Bail conditions have been set for a former BlueScope Steel executive charged with obstructing an Australian Competition and Consumer Commission criminal cartel probe into the steel company, the first criminal charges ever brought against an individual in relation to an ACCC investigation.
The competition regulator has been probing alleged cartel conduct by steel giant Bluescope for a number of years, counsel for the company told a court Friday as it sought transcripts of the watchdog’s compulsory interviews of witnesses and asked for five months to put on a defence.
Prosecutors will not lay charges against BlueScope Steel over an alleged price-fixing conspiracy, but its former general manager of sales faces possible jail time after being charged with obstructing the ACCC’s investigation.
A judge has ordered engineering services firm CIMIC Group to pay the costs of a 2017 attempt to stay a competing class action against it, saying the bid was one the company “could never have successfully prosecuted”.
Prosecutors are weighing criminal charges over alleged cartel conduct the subject of a price-fixing case by the ACCC against BlueScope Steel and former general manager of sales Jason Ellis, a judge has revealed in rejecting a bid by the competition watchdog to suppress details of its case.
Engineering services firm CIMIC Group has attacked the pleadings in a shareholder class action against it, saying needlessly convoluted paragraphs containing a “numerically vast number of contingencies” should be struck out.