In the first instance, in the current understanding of the PRA, as it was introduced in the statute—or as in this draft—there is a bar, which is that the commissioner has heard your complaint and ruled that it is actually a violation. Therefore, you're then allowed to proceed on the civil basis for penalties.
That was done for a number of reasons. The first is that the Privacy Commissioner is the first-instance arbiter of privacy considerations, and the second is the potential for the courts to be clogged by a massive number of actions that may or may not be founded.