong way. In many states in America, for example, the doctors apologise openly at the outset. It has really reduced litigation.