Property insurance: defects in design and interpretation issues

The judgment of Stevenson J in the New South Wales Supreme Court in Mobis Parts Australia Pty Ltd v XL Insurance Company SE (No 7) [2017] NSWSC 1321 runs to an outrageous 1,146 paragraphs. The second half of the judgment was obiter, and much of its first half was an assessment of facts.

However, buried amongst the mass of detail there are some important principles of law. These concern primarily the effect of exclusions from property cover of defects in design, and also the operation of insurance arranged by means of a master policy that provides cover where a local policy fails to do so.