Ah yes, I would agree that if you have an affidavit, and you do NOT have the witness there to be cross examined on their affidavit, THEN the affidavit will get thrown out at the hearing. The solution to this is simple - ensure your witness (or you, if it is your affidavit) actually turn up to the hearing of your own court case. That is an important fact about witnesses, and the same deal applies in the higher courts - if your witness does not turn up, an affidavit will not help, since the other side cannot cross examine the witness about their affidavit, and so the affidavit gets thrown out... That's a specific circumstance you should be prepared for. Of course, if it is your own case, and your own affidavit, presumably you are going to turn up to the hearing, and so the affidavit in this case cannot be thrown out - but your opponent can of course ask to cross examine you, and then you get into the witness stand and they cross examine you. If you are not confident in the facts of your own case, or if you are not confident generally, and you can afford a barrister, it is almost certain you'll get a better outcome by paying for a barrister and lawyer. But that costs a lot of money. On Wed, Dec 04, 2019 at 05:13:31PM +1100, Sid E wrote:

Just because an affidavit can be used in an application doesn't mean it can be used within a hearing.

You can't question an affidavit, thus it allows a "witness" to deliberately leave things out and not give the other party a chance to either disprove it or add more to it during questioning

Therefore an affidavit can't be used as evidence whilst a case is actually being heard, the witness or party has to physically be there (or via video).

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