Background
Eunise Undag, a public-housing tenant, and her son, Willy Bagatcholon, commenced urgent Supreme Court proceedings seeking judicial review of several orders made during 2026 by the Civil and Administrative Tribunal of New South Wales. The underlying NCAT dispute concerned water-usage charges billed with the rent, although the precise relief sought in NCAT was not made clear to the Court.
The plaintiffs sought an interlocutory stay of an NCAT hearing listed for 16 October 2026. Mr Bagatcholon, who lived at the premises as an occupant and said he paid the household charges and supported his mother, contended that numerous NCAT decisions involved jurisdictional error. The stay application appeared principally motivated by NCAT orders removing him as a party because he was not the tenant and preventing him from representing his mother.
The Court’s Holding
Sirtes J refused the stay. Applying the requirements of a prima facie case and balance of convenience, the Court found that the judicial-review claim was unlikely to succeed. Several challenged decisions fell outside the three-month period prescribed by UCPR r 59.10 absent an extension, and the plaintiffs had not used NCAT’s internal appeal mechanism. The First Defendant was ready for the hearing, and a stay would delay Ms Undag’s own NCAT application; the Court identified no factor favoring a stay.
The Court also removed Mr Bagatcholon as a plaintiff because he was an occupant, not the tenant, and therefore had no legal relationship with Homes New South Wales that gave him standing. The Court dismissed only prayer 1 of the Notice of Motion—the request for a stay. It stood over the balance of the Notice of Motion and the proceedings before the Common Law Registrar on 19 October 2026 and reserved costs.
Key Takeaways
- A party seeking to halt tribunal proceedings must demonstrate both a sufficient likelihood of success and that the balance of convenience favors a stay.
- Available internal appeal rights and the three-month time limit for judicial-review proceedings may weigh strongly against interlocutory relief.
- Paying rent and charges or assisting a tenant does not, without more, give an occupant standing to litigate as though the occupant were the tenant.
Why It Matters
The ruling illustrates the difficulty of obtaining urgent Supreme Court intervention in ongoing NCAT proceedings where the proposed judicial-review grounds are diffuse, some challenges may be out of time, and an internal appeal route remains available.
It is a procedural ruling rather than a final determination of all relief sought: only the stay request was dismissed, while the remaining motion and proceedings were adjourned and costs were left unresolved.