A court has directed a senior barrister acting in a $650 million lawsuit against Mercedes-Benz to “tear up” a letter his instructing solicitors sent concerning the judge’s ownership of a Mercedes vehicle, and said he was “surprised” the counsel signed off on it.
Mercedes can’t access communications between Australia’s peak body for car dealers and a Labor senator to use in its defence of a $650 million lawsuit over its decision to move to a fixed-price agency model.
Officials at the Mercedes-Benz Australia head office referred to car dealers as “baby piglets” in internal communications and threatened and bullied the retailers, a trial court has been told in a $650 million lawsuit over the car maker’s decision to move to a fixed-price agency model.
Slater & Gordon has defeated Shine Lawyers in a contest to run a shareholder class action against Beach Energy, with a judge finding Shine’s tiered contingency fee arrangement was “mere window dressing”.
A judge has approved a $20 million settlement in a sham contracting class action accusing telco contractor BSA Limited of misclassifying its workforce of technicians as independent contractors.
Deloitte has won its bid to keep confidential documents away from the funder backing a consolidated shareholder class against food company Noumi which alleges the auditor was complicit in misleading the market.
A fight over a global privilege claim by Noumi has been foreshadowed in a consolidated shareholder class action against the food company, formerly Freedom Foods.
A judge overseeing the settlement approval of an underpayments class action against telco contractor BSA has questioned whether litigation funders should receive commissions lower than the market rate for running employment class actions.
Telco contractor BSA has won a bid to ringfence a $13 million capital raising from a $20 million settlement reached with group members in a Shine Lawyers-led class action accusing the company of misclassifying its workforce of technicians as independent contractors.
A judge who will oversee an upcoming hearing for approval of a $20 million settlement in a class action against Optus contractor BSA has urged the parties to sever the funder’s commission and costs from the settlement to avoid delays in distribution to group members.