Coronavirus crisis: More evidence sought in Ruby Princess class action after judge rules on international passengers

A judge has made a significant ruling over whether international passengers can be included in a class action over a COVID-19 outbreak on the Ruby Princess cruise ship. Deliberations over documents are continuing as Carnival cruise liners fight a class action over the deadly outbreak. Hundreds of passengers contracted the virus after the outbreak on the ship which left Sydney on March 8, 2020 and returned on March 19 after sailing through New Zealand. The class action was filed by Shine Lawyers on behalf of 2700 passengers, relatives and executors in July 2020, sparked by Susan Karpik against Carnival PLC and Princess Cruise Lines Ltd, the owner and operator of the boat. It centres around more than 700 cases of COVID-19 and 28 deaths linked to the cruise ship. The cruise liner is being sued for negligence for three alleged breaches of its duty of care to passengers including letting the voyage proceed despite being aware of the COVID-19 outbreak, failing to protect passengers from contracting the virus on-board, and failing to warn passengers of the risk of contracting the virus while on the boat. Carnival is also accused of two breaches of the Australian Consumer Law including failure to provide a “safe, relaxing and pleasurable” holiday as advertised and false, misleading and deceptive conduct by advertising the holiday as above. During a hearing in the Federal Court on Wednesday, counsel for Ms Karpik and the cruise liner deliberated over common questions and documents ahead of the trial next year. David McLure SC on behalf of the cruise liner told the court they are seeking more evidence from parties involved as the trial will need to take into account the law of England and the general maritime law of the United States. “We will need to receive evidence from the parties about what the law is in relation to them,” he said. Mr McLure said the norms under the other systems of law are “expressed differently”. “I am not pretending that they are so radically different that conceptually an Australian lawyer would be unable to compare them relevantly to what the Civil Liability Act says,” he said. Mr McLure argued that questions consisting of what services were offered to patients did not need to be asked at trial as they differed between customers. “There is an allegation the services offered comprised medical services but I don’t think Ms Karpik alleged medical services were provided to her while she was a passenger,” he said. Ian Pike SC, representing the group, said whether she took up the medical services was “neither here nor there”. The hearing comes after Justice Angus Stewart ruled passengers from the United States and United Kingdom could be included in the class action. The Federal Court denied the application by the cruise liner to block overseas passengers from joining the class action after failing to successfully argue they should be excluded as they signed up to different terms and conditions when buying tickets. Of the 2651 passengers who paid for their tickets onto the boat, 696 bought tickets on US terms and conditions and 159 on UK terms and conditions. The remainder bought the tickets with Australian terms and conditions. The US terms and conditions include a class action waiver clause. Justice Stewart ruled it wasn’t necessary or appropriate to determine the law applicable to the US and UK sub groups’ negligence claims. The hearing will return before Justice Steward in June 2022.