The NSW Supreme Court has ruled against the operators of two Queensland dams as well as the state government, finding they were vicariously liable for the negligence of flood engineers in the 2011 Southeast Queensland floods that destroyed over 2,000 homes.
Embattled banking giant Westpac may be seeking to limit its potential liability in any shareholder class actions it may face in the wake of AUSTRAC’s lawsuit alleging 23 million breaches of anti-money laundering and counter-terrorism financing laws, with the bank offering to refund some of those that purchased shares as part of a $2.5 billion capital raising.
Plaintiffs lawyers running class actions in Victoria will be free to charge contingency fees under new legislation introduced by the Labor government this week, a move that will see a boost in class actions brought in the state and has prompted calls for the Federal Government to follow suit.
The ACCC has taken its long-running battle over access fees at the Port of Newcastle to the Federal Court, challenging a re-arbitration decision that overturned its finding that the fees should be cut by 20 per cent.
The funders behind two shareholder class actions against online fashion retailer Surfstitch Group will seek a commission of up to 30 per cent while the law firms that brought the cases will ask for approval of up to $6 million in legal fees during an upcoming settlement approval hearing, which also puts the fate of a deed of company arrangement that saved the company from liquidation on the line.
Eight years after floods in Southeast Queensland destroyed more than 2,000 homes, a judge will deliver his ruling in two class actions seeking a record $1 billion in damages, and the decision could well come down to which of two conflicting flood modeling reports the judge sides with.
The Commonwealth Bank of Australia’s insurance division, CommInsure, has been fined $700,000 for breaching insurance hawking laws in Australia’s first post-Royal Commission criminal conviction, dodging a maximum fine of over $1.8 million through an early guilty plea and cooperation with ASIC.
Accounting giant Deloitte Touche Tohmatsu will not face cross claims over the collapse of failed retailer Dick Smith when a hearing of three shareholder class actions kicks off in three months.
The litigation funder financing the second of two recently settled shareholder class actions against Murray Goulburn will face similar scrutiny over its commission as the funder behind the first action.
Infant food maker Bellamy’s has agreed to pay $49.7 million to settle two shareholder class actions alleging the company misled investors in 2016 about its China growth strategy and declining infant formula market share in Australia.
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