ABSTRACT

Prevention remedies tend to declare rights and/or compel performance. Courts have various remedies at their disposal to deal with prevention of performance. Attempts to create a contractual mechanism to manage preventative activity will be construed strictly against the employer. Always “intended to be rough justice”, the UK’s statutory adjudication scheme, allowing an adjudicator to make a determination within 28 days of a reference, has “spread around the world”. The “rough and ready” adjudication scheme for tenancy deposit disputes, equally, appears to be transforming the handling of disputes around deposits. As Chief Justice Wayne Martin suggests, expert determination is one possible route for fast-track dispute resolution, but it carries the risk of finality even when a determination is “idiosyncratic and extreme”. The number of adjudications appears to have levelled off according to figures produced by the Adjudication Society.