Just when you thought there were no more seats left on the tort reform bandwagon, another chief justice has climbed aboard.

Victorian Chief Justice Marilyn Warren has criticised the drop in court lodgements in Victoria and NSW, saying the decline “should be carefully analysed and considered because it might be that there are genuine and appropriate litigants out there who should be dealt with differently”.

Lodgements in the Victorian County Court dropped 30% between 2002 and last year – from 7999 in 2002/03 to 5488 in 2004/05. In the NSW District Court the number of similar lodgements dropped from 8418 to 7207.

Chief Justice Warren first voiced her disquiet at the impact of the tort reforms while speaking at an Insurance Council of Australia luncheon in November 2004. She was in good company: NSW Chief Justice Jim Spigelman had already expressed his concerns.

Insurance Council of Australia Executive Director Alan Mason warned recently that to return to the “bad old days of ‘when something happens to me, someone else must pay’” is wrong.