Convenience store chain 7-Eleven has asked the High Court to find courts do not have the power to make common fund orders at settlement or judgment in a class action, one year after the High Court ruled common fund orders could not be made in the early part of a representative proceeding.
A court battle between the Australian Taxation Office and PricewaterhouseCoopers over the scope of legal professional privilege claimed by one of its major clients, meat processing giant JBS Australia, has hit a preliminary snag over the consulting giant’s representation of JBS, with a judge warning he might compel the company and its subsidiaries to engage independent lawyers.
A judge has given his blessing to investors to pursue a class action against financial services firm Linchpin Capital and its subsidiary Endeavour Securities, saying there was a strong possibility the failed companies’ alleged liability would be covered by an insurance policy.
The applicant in a class action against labour hire firm One Key Resources has lost a lawsuit seeking preliminary discovery of liability insurance policies to potentially add One Key Workforce to the proceeding.
Deloitte Touche Tohmatsu has succeeded in striking out claims that it made misrepresentations to Rio Tinto when it appointed a partner nearing the mandatory retirement age to a five-year project with the mining giant.
A bid by the applicant to restrict a securities class action against recycling company Sims Metal Management to shareholders who have registered to join the case has been shot down by a judge, who said the application was not in the interests of justice but “in the interests of injustice”.
Nine-owned Fairfax has denied that two Australian Financial Review articles implied that venture capitalist Dr Elaine Stead “deliberately” destroyed capital, as it seeks to significantly reduce the defamation case it faces.
The parties in a class action against AMP over changes to its buyer of last resort policy have agreed to a communications protocol making settlement offers and for releases attached to BOLR payments that require exiting financial advisers to waive their claims in the litigation.
PricewaterhouseCoopers won’t get a chance to seek summary dismissal of a lawsuit brought by a former company director who claims her notice of termination through DocuSign was invalid and that she was denied entitlements, with a judge saying the former employee had a claim and that the parties needed to “just get on with it”.
Being called a fraud is not as bad as being labelled a “terrible investor”, venture capitalist Dr Elaine Stead has said during trial in her high-profile defamation case against the Nine-owned Fairfax over two articles about her involvement in the failed investment company Blue Sky.