Page:JT International SA v Commonwealth of Australia.pdf/51

Gummow J

Case") . However, the consequence is that close attention is required to the terms in which the various cases applying that reasoning were decided. Expressions of conclusion in one case as to the deprivation of property, and, if so, the existence of an acquisition of property, do not necessarily provide a sufficient guide to the outcome in later disputes.

In that regard something should be said respecting three cases upon the development of doctrine from which submissions in the present matters sought to draw support. They are Minister of State for the Army v Dalziel, the Banking Case and the Tasmanian Dam Case , with reference to the reasons of Deane J.

The respondent in Dalziel occupied, as a weekly tenant of Bank of New South Wales, vacant land in the Sydney central business district upon which he conducted a parking station. In pursuance of authority conferred by regulations made under the National Security Act 1939 (Cth) the Minister took possession of that land for defence use purposes as fully "as if" the Minister held an unencumbered fee simple, and for a period not to extend more than six months after war hostilities ceased.

The Minister unsuccessfully submitted that Dalziel retained his weekly tenancy and the Bank its fee simple in the land, and that there had been no taking of any recognised estate or interest in the land, and therefore there had been no "acquisition".

Latham CJ, although in dissent, did indicate that as applied to land the term "property" in s 51(xxxi) may mean both the physical subject matter in relation to which exist rights of ownership, including a range of uses, and those rights of ownership themselves.